Biden’s Immigration Trap

In the Democrats’ fight to maintain their congressional majorities this fall, there is perhaps no more daunting obstacle facing them than the controversy surrounding undocumented immigration.

The combination of President Biden’s low approval numbers and historical trends in midterm elections that strongly favor the party that does not hold the White House makes the Democrats’ goal a difficult one, even under the best of circumstances. But voter unhappiness over inflation, a Democratic base dissatisfied with the lack of progress on their priorities, and the ongoing distraction of war in Ukraine combine to make that task even more formidable

Unfortunately for Biden and his party, the immigration crisis looks like it will worsen before it gets better. Border authorities recently announced that they had arrested more than 210,000 migrants at the Mexico border in March, a 24 percent increase from last March and the highest monthly total in more than twenty years. Not only are Republicans moving aggressively to hold Biden’s feet to the fire on the issue, but many of his fellow Democrats who are preparing to face voters this fall are leveling their own criticisms toward a president of their own party.

Biden inherited an immigration infrastructure that had been gutted over the previous four years. He promised comprehensive reform on his first day in office, stopped construction on a border wall, and quickly reversed several Trump-era restrictions. But he maintained other changes that his predecessor had instituted, including the utilization of a 1944 public health law called Title 42 which allowed the U.S. government to expel more than 1.7 million migrants who had hoped to apply for asylum as a way of protecting against the threat of the coronavirus.

Now, Biden administration health officials have indicated that these restrictions can be lifted, potentially creating an immense increase in the number of immigrants attempting to cross the border. The result could be a replay of the chaos that the administration faced early in Biden’s term, when overwhelmed border staff struggled to remain control over huge numbers of migrants attracted by what they hoped would be more welcoming policy changes under the new president. 

Several Democratic Senators up for re-election this year have raised doubts about the plan to repeal Title 42, including Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, the first Latina to ever serve in the U.S. Senate. The critics represent border states like Arizona and Northern locales like New Hampshire. The group is comprised of both progressives and centrists. The one thing they all have in common is a vulnerable path to re-election, along with an awareness that Biden’s public approval ratings on immigration policy are scraping bottom.

These endangered incumbents were then joined by an even more improbable voice, when Senator Chris Coons of Biden’s home state of Delaware spoke out against the policy change too. Coons is the president’s closest friend in the Senate, so he was exceedingly polite in expressing his concern. (“My hope is that will be reconsidered appropriately” was all Coons said.) But even well-mannered opposition is still opposition, and Coons’ statement almost certainly reflects broader concerns among congressional Democrats.

Biden’s party is deeply divided over this issue. At the same time that party centrists are pulling away from Biden on Title 42, progressives are warning him that an already dispirited Democratic base would be enraged if Trump’s policy is not reversed as planned.

Meanwhile, Republicans smell political blood. Texas governor Greg Abbott was forced to back down from his plan to require additional truck inspections at the border when it threatened to shut down his state’s agricultural sector. But other GOP leaders are now seeking to tie Biden’s immigration policy to the increase in fentanyl coming across the border. Expect to hear about this link almost non-stop until November.

Biden will need to find a way to reverse the current trend quickly for his party to avoid being swallowed whole by the immigration debate this fall.

A motivated Republican Party challenging divided Democrats on one of Biden’s weakest issues is not a recipe for midterm success. Six months is a long time in politics, but Biden will need to find a way to reverse the current trend quickly for his party to avoid being swallowed whole by the immigration debate this fall.

Dan Schnur is a Professor at the University of California – Berkeley, USC and Pepperdine. Join Dan for his weekly webinar “Politics in the Time of Coronavirus” (www.lawac.org) on Tuesdays at 5 PM.