What Is Biden Thinking on Immigration?

By Charles C. W. Cooke

Monday, June 17, 2024

 

Excluding from consideration any conspiratorial explanations for the proposition, the news that President Biden intends imminently to “announce one of the largest immigration relief programs in recent history” must have left even the most weather-beaten of political observers scratching their heads in astonishment. This, one need not be reminded, is an election year. Immigration remains one of Biden’s most conspicuous weak spots. And he is running against Donald Trump, the country’s leading immigration hawk. Might we conclude from this dimwitted decision that the White House policy team has taken a liking to magic mushrooms?

 

In its report on the topic, CBS nonchalantly observed that the plan would involve “removing an obstacle in U.S. law” — which, if his prior lawlessness is any guide, is almost certainly a euphemism for “usurping the authority of Congress.” And to what end? To make himself even more unpopular than he already is? So pronounced has been President Biden’s abdication of responsibility at the Southern border that solid majorities of Americans have come to support mass deportations in response. Last week, CBS found that 62 percent of registered voters favor “a new national program to deport all undocumented immigrants currently living in the U.S. illegally.” That support is broad-based. Independents back the idea 60–40; Hispanics, 53–47; men, 66–34; women, 58–42; voters without college degrees, 74–26; voters with college degrees, 58–42.

 

The cause of this shift ought to be obvious: The citizenry has watched in anger as President Biden first opened up the border and then, having been roundly criticized for doing so, steadfastly refused to change course. For almost his entire tenure, Biden’s approval rating on immigration has been catastrophically low. To address this, he has denied, lied, obfuscated, and played politics, while doing nothing of consequence to fix the problem. Perhaps if the possibility of mass deportations were to be raised in another context, the public would strike a more permissive note. But right now, in these circumstances? Voters want something done — and they want it done fast.

 

When, in the next few weeks, Biden formally adumbrates his proposal, he will undoubtedly stress that the illegal immigrants to which it applies are the sympathetic ones. And when he does, nobody listening will much care, for Biden now faces the same problem with immigration as he does with inflation: Having been blamed for the disease, he cannot expect to be invited to provide the remedy. A president whom voters trusted on this issue might be allowed to draw distinctions between different sorts of illegal immigrants. From Biden, such delineations will ring hollow. By dint of his actions and of his rhetoric, President Biden has routinely signaled to the American public that he does not believe that any type of enforcement is legitimate or worthwhile. In return, Americans have signaled that they, too, can flatten the question until there is nothing left. If, as it has been for nearly three years, the government’s policy is to be “come in!” then the policy of the public is to be “get out.” Sir Isaac Newton, call your office.

 

Equally as baffling as his willful recrudescence is that President Biden seems earnestly to believe that he is going to get away with it. At each and every stage of this saga, the White House has exhibited a revolting, self-satisfied smugness, and, true to form, this late push represents no exception to that rule. At first, the administration’s line was that there was no crisis at all; then it was that the crisis existed, but that it was the Republicans’ fault for not having given the president more power; then, in an obvious panic, it was that Biden had the power after all, and, by gum, he intended to use it; and, finally, it was that, having ticked the “cares about the border” box, it was time to move on to “relief.” That Biden’s approval rating in this realm is sitting at around 32 percent — and, indeed, that it has been there for more than a year — has never seemed to matter. From the beginning, this has been seen as a debating game or a velleity, rather than as a tangible problem to solve. If, in November, Biden loses the election to Donald Trump, the first question that his bereaved team ought to ask itself is, “Really, what the hell were we doing on immigration?”