The Democratic Revolt against Biden’s Border Policies

By Noah Rothman

Friday, September 01, 2023

 

Fate has a sense of humor. Or, at least, it has a habit of exposing in humorous ways the rank opportunism of Joe Biden’s increasingly hard-pressed defenders.

 

“The president has done more to secure the border, to deal with this issue of immigration, than anybody else,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre claimed. “He really has!” she added for emphasis, perhaps intuiting that the words that just escaped her mouth would not age well. And lo, less than 24 hours later, Jean-Pierre’s claim reached its sell-by date.

 

According to the preliminary data published in the Washington Post, the number of migrant families streaming across America’s border with Mexico surged to record levels in August. “The U.S. Border Patrol arrested at least 91,000 migrants who crossed as part of a family group in August, exceeding the prior one-month record of 84,486 set in May 2019,” the Post reported. “The latest Customs and Border Protection data show more than 50,000 migrants were processed in August at U.S. border crossings,” the dispatch continued. “That increased the total number of migrants encountered by CBP at the southern border in August—at legal crossings or elsewhere—to about 230,000, the highest one-month total this calendar year.”

 

It’s possible that Jean-Pierre’s facially laughable claim wasn’t aimed at anyone predisposed to debunk it. It’s more likely her intended audience was the Democratic governors, mayors, and lawmakers who are becoming increasingly vocal about their frustration with the Biden administration’s border and immigration policies.

 

This week, New Jersey governor Phil Murphy became the latest prominent Democrat to cast aspersions — albeit obliquely — on the Biden administration’s handling of immigration. “You need scale, enormous amount of federal support, resources that go beyond anything that we can afford,” Murphy said when asked if his state’s “sanctuary” policies would be applicable if the Biden White House tried to transfer migrants in New York City to temporary facilities in Atlantic City. “Putting everything else aside, I just don’t see it. I would suspect that that will continue to be the case.”

 

Murphy joins a growing cast of Democratic officials who have responded to the strain imposed on their constituents as a result of the influx of illegal migrants over the course of the Biden administration. Democratic mayors of New York City, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles have all protested against the situation and even taken legal action to avoid having to shelter a growing population of illegal residents.

 

“This is a national issue that demands a national response,” said Massachusetts governor Maura Healey this week in her announcement that a state of emergency had been declared in response to the migrant surge. New York governor Kathy Hochul and New York City mayor Eric Adams are locked in a political struggle over what to do with the city’s unsustainable number of migrants: keep them in the city or relocate them to the suburbs or elsewhere upstate? Neither has pulled many punches when criticizing Washington for putting them in their unenviable position.

 

Indeed, for as much as Democratic leaders complain when Republican governors relocate a fraction of their migrant populations to more hospitable Democrat-led urban enclaves — what has turned out to be an illuminating public-relations coup — Colorado governor Jared Polis demonstrated the efficacy of Republicans’ efforts when he went and did the same thing himself. Illinois governor J. B. Pritzker and California governor Gavin Newsom have both sought additional federal resources to deal with the influx — a request that, at the very least, betrays the falsity of Jean-Pierre’s boast.

 

Given the demands on partisan political actors today, this is about as close to a revolt from within the president’s own party as we’re likely to get. Joe Biden’s immigration policies are untenable, as his fellow Democrats indicate with increasing vehemence. Their protests grow louder by the day.