White House press Secretary Jen Psaki on Tuesday declined to address the immigration crisis at the border, suggesting it was the Department of Homeland Security, and not President Joe Biden’s administration, that should be responsible for handling the issue.
The moment: Psaki, speaking to reporters at a news conference, refused to confirm reports that more than 3,200 children are being detained at the border daily and avoided characterizing the immigration surge as a “crisis.”
- “Look, I don’t think we need to sit here and put new labels on what we have already conveyed is challenging, what we have conveyed is a top priority for the president, what our policy teams are working on every single day,” she said.
- When a reporter pushed back by saying the Department of Homeland Security would not confirm the numbers cited by Psaki, Biden’s spokeswoman said, “Well, I would encourage you to go back to them and ask them again. We’re not going to confirm them from the White House. It’s not our program; it’s the Department of Homeland Security’s.”
The reaction: Critics of the Biden administration argued that the Department of Homeland Security is part of the executive branch, and border control programs would fall under the purview of the president.
Context: President Joe Biden’s early moves to undo Trump-era immigration restrictions have sparked criticism from both the left and right as a surge of migrants at the southern border threatens to overwhelm agency resources.
- Biden’s Homeland Security Secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, has denied the situation is a “crisis,” saying, “I think there is a challenge at the border that we are managing, and we have our resources dedicated to managing it.”
- Former President Donald Trump slammed the new enforcement regime in a February speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference, saying, “Biden’s radical immigration policies aren’t just illegal. They’re immoral. They’re heartless. And they are a betrayal of our nation’s core values.”
