The White House statement comes after a week of frantic negotiations in the Senate.

The White House statement comes after a week of frantic negotiations in the Senate.

President Joe Biden on Friday urged Congress to pass a bipartisan bill to address the immigration crisis at the nation’s southern border, saying he would shut down the border the day the bill became law.

“What’s been negotiated would — if passed into law — be the toughest and fairest set of reforms to secure the border we’ve ever had in our country,” Biden said in a statement. “It would give me, as President, a new emergency authority to shut down the border when it becomes overwhelmed. And if given that authority, I would use it the day I sign the bill into law.”

Biden’s Friday evening statement resembles a ramping up in rhetoric for the administration, placing the president philosophically in the camp arguing that the border may hit a point where closure is needed. The White House’s decision to have Biden weigh in also speaks to the delicate nature of the dealmaking, and the urgency facing his administration to take action on the border — particularly during an election year, when Republicans have used the issue to rally their base.

The president is also daring Republicans to reject the deal as it faces a make-or-break moment amid GOP fissures.

  • circuscritic@lemmy.ca
    1422·
    10 months ago

    … spoken like someone who has never actually spent time around the border for any real period of time.

    Just because the GOP is wrong in how they want to approach the issue, doesn’t mean the problems aren’t real.

      • circuscritic@lemmy.ca
        1223·
        10 months ago

        What? 40 years ago? Because I find it pretty absurd that anyone who’s spent anytime there since even the Obama administration, would not understand, or have witnessed, the fact that there has been a consistent humanitarian crisis at the border for quite some time.

        It ebbs and flows, sure, but it’s definitely been flowing pretty heavy for many years straight now.

          • circuscritic@lemmy.ca
            1118·
            10 months ago

            Right, like I said, you don’t live anywhere near the southwest. Because when the issue doesn’t get press coverage, it’s not happening in your version of reality.

            It’s been year-round issue for quite some time, but it only gets national coverage around elections for obvious reasons.

            • APassenger@lemmy.world
              43·
              10 months ago

              If your reality does not conform to the desired lemmy narrative, it is rejected with down votes. Your politics won’t matter, it’s not the truth that’s desired.

              Sounds weird, but on this topic and a few others, that’s how it works. It’s uncanny.

              Sorry people are rejecting the message.

              • circuscritic@lemmy.ca
                21·
                10 months ago

                Not sure about any “Lemmy narrative”, more like certain boards have a dominant demographic or beliefs. Clearly, the group here hasn’t lived anywhere near the southern border, or at least not in the past decade.

                I’m not even talking politics, I just mean the objective fact that there is, and has been, a humanitarian crisis there, and it will still be there after the election. But, it’ll go back to being out of sight, out of mind, for them, therefore it will cease to exist.

                Politics has to play a part in how it’s addressed, but it shouldn’t be used to decide if it’s real, or not. I realize you know that, this is more for the benefit of anyone else who stumbles this far down the thread.