We’re finishing up another week with no action being taken to secure the southern border and another week of the White House refusing to seriously address the question. Now there are even reporters from the legacy media pressing Karine Jean-Pierre on the issue during press briefings, such as the one that was held yesterday. When a reporter asked why Joe Biden wasn’t using his executive authority to address the problem, all KJP could manage to say was, “Why should he?” She then attempted to claim that the border issue would need to be addressed legislatively, ignoring the fact that Biden opened the border with no help from the legislature. (Fox News)
During Wednesday’s White House briefing, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre addressed the border crisis, defending President Biden’s approach and giving a shocking reason as to why he has not taken action.
Jean-Pierre opened the briefing by saying it was up to Republicans to do something to solve the problem or continue to use it as a political issue.
When asked why the president has the authority to do something about the issue unilaterally, but isn’t doing anything, Jean-Pierre responded.
“Why should he have to do it unilaterally? Why shouldn’t we do it in a legislative way?” Jean-Pierre replied.
You can watch and listen to the exchange via this tweet from the House GOP.
🚨WATCH🚨
Karine Jean-Pierre says it is not Joe Biden’s job to secure the Southern Border when asked why he doesn’t take executive action.
“Why should he have to do it.”
Pierre goes on to admit that Biden has “taken many executive actions before” that created the… pic.twitter.com/DbIKEy6bpj
— House Republicans (@HouseGOP) May 22, 2024
As soon as Biden took office he signed 94 executive orders reversing all of Donald Trump’s border policies. Congress didn’t take a single vote on those choices. Biden’s response to the crisis he created and the excuses he’s trying to make have long since passed the point of being stupid. Now It’s simply insulting. Biden knows it, or at least his handlers do, and KJP knows it too.
As with everything that unfolds in the current White House administration, they believe they are playing a political angle here. By falsely insisting that a legislative solution is required, Biden gets to come out before the election and say, ‘Yes, we’re having some problems with some of these asylum seekers, but the MAGA Republicans are refusing to send me legislation to address it.’
That response is, of course, both irrelevant and a lie. Even if legislation were required, the House GOP already passed HR2, which would have done a significant amount of work (though not everything) to secure the border. But the Senate Democrats refused to take it up. The reason that is irrelevant is that a failure of Congress to send Biden legislation is not the reason why the border is such a disaster. Things are as they currently stand because Joe Biden has refused to pick up his pen and reverse the 94 executive orders mentioned above.
It could be done in a day. He simply doesn’t want to do it and he believes this path will buy him a few more votes on the left. But even that is almost certainly a significant political miscalculation. There is a reason that such a broad swath of poll respondents rank immigration and the border among their chief concerns and it’s not because they are applauding Joe Biden for allowing ten million illegals into the country. That includes a significant percentage of Hispanic voters, where Biden is currently bleeding off support.
Yesterday’s press conference also served as yet another reminder of what a terrible choice Karine Jean-Pierre turned out to be as a Press Secretary. Sure, she ticked most of the correct DEI boxes for a spot in the Biden administration, but she’s really not very good at her job if we’re being honest. I don’t envy her the job of having to address all of Joe Biden’s various fumbles and untruths, but a true professional could have handled that question more cleanly and professionally. She could have simply said, “I don’t have anything new for you on the subject of executive orders, but I’ll let you know when I do.” It would have been a frustrating answer, but at least it wouldn’t have made both the Press Secretary and the White House look ridiculous.