How a visit to the American border became a powerful form of political theater
Vice President Kamala Harris went to the U.S.-Mexico border shortly after she and President Biden took office, even though she had branded such visits as empty politics just weeks earlier. President Barack Obama also toured the border during his time in the White House, although he came to view the trips as little more than photo ops.
Donald J. Trump used the border when he was president to drum up support for his anti-immigration policies, even signing his name on his “big, beautiful wall” with a Sharpie pen.
As the immigration debate becomes increasingly polarized, a trip along the 2,000-mile border has become a mandatory piece of political theater for leaders who want to show they care about immigration. The images at the border—the wall, the Border Patrol agents, the overcrowded detention centers—serve as a powerful backdrop to draw attention to the crisis or, increasingly, to use the issue to attack political opponents.
Both factors will come into play on Thursday when President Biden and Mr Trump make dueling trips to the US-Mexico border.
Mr Trump will travel to Eagle Pass, Texas, where he will speak about crimes committed by migrants and blame Mr Biden for the increasing number of border crossings. More than 300 miles away in Brownsville, Mr. Biden plans to speak to border agents and call on House Republicans who took Mr. Trump’s cue and thwarted a bipartisan border bill that would have imposed a crackdown against illegal migration.
“It’s a relatively new phenomenon where you pay a lot of attention to the border at the border,” said Tevi Troy, a presidential historian. “As long as this remains a problem, there will be presidents who will either make a political point or, if they don’t, will be pressured to do so.”
Immigration has become one of Mr. Biden’s biggest political commitments as millions of migrants overwhelm the underfunded and under-resourced system, something that Republicans like Mr. Trump are keen to emphasize. A Gallup poll released Tuesday found that Americans are most likely to name immigration as the most important issue in the country.
“This is a Hail Mary from Biden,” said Brandon Judd, president of the National Border Patrol Council, the main union for Border Patrol agents. Mr. Judd, a longtime supporter of Mr. Trump, will join the former president in Eagle Pass on Thursday. Still, he said he was in Congress in favor of the border bill that Mr. Biden supported and Mr. Trump opposed.
Immigration is central to Mr. Trump’s candidacy for president and many Republicans, especially in the House of Representatives, would be reluctant to grant Mr. Biden an election victory on an issue that has given them a strong line of criticism of the White Party delivered. House.
Politics at the border was not always so divided. In 1971, Pat Nixon, then the first lady, made headlines when she greeted Mexican children and complained about fencing during a visit to a park along the border in San Diego.
Decades later, President George W. Bush traveled to a Border Patrol station in New Mexico to rally support for his effort to overhaul the country’s immigration policy. While the Senate at the time supported a bill that included a path to eventual citizenship for many illegal immigrants, the House emphasized the need for border security.
Obama faced greater divisions. In 2011, he gave a speech in El Paso, within sight of the border, to push for legalization laws, in a nod to the Latino voters who would be crucial in the 2012 elections. But in 2014, when a record number -accompanied minors crossed the border, Obama faced relentless calls to visit the border, which he rejected.
“I’m not interested in photo ops,” Obama said.
Mr. Trump was. He visited the border several times during his presidency and would have gone more often if not for the pandemic.
Almost as soon as Mr. Biden took office, he and Ms. Harris faced demands from Republicans saying they should visit the border and see the crisis first-hand. Both made the trip to El Paso; Ms. Harris in June 2021 and Mr. Biden in January 2023.
Both have also received criticism. Republicans scrutinized Ms. Harris for going to El Paso instead of the lower Rio Grande Valley, considered the epicenter of the wave of migration. Progressive Democrats said Biden should have spoken directly to migrants.
Gil Kerlikowske, Customs and Border Protection commissioner during the Obama administration, said presidents and other top officials can show they prioritize the border by visiting it. But he also acknowledged that such visits may be more for political gain.
“It’s so politically sensitive right now,” Kerlikowske said. “To have them come and look at the work and the difficulties that Customs and Border Protection in particular are facing at the border tells you that this will be, if not number 1, then certainly one or two in the topics of this presidential election cycle. ”