Biden spoke after U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced that about 158,000 immigrants were apprehended in August, bringing the 11-month tally so far for fiscal 2022 to more than 2.15 million.
Biden invoked “communism” despite the fact that just 35% of immigrants in August left the authoritarian socialist governments of Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela.
“There are fewer immigrants from Central America and from Mexico. This is a completely different circumstance,” Biden said at the White House when a reporter asked why “the border [is] more shocked under your watch.’
“What I’m watching now is Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua,” Biden asserted. “And to be able to send them back to those states is not reasonable.”
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre also attributed the influx of immigrants to “communism” — rather than “pull” factors related to Biden’s looser border policies.
“These people are escaping communism,” Jean-Pierre said. “The fall of authoritarian regimes in Venezuela, as well as Nicaragua and Cuba, is creating a new migration challenge across the Western Hemisphere. So what we’re seeing is a new pattern.”
President Joe Biden has defended the crisis at the US-Mexico border, saying immigrants are fleeing communism. AP/Andrew HarnikBiden thinks it doesn’t make sense to send immigrants back, even as big cities struggle to meet the demands of new arrivals. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez
“Meanwhile, immigration from Mexico and northern Central America has declined for three consecutive months and has almost halved, and we’ve seen growth with Nicaragua, Venezuela and Cuba increase by 121 percent,” he told reporters.
The August figures brought the number of failures at the US-Mexico border to more than 2 million for the first fiscal year on record. In fiscal 2021, there were about 1.7 million border arrivals, up from about 460,000 in 2020 and 980,000 in 2019.
Figures for fiscal 2022 show that immigrants from Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela are indeed more numerous, but still only a fraction of the increase at the border.
In the past 11 months, about 154,000 Venezuelans, 195,000 Cubans and 146,000 Nicaraguans have found themselves at the southwestern border, cumulatively accounting for less than 23 percent of the 2.15 million migrants so far in fiscal 2022 figures.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre criticized Republicans for not agreeing to the administration’s calls for immigration reform.AP/Andrew Harnik “There are fewer immigrants coming from Central America and from Mexico. This is a completely different circumstance,” Biden said.Getty Images/Jordan Vonderhaar
Removing all immigrants from the three socialist countries from the tallies, there were 1.43 million immigrants at the border in the first 11 months of fiscal 2021 and 1.66 million in the first 11 months of fiscal 2022 — meaning the border crisis worsened slightly further and without factoring in the hit to immigrants from those nations.
Republicans blame Biden’s policies, including his decision to end the Trump administration’s “Remain in Mexico” policy that required asylum seekers at the US-Mexico border to remain in Mexico while US courts evaluated their claims of persecution .
Biden has also relaxed a COVID-19 pandemic policy that Trump officials are using to quickly deport most people who have crossed the border illegally.
A Texas lawmaker has thrown cold water on the White House alleging that a wave of immigrants coming from Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua is responsible for the increase, not Biden’s lax policies.
“I understand what (Biden) is saying, but at the end of the day it’s because our borders are open and we’re allowing it to continue and that’s why they’re coming. These people have had the same problem forever. The only thing that has changed is the man in charge,” Val Verde County Commission Robert Beau Nettleton told The Post.
He said many immigrants simply abuse the asylum system to enter the US.
“The asylum process is not about sending 20,000 (people) across the river at once and saying I want asylum. This is not the process. The process is to walk into a port of entry and ask for asylum or do it at an embassy in your home country,” Nettleton said.
“We need to get our immigration system under control. We have to close the borders,” he warned.
During the year about 154,000 Venezuelans, 195,000 Cubans and 146,000 Nicaraguans were stopped at the southwest border.AP/Gregory Bull
Republicans have long argued that repealing Biden’s immigration policies put in place by former President Donald Trump was tantamount to putting up welcome signs at the border.
Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said the president “lied” to the American people about border security and pointed out that his policies created the conditions at the border that led to the immigration crisis.
“Democracy depends on the mutual acceptance of rules, norms and institutions. President Biden’s policy on the southern border has undermined this principle. He completely opened the southern border and looked the American people in the eye and lied and said the border is closed,” Kennedy told Fox News on Tuesday.
Jean-Pierre acknowledged the historic number of migrant encounters at the southern border, but said those without a legal reason to enter the US were being turned away before going on to criticize Republicans for not agreeing to the administration’s calls for immigration reform, claiming the changes are needed to fix a system destroyed by the Trump administration.
“We have solutions. We have brought solutions on the first day of this administration. The president has been very clear that he has put forward a comprehensive immigration bill,” he said.
“And what we’d like to see is for Republicans to decide to come to the table and help us deal with a really systemic problem that we’ve seen for decades with our immigration system, which by the way has been mismanaged and decimated by the last administration.” , said Jean-Pierre.
He went on to decried as a “political stunt” Florida Gov. Ron DeSandis’ migrants flying from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard last week to demonstrate the consequences of the Biden administration’s lax border policies.
Some politicians disagree with Biden’s approach and believe he is dismantling immigration policies. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez
The White House is also monitoring reports that Republican De Sandys is sending a planeload of immigrants to the president’s Delaware vacation home.
Nettleton said the same pattern of immigration will continue until the Biden administration does something to end it.
“This will continue as long as we have the administration that we have. Nothing is going to change because there is no desire to stop it. Until you start deporting everyone who crossed the river, then at that point it will stop,” he said.
