The mainstream media paid a lot of attention on Monday to a new, eye-opening claim made by White House sources, that President Joe Biden, was finally considering executive action to quell the Biden Border Crisis.
As Axios noted at the time, Biden had considered “an executive order which would drastically stop the record flow of migrants to the Southwest”.
They also said that “this could happen two weeks before the State of the Union address”, allowing Biden to claim he had taken action, while Republicans only talked.
Politico reported two days later that Biden “was considering a string new executive actions and Federal regulations,” which “would represent a sweeping new approach for a problem that has stymied the White House.”
My colleague noted that the news “undermines the claims made in the last few weeks that Biden sat eagerly waiting for Congress to pass legislation before he finally took action.”
The Biden administration’s “hands-tied” statement and alternatively that “there was no border crisis” was also undermined.
Biden is aware that it’s election season and the majority of voters don’t have much time left for him to act. To save face, Biden is now thinking about Doing Something ™, which he had previously stated that he didn’t have the authority to do.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La, was not surprised by the reports that Biden might take some action in the election year to improve on Republicans. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La) released a statement on Thursday afternoon in which he took off his gloves.
Johnson wrote that Biden was not fooling the voters he is trying to convince, and urged him to implement “critical reforms”, including the former president Donald Trump’s policy of “Remain in Mexico”.
Since the beginning of his tenure, House Republicans have raised the alarm over the disastrous effects of President Biden’s open-border policies. I wrote to President Biden last year to urge him to take immediate action. He has so far ignored both my demands and those of the mayors of big cities, the governors of border states, and even the American people.
In an election year after the president surrendered the borders to cartels and drug smugglers after tens of thousands of Americans tragically died from fentanyl, after unaccompanied minors, young people, and other vulnerable individuals have been victims of human trafficking and after millions of illegal aliens were scattered throughout the country by the Biden Administration, the President seems to be interested in making a change, using the legal authority he previously claimed didn’t exist.
Americans no longer trust this president and will not be fooled by election-year gimmicks that do not secure the border. They will not forget either that this President caused the catastrophe and has, up until now, refused to use executive power to fix it.
These reports show how blatantly and deliberately President Biden misled his public by claiming he did everything he could to secure the border. Specifically, President Biden’s alleged wish to invoke Section 212 (f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act is very telling. The White House has been denying this for months.
If these reports are accurate and the President is serious about taking action, then he should change more than just asylum policy. He should start by reintroducing the “Remain in Mexico”, and end the abuse of the parole system under his administration, as well as other important reforms.
My statement regarding President Biden finally admitting he has the authority to address the border catastrophe he has created: pic.twitter.com/GUWeeb05pW
— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) February 22, 2024
In an especially delicious twist, Biden’s power to close the border (if that’s what he decides to do) comes in part from the Trump-era border cases (Trump v. Hawaii), which went all the way to the Supreme Court. According to former immigration judge Matt O’Brien’s explanation, the majority of the court ruled that Trump was authorized, under Section 1182 (f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act Section 1182(f), “to temporarily suspend admission of certain categories of aliens” into the United States.
Ironically, Biden is considering the same types of actions he will criticize Trump for if they were in the opposite roles. Biden can do this in part because Trump fought back during his administration against Democrat critics like Biden and their lawsuits, ensuring that he and future Presidents would be able to have the power.
This stuff is impossible to make up.
