President Biden said on Thursday that he would be “flattered” if migrants were migrating to the US-Mexico border because of him – but he contested that idea, insisting that migration waves generally happen in the spring and that the growing crisis that his government is experiencing is not unique.
Biden, answering his second question at his first formal press conference at the White House, was asked about people entering the United States illegally because of the perception that he would welcome them, which he did not address and instead insisted that the same situation occurs “every one, lonely year.”
“Well, look, I think I should be flattered if people are coming because I’m a nice guy – that’s why it’s happening – that I’m a decent man, or whatever it is said, that’s why they’re coming, because they know that Biden is a good guy. “
He added: “But the truth is that nothing has changed. When many people attended, there was a 28% increase in children at the border in my administration. Thirty-one percent in the last year of 2019, before the pandemic in the Trump administration. It happens every lonely year. “
Biden repeated that this “happens every year”, without answering the original question in his messages attracting waves of illegal immigration.
“Does anyone suggest that there was a 31% increase under Trump because he was a nice guy? And was he doing good things at the border? That is not the reason why they are coming. The reason they are coming is that it is the time when they can travel less likely to die on the way because the desert heat, number one, number two, they are coming because of the circumstances in their country. “
Biden said of the increase in migrants: “I would like to think that it is because I am a nice guy, but it is not. It is because of what happens every year. “
In response to a question from Kristen Welker of NBC News, asking when reporters will be allowed to visit overcrowded Border Patrol facilities that house children who have illegally crossed the United States border with Mexico, the president said “I don’t know” .
“I don’t know, to be clear,” said Biden
On Wednesday, reporters had limited access to a facility in Carrizo Springs, Texas, run by the Department of Health and Human Services, but the Biden government did not allow reporters to enter tighter Border Patrol camps.
Welker asked: “Will you commit to allowing journalists to have access to facilities that are overcrowded going forward?”
Biden said: “I will commit – when my plan is very soon underway – to allow you to have access not only to me, but also to other facilities.”
He said: “I commit to transparency as soon as I am in a position to be able to implement what we are doing now.”
Biden acknowledged that he did not have a specific deadline to expand access to the press.
He added that “one of the reasons I didn’t fall … is that I don’t want to become the problem” in the midst of the crisis.
Biden’s critics accuse him of unleashing a wave of immigrants by relaxing former President Donald Trump’s border policies and proposing legislation to legalize the majority of the 11 million illegal immigrants currently in the United States. He denied the charge at the press conference.
Last month, Biden ended Trump’s “Stay in Mexico” policy, which required Central American asylum seekers to stay in Mexico while U.S. courts analyzed his claims.
Biden halted the construction of the border wall of his predecessor with Mexico and issued an order stating the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which grants work permits and deportation protection to people illegally brought to the U.S. as minors.
The House of Representatives last week passed bills that would create a path for citizenship for up to half of the estimated illegal immigrants in the United States, including rural workers and children who arrived as minors. Many Republicans said the bills create new “attraction” factors for migration.