Joe Biden is pushing progressives who are already sour on his presidency to the limit with a tough new executive action barring most asylum applications from migrants crossing the US-Mexico border illegally.
But the president’s weakness on one of Donald Trump’s biggest campaign issues means it’s a risk that he has no option but to take. People familiar with Biden’s strategy pointed out privately that he was in the position of taking bold action on immigration after Republicans in Congress refused to act after killing a bipartisan immigration bill to please their presumptive nominee.
If Biden wins November’s election, it will probably be because he was able to cement the most disaffected liberal Democrats behind him, while appealing to moderates and dissenting Republicans who reject Trump’s extremism. Many of the latter group feel that the border crisis is a matter of urgent national security, and Biden needs to show he takes the presidential duty of securing the homeland seriously.
But the president has been on dicey ground with his party’s most liberal members for months, and his standing with progressives has weakened dangerously over his support for Israel’s assault on Gaza after Hamas’ October 7 terror attacks. The party schism will be on graphic display when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses Congress in the coming weeks — honoring an invitation that originated with Republicans keen to maximize Biden’s political distress.
The president’s dilemma is so significant because of signs that the coalition that carried him to power over Trump four years ago has eroded. His support in polling compared to his performance four years ago has been especially shaky among liberal voters and people of color. In a knife-edge election that could come down to thousands of votes in a few states, every Democrat who doesn’t show up for Biden is effectively a vote for his rival.
The election may well turn on another Biden vulnerability — high prices and interest rates — or it could be decided by his warnings that Trump is unfit for office and a danger to democracy. But polls show voters are increasingly concerned about immigration. Of all issues tested, Biden recorded his lowest approval rating on immigration in a CNN poll in February — just 30%.
The executive action, which is designed to alleviate the pressure on a hopelessly swamped asylum system, differs in important ways from the draconian policies of Trump — a point Biden was at pains to stress on Tuesday by emphasizing that he’s not sending the military to lock people up before mass deportations, as the former president has said he plans to do. The Biden measure includes exceptions for unaccompanied minors and people who are deemed to be victims of a “severe form” of human trafficking. And the restrictions can be lifted if migrant arrivals fall well below current levels. But the act of wielding executive power to thwart any asylum applications strikes many progressives as a betrayal of liberal values, morally repugnant and counter to the country’s historic mission.
Biden addressed those Democrats directly on Tuesday at the White House. “For those who say the steps I’ve taken are too strict, I say to you … be patient … (the) good will of the American people … is wearing thin right now,” he said. “Doing nothing is not an option. We have to act.”
Progressives are not just angry that the president’s actions curtail asylum rights for desperate migrants fleeing repression, economic blight, trafficking, gang violence and other forms of political and social intimidation in South and Central America. The fear is that Biden’s position will be the new orthodoxy for Democratic immigration initiatives going forward. These Democratic critics also despair that there’s no path to citizenship for millions of migrants already in the country — including those brought to the US as children who are in limbo with no legal status. “Once again, no relief for Dreamers, farmworkers,” Sen. Alex Padilla told CNN’s Manu Raju. Asked whether Biden could be hurt with progressive and Hispanic voters, the California Democrat replied: “I guess there’s still time for him to do what’s right.”
Biden points out that he’d rather act with Congress and that Republicans refused to pass the most conservative immigration bill in decades that would have paid for extra border patrol officers and poured resources into the stretched asylum system. But even that measure was stripped of many of the measures that Democrats traditionally seek to include in comprehensive immigration plans.
Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair Pramila Jayapal voiced a complaint shared by many liberals that Biden can’t win votes by trying to match the Republican Party’s march to the right. “We are making the same mistake again that Democrats continually make when we try to out-Republican the Republicans; it does not work,” the Washington state Democrat said.
Texas Rep. Greg Casar said Republicans “try to cover up their failures for this country by scapegoating immigrants and by trying to point to the border and to immigrants as the source of all of our problems,” adding that it is “unfortunate that President Biden is responding to those politics” with this action. Massachusetts Rep. Ayanna Pressley added: “With all due respect Mr. President, we should not be unearthing policies from the last administration.”
Any president who disappoints his own supporters is in a perilous place when seeking reelection. Biden has shown throughout his term that he is conscious that the grassroots of his party is shifting left. He’s granted billions of dollars in student loan relief — despite his efforts being thwarted by the courts and blasted by Republicans as illegal. He’s tried to revive US manufacturing with hundreds of millions of dollars in public spending in his bipartisan infrastructure plan. And he’s passed the most significant climate change legislation in America history, even if the measures fell short of what progressives had initially hoped for. Biden has also courted key figures on the progressive left, including Vermont independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, who ran against him in the 2020 Democratic primary.
Biden would never say it bluntly in public, but his gamble with progressives carries an implicit question — where else are they going to go? Will they instead vote for a Republican demagogue who borrowed Adolf Hitler’s language while warning that immigrants are “poisoning the blood” of the country? Will progressives and Arab Americans really stay home in the key swing state of Michigan and give an opening to a former president who called for a Muslim ban?
This is a risky proposition for Biden, and some Democrats privately fear that the deaths of thousands of Palestinians in Israel’s military operation in Gaza could be the kind of burning single moral issue that could depress significant votes in Michigan. Rep. Rashida Tlaib, who represents the battleground state’s 12th Congressional District, got a lot of attention last month when she warned that there would be a price to pay for Biden and other Democrats who she said smeared pro-Palestinian protesters on college campuses. “We’re not going to forget in November are we?” Tlaib said.
The congresswoman’s remarks followed a campaign in the Michigan Democratic presidential primary that led more than 100,000 people to vote “uncommitted” because of Biden’s support for Israel. The protests did not come with a commitment for voters to desert the president in November, and Trump, obviously, was not on the ballot. But anything like that loss of Democratic votes could spell big trouble for Biden in the general election.
Still, Biden’s comeback after a terrible start in the 2020 primary is a reminder that the loudest progressive voices do not necessarily represent the critical center of a party. Biden did especially well with moderate and Black voters, especially women, whose views may resonate as much as those of frequently quoted progressive leaders in Washington. And there are some scenarios in which being rebuked by voters like Tlaib may help Biden with the voters he most needs to beat Trump in November.
“Broadly speaking, for her to attack Joe Biden in this way probably helps him politically,” Kate Bedingfield, a former Biden White House communications director, said on “CNN This Morning” last month. “I think the majority of voters he’s trying to win over, frankly the majority of voters in this country, are, broadly speaking, supportive of Israel, want to see us stand by our ally there. And I think if someone who is representing the farthest left of the party … if she’s attacking Joe Biden, that probably helps him with the voters that he needs.”
One vital slice of the electorate the Biden campaign would love to impress are the Republican voters who chose former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley over Trump even months after she suspended her presidential primary campaign.
Some Haley supporters on Tuesday welcomed Biden’s immigration actions, CNN’s Kit Maher reported. “While many Haley voters continue to have policy differences, this common-sense action is a clear step in the right direction to address one of the top priorities of many Haley voters,” the Haley Voters Working Group, a coalition of approximately 25 conservative Haley supporters, posted on X. The group is far too small to be representative. But expanding tiny seams of potential support is the critical work of grassroots campaigning in very tight elections. A Biden campaign official met with the group for a Zoom call last month.
Amanda Stewart Sprowls, a Haley supporter from Arizona, told CNN Biden’s actions on Tuesday were a “show of good faith” and added: “They’re starting to listen to the center.”
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