President Biden refused to commit to using executive action to turn away migrants seeking to enter the US at the southern border, arguing in an interview that aired Tuesday that he’s unsure whether he has that power.
In February, amid an expected surge in illegal border crossings, Biden, 81, had reportedly been mulling sweeping executive action that would beef up asylum standards and shut down the border when illegal crossings exceeded a certain threshold – but he never followed through.
“Well, I suggested that,” Biden told Univision’s Enrique Acevedo when asked about a potential executive order on immigration and border security.
“We’re examining whether or not I have that power,” he added.
The president noted that he “would have that power” – to shut down the border – under the ill-fated Senate bipartisan border deal that was strongly opposed by several Republicans earlier this year.
“When the border has over 5,000 people a day trying to cross … you can’t manage it, slow it up,” Biden said, explaining the importance of having the mechanism at his disposal.
“There’s no guarantee that I have that power all by myself without legislation. And some have suggested I should just go ahead and try it. And if I get shut down by the court, I get shut down by the court. But we’re trying to work that, work through that right now,” he said of the current state of potential executive action.
Politico reported last month that the White House put a potential executive order on immigration on the back burner because of “less intense” media coverage of the migrant crisis and a drop in migrant encounters from the levels seen late last year.
More than 7 million migrants have been encountered by US Customs and Border Protection agents along the southern border since Biden took office in 2021, CBP data shows, including 961,537 in the current fiscal year.
CBP reported 189,922 attempted crossings in February, a figure that eclipses the prior February record of 166,010 encounters, set in 2022, and the 156,000 attempted crossings during the same month last year.
The nearly 302,000 attempted crossings in December 2023 was the highest monthly total on record.
