President Joe Biden’s standing with the progressive Left could be further imperiled by his support for the Senate’s failed bipartisan border deal.
Biden has faced months of slumping poll numbers and surveys that show him losing in November to former President Donald Trump due to the diminished turnout of his 2020 coalition. Those numbers have been made worse by progressive opposition to his support for Israel’s war in Gaza, which has led Arab people in Michigan, a critical state in Biden’s path to victory, vowing to stay home in November.
The president has also dealt with months of outcry from Democratic-aligned organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union, which equated the border compromise to “cruelty,” as the failed Senate deal would have effectively closed the southern border for the majority of the year. Hispanic Democrats in the House and Senate decried being left out of negotiations and had the backing of leading immigrant rights groups.
The outrage only intensified once the bill text was released on Sunday evening, with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus chairwoman bashing the deal along with leading Hispanic Democrats in the Senate.
“There are some good provisions in the bill,” CHC Chairwoman Nanette Barragan (D-CA) said of the bill. “However, there are many more that are not in line with our values, take away due process safeguards in our asylum system, could make matters worse at the southern border, and, more importantly, fail to include protections and legal pathways for our ‘Dreamers’ or the greater undocumented community that calls America home.”
Meanwhile, Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) has spent months criticizing the White House and Senate leadership for excluding Hispanic members from the talks, something he reiterated when the text was unveiled.
“Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus were told we would have an opportunity to provide meaningful input before the deal was consummated, but Senate leadership has brazenly reneged on their commitment,” Menendez said on Sunday. “They expect us to fall in line on a deal that directly impacts millions within our communities and will forever reshape America’s immigration system.”
The New Jersey senator, who was involved in the failed 2013 immigration deal, accused negotiators of “trying to enact sweeping legislation without the buy-in of the most important stakeholders: immigrant communities and those who represent them.
“Could you imagine a voting rights deal coming together without start-to-finish input from the Congressional Black Caucus? Unimaginable!” he said. “An immigration deal without any input from the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and immigration advocates should be equally unimaginable. Yet here we are.”
Biden acknowledged the deal lacked “everything I’d like,” including addressing a solution for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients, or people born and raised in the United States to migrants who came here illegally.
“Now, it doesn’t address everything I’d like — that I wanted,” Biden said of the bill after Republicans killed it on Tuesday. “But the reforms in this bill are essential for making our border more orderly, more humane, and more secure.”
Making matters more difficult for Biden is that he stayed committed to the bill up until the end, still urging Republicans to pass the bill after the party walked away from the deal.
When asked about those risks, Sen. Ed Markey (D-MA), a leading progressive Democrat in the Senate, told the Washington Examiner he believed Biden would be able to mobilize the same coalition that delivered him a victory in 2020. The reason: Trump.
“He will have to work hard, but since it’s going to be him versus Donald Trump, the choice is so stark, and the risk to the future of progressives is so grave,” Markey said. “So I have no doubt that ultimately, it will turn out to be an overwhelming landslide for Joe Biden against Donald Trump in the general election.”
Detractors on both sides of the aisle were quick to attack negotiators and the bill’s contents, and House GOP leadership vowed that the deal would die in its chamber. Trump, who has significant influence over the House Republican Conference, had also begun actively lobbying members to reject the bill.
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The bill has also caused a strain among the Senate Republican Conference, especially with hard-line Republicans. Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Ted Cruz (R-TX) have called for Senate Republicans to oust and replace GOP leadership over its embrace of the supplemental.
Over 25 GOP senators, more than half of the 49-member conference, announced their intent to oppose the bill. It was clear by Tuesday that the legislation would not have enough votes to pass the upper chamber, at which point Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) essentially declared the bill dead.
