HEBRON, Kentucky — President Joe Biden said Wednesday he planned to visit the US-Mexico border — his first since taking office — as part of his meeting next week in Mexico City with the leaders of Mexico and the United States. Canada.
“That’s my intent, we’re working out the details now,” Biden told reporters on a trip to Kentucky.
This border has led to a massive increase in the number of migrants, even as US public health law remains in effect, allowing US authorities to deny many people seeking asylum in the United States. Republican leaders have criticized the president for what they say is an ineffective border security policy and wonder why he hasn’t been there yet.
Immigration will be one of the main talking points at the summit on Monday and Tuesday, when Biden and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will be hosted by Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador.
Early in his term, Biden put Vice President Kamala Harris in charge of White House efforts to address the border migration challenge and work with Central American countries to address the root causes of the problem. She traveled to El Paso, Texas in June 2021, and was criticized for choosing a location that was too far from the epicenter of border crossings straining federal resources.
For now, the Supreme Court has upheld the Trump-era restrictions, often known as Title 42 in reference to a 1944 public health law, after Biden moved to stop them. end and that the Republicans filed a lawsuit in response. Title 42 was invoked to prevent the spread of COVID-19, but there has always been criticism that the restrictions were used as a pretext by then-President Donald Trump to seal off the border.
The Biden administration has yet to outline systemic changes to handle the expected influx of migrants should restrictions end. In Congress, a bipartisan immigration bill was buried shortly before Republicans took control of the House.
Biden made his comments on the upcoming visit during a Kentucky stop at a highway bridge that receives federal dollars under the bipartisan infrastructure bill.
Trump has visited the US side of the border several times as president, including a trip to McAllen, Texas, where he claimed Mexico would pay for the border wall.
American taxpayers ultimately paid the cost. Mexican leaders had flatly rejected the idea when Trump pushed for it early on. “NO,” tweeted Enrique Peña Nieto, then President of Mexico, in May 2018. “Mexico will NEVER pay for a wall. Not now, never. Sincerely, Mexico (all of us).”
___
Long reported from Washington.
Not all news on the site expresses the site’s point of view, but we automatically transmit and translate this news through programmatic technology on the site and not from a human editor.
