The southern US border will play host to two presidents this Thursday, as Joe Biden and Donald Trump tour different sectors of the Texas border. This spectacle underscores the critical role of immigration issues in the upcoming November elections and the decades-long failure of polarized American politics to mend a dysfunctional immigration system.
Former President Trump will be in Eagle Pass, a hotspot for border conflicts between the Biden administration and Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott. Trump’s visit aims to reinforce his grim depiction of a country under siege by what he alleges are criminal migrants and invaders. This narrative, he hopes, will propel him back to the presidency, just as it did in 2016. Trump is promising mass deportations and detention camps if he regains the White House, employing some of the most extreme anti-migrant rhetoric in modern American history.
President Biden, who has been on the defensive over the border for much of his term, will visit Brownsville after adopting tougher rhetoric and policies. Biden aims to turn the tables on Republicans, including Trump, who thwarted a bipartisan Senate bill filled with conservative goals, seemingly to deny him an election-year victory. Biden’s first border visit in 13 months follows tense discussions within his administration as the immigration crisis evolved into a political liability.
However, the political theatrics of Thursday’s visits are likely to do little to address the flow of desperate people fleeing economic hardship, environmental disasters, drug and gang violence, and political persecution. This global issue is ironically creating the conditions for demagogues like Trump and European populists to exploit the issue in a way that further weakens democracies.
Despite the risks, Biden’s campaign is taking a gamble by showcasing the president at the border, a symbol of one of his most glaring political vulnerabilities. Yet, Biden’s border visit is a step that epitomizes a more aggressive campaign strategy designed to repair weaknesses in his electoral coalition. This offensive will culminate in the president’s annual State of the Union address next week, where he is expected to criticize GOP lawmakers for failing to act to end the border crisis.
The immigration issue is particularly tricky for the president since his attempts to adopt tougher positions risk further alienating progressives, some of whom are already lukewarm about his presidency. However, White House and Biden campaign officials see a unique opportunity for Biden to point the finger at Republicans on border security.
As he seeks to win back the White House, despite his disgraced exit from Washington, DC, in 2021 after trying to steal an election and as he faces four criminal trials, Trump is turning up the dial against migrants even more. While he is in Texas, Trump is expected to meet members of the state’s national guard and to tour Shelby Park alongside the Rio Grande.
While Thursday’s exchanges may have a tangible political impact ahead of the likely general election rematch, they will almost certainly do nothing to resolve the genuine crisis in the immigration system. And tackling the root cause of the migrant crisis would need a major international initiative that a fractured global political consensus is as incapable of addressing as Washington is of fixing the domestic immigration mess.
Contributor: Alayna Treene, CNN