“Civil rights advocates and members of Congress are outraged by these policies because they violate refugee law and will unleash more suffering at the border, disparately harming black, brown and indigenous asylum seekers,” said Heidi Altman, national policy director at the Immigrant Justice Center, a liberal human rights group. , He said on Twitter. “The admin needs to stop deflecting, *listen* & reverse.”
Mr. Criticism from the same groups that have vehemently opposed Mr. Trump’s policies. It has angered Biden and his aides, who say the comparison is unfair and inaccurate.
“Well, obviously, we take a different view,” said John F. Kirby said, noting the demand to balance the need for “legal pathways to entry” with “ensuring that illegal migration is controlled.”
Mr. Kirby and other White House officials, including the leaders of San Antonio, Chicago, Washington and New York, and several mayors who have struggled with the influx of immigrants to their cities, joined Mr. They praised Biden’s plans.
But as the president’s aides struggled to deflect criticism from Democrats and human rights groups, they braced for months of renewed attacks by Republicans who accused the administration of being too weak at the border. In Commentary published prior to the President’s visitSenator Shelley Moore Capito, Republican of West Virginia, criticized Mr.
“The president’s neglect of a visit to the southern border — at a time when we are facing record levels of illegal crossings and a clear crisis — is tantamount to our commander in chief not visiting the Pentagon during a military operation,” he wrote. “It checks a box, but it doesn’t begin to solve the problems,” he said of his move to El Paso.
The question of what to do along the southern border in places like El Paso has drawn Mr. Trump to meetings with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Biden will be at the center of discussions during the visit.
