Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) posted a video Saturday offering his thoughts on the proposed Senate deal to conditionally shut down the southern border.
The Florida governor called the bipartisan agreement, which would grant the Biden administration authority to close the border if crossings exceed certain levels, “a farce,” claiming that President Joe Biden already has that power.
“He could declare it a national emergency,” DeSantis said. “He could stop the invasion cold if he wanted to. He does not want to. He wants to let people in.”
The deal is part of a broader spending bill that would provide aid for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. Conservatives, such as DeSantis, who oppose it claim it allows too many illegal immigrants to enter the United States — up to 1.8 million per year.
“I think the appropriate number of illegal entries is zero,” DeSantis said. “And our policy should reflect that, that we do not want people coming to this country illegally.”
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), who previously said the agreement would be “dead on arrival” in the House of Representatives, issued a statement Saturday echoing some of DeSantis’s complaints.
“The Immigration and Nationality Act coupled with recent Supreme Court precedent give (Biden) ‘ample authority’ to ‘suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants, or impose on the entry of aliens any restrictions he may deem to be appropriate,” Johnson said.
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Meanwhile, Biden called the deal the “toughest and fairest set of reforms to secure the border we’ve ever had in our country,” adding that he would use the power to shut the border down the day he signs it into law. That statement did not appear to carry any weight with DeSantis, however.
“He doesn’t have the will,” DeSantis said. “He doesn’t have the political philosophy to want to actually solve the problem. Meanwhile, the country continues to get weaker, and the problem continues to persist, so this is a question of leadership.”
