President Biden took the border fight directly to former President Donald J. Trump on Tuesday, blaming his predecessor and putative challenger for torpedoing a bipartisan immigration agreement out of crass politics at the expense of national security.
Weighing in forcefully after months of largely staying out of the fray, Mr. Biden called on congressional Republicans to show some spine and stand up to Mr. Trump. But he effectively acknowledged that the deal negotiated over several months was doomed and vowed to make it a campaign issue against the opposition.
All indications are this bill wont even move forward to the Senate floor, Mr. Biden said in a speech televised from the White House. Why? A simple reason. Donald Trump. Because Donald Trump thinks this is bad for him politically.
The president said that Mr. Trump would rather weaponize this issue than actually solve it and has leaned on Republicans to block it. It looks like theyre caving, he added. Frankly, they owe it to the American people to show some spine and do what they know to be right.
The decision by Republicans to reject a bipartisan border deal that they had previously demanded not only paralyzed the immigration debate but also imperiled security assistance for Ukraine and Israel attached to the $118 billion measure, closing off what had been seen as the best remaining avenue to aid embattled American allies.
The deadlock raised questions about whether Congress would be able to salvage the emergency aid package and, if so, how. Speaker Mike Johnson sought to advance aid to Israel alone by pushing a separate $17.6 billion measure. But it ran into strong resistance from hard-right Republicans, as well as Democrats and Mr. Biden, who threatened a veto, and failed to garner the two-thirds vote needed for passage on Tuesday evening.
The result was a vivid portrait of congressional dysfunction. Rather than pursue the border crackdown they had once sought, Republicans in the House spent the day trying and failing to impeach Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the homeland security secretary, on charges that he willfully refused to enforce border laws. With even a few Republicans calling the move a stunt, Mr. Johnson could not muster a majority for impeachment in an embarrassing setback.
The disarray and discord on Capitol Hill, punctuated by the presidents sharp speech at the White House, underscored how much this years presidential election has already come to shape the debate in Washington nine months before the vote. In effect, two presidents, one incumbent and one former, are clashing over some of the most pressing issues facing the United States, each vying in a way to set the direction for the country even before voters make their choice in November.
Mr. Biden, who for most of his presidency has avoided even using Mr. Trumps name, referring to him only as the former guy or other elliptical phrases, has in recent weeks seemed increasingly eager to confront the former president more directly, culminating in Tuesdays speech.
The president privately complained that the initial draft of the address was not pointed enough in attacking Mr. Trump and wanted it toughened, according to a senior administration official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. He and aides then tested out tougher phrases shortly before he went before cameras to deliver it more than an hour after originally scheduled.
I understand the former president is desperately trying to stop this bill because hes not interested in solving the border problem, Mr. Biden said. He wants a political issue to run against me on.
Republicans have to decide, he added. Who do they serve? Donald Trump or the American people?
He called the bipartisan agreement a win for America because it combines the most fair, humane reforms to immigration law and the toughest set of reforms to secure the border at a time of record illegal migration. To buttress his point, he cited support from institutions normally favorable to Republicans, including The Wall Street Journals editorial page, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Border Patrol Council, a union that endorsed Mr. Trump in 2016 and 2020.
If this bill fails, I want to be absolutely clear about something, Mr. Biden said. The American people are going to know why it failed. Ill be taking this issue to the country.
The reason, he said, is Republican fear of their front-runner. Theyre afraid of Donald Trump, Mr. Biden said. Every day between now and November, the American people are going to know that the only reason the border is not secure is Donald Trump and his MAGA Republican friends.
The president is coming late to the debate. While he has supported the bipartisan negotiations, he has largely kept away from them personally and not waged a high-profile public fight for a deal. Aides said he wanted to avoid complicating the talks by making them about him. But some Democrats were frustrated that he had not taken a more prominent role until now.
The presidents speech was in part aimed at some Democrats who have already criticized provisions in the border bill that would tighten rules for migrants to gain asylum in the United States. If fellow Democrats vote against the measure, it could make it more difficult for Mr. Biden to frame his party as the one seeking solutions in the face of Republican intransigence.
Mr. Trump fired back at Mr. Biden after the presidents speech. America does not need a border bill that does nothing to deter illegal immigration, Karoline Leavitt, a spokeswoman for Mr. Trump, said in a statement. We need a president who will use his executive authority to shut the border down. Joe Biden clearly refuses to do that, but President Trump will get it done on day one.
Republicans have fallen in line behind Mr. Trump, including some who initially favored the bill, which includes measures to toughen border security but none of the provisions historically insisted on by Democrats offering a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants already in the country or protecting those previously brought in as children.
The legislation would make it harder for migrants to claim asylum and speed up processing of their cases, which can now take years. It would also expand federal detention centers, enable hiring of more asylum officers and border agents, and call for the border to be effectively shut down when the number of encounters with migrants making illegal crossings reaches an average of 5,000 a day. Critics on the right complained that it nonetheless did not go far enough.
Joe Biden will never enforce any new law and refuses to use the tools he already has today to end this crisis, Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming, the No. 3 Republican, said on Tuesday. I cannot vote for this bill. Americans will turn to the upcoming election to end the border crisis.
Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and the minority leader, who was initially supportive of the deal, told reporters at a news conference that his conference had a very robust discussion about whether or not this product could ever become law and was influenced by Mr. Johnsons declaration that it would be dead on arrival in the House.
Its been made pretty clear to us by the speaker that it will not become law, Mr. McConnell said. Asked whether he had misread his fellow Republicans, Mr. McConnell said: I followed the instructions of my conference who were insistent that we tackle this in October. It is actually our side that wanted to tackle the border issue. We started it. Obviously with a Democratic president and a Democratic Senate, our negotiators had to deal with them.
Mr. Johnson cheered the Senate Republican reversal over the border deal. It may be on life support in the Senate, he told reporters. We welcome that development.
Mr. Biden argued that Republicans were not just sacrificing a border compromise, but also abandoning Ukraine during its war against President Vladimir V. Putins Russia.
We cant walk away now, he said, wearing a striped tie with the blue and yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag. Thats what Putins betting on. Supporting this bill is standing up to Putin. Opposing this bill is playing into his hands.
The grim reality, however, was that the once-strong bipartisan consensus for aid to Ukraine was fraying. In an unusual letter, a group of U.S. ambassadors stationed in the Indo-Pacific region urged congressional leaders on Monday to secure passage of the legislation, which also includes aid to Taiwan, saying that Americas credibility with its strategic partners was on the line.
For months, many in the White House and abroad had followed conventional wisdom and assumed that the combined will of a handful of like-minded congressional leaders, national security committee chairs and the president would be enough to push new funding to Ukraine across the finish line.
But a restive G.O.P. voter base is dead set against sending another round of taxpayer money to Ukraine, and rank-and-file Republicans, especially in the slim-majority House, have flexed their muscles to oppose any real movement.
After reports indicated there was no clear path ahead for Congress to approve aid to Ukraine and Israel on Tuesday morning, Representative Matt Gaetz, Republican of Florida and a Trump ally, was exultant on social media. He cited a line from the film Apocalypse Now: I love the smell of napalm in the morning!
Reporting was contributed by Katie Rogers, Erica L. Green, Carl Hulse, Karoun Demirjian , Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Michael D. Shear.
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Border Security: Biden Blames Trump for Faltering Effort to Address Immigration and Ukraine Aid - The New York Times