The immigration issue in the United States, while occupying the minds of liberal and conservative politicians, was not exactly the focus of Wednesday’s Republican primary debate. Most candidates portrayed the measures as more or less aggressive than those that marked the four years of former President Donald Trump’s administration.
In his first televised public interaction, From Milwaukee, the eight participating Republican candidates agreed that stronger scrutiny was needed to stop illegal border crossings, hire more border patrol agents, and even provide continuity to the ambitious project of completing the wall along the border with Mexico.
“The Republican debate has shown that there is democracy in our party. Most of the candidates are talking about how we need to strengthen our border,” he told the Voice of America Republican political scientist Félix Garca.
The immigration issue in the United States marks a focal point in the domestic and foreign policies of the Joe Biden administration.
Since arriving in the White House in 2021, Biden has launched his immigration project, held back by his campaign promises, but that massive influx of immigrants without the required documentation—eespecially along the southwest border—ddrew criticism from Republican rivals, blaming the Democratic president for unprecedented permissiveness.
Most candidates in the debate opted for a “hard hand” on the southern border with Mexico, going against Biden’s immigration policies. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, known for his policies against irregular immigration, opted to militarize the border.
DeSantis said he will “not send troops to Ukraine, but will send troops to the southern border,” where “drug traffickers are bringing in fentanyl.”
“If you breach a border wall on the sovereign territory of the United States and try to poison Americans, you’ll be dead as a stone,” the Republican warned.
the drug epidemicFentanyl, in particular, monopolized the discussions of the other candidates for the Oval Office.
Vivek Ramaswamy was the surprising protagonist of the first Republican debate on Wednesday. The tech entrepreneur, son of Indian migrants, noted that “an open border” is not a border.
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, for his part, proposed stopping “rewarding” immigrants who enter the United States without immigration documents.
Biden appointed Vice President Kamala Harris responsible for immigration affairs two years ago. Harris chaired meetings with leaders and senior officials from Mexico, the southwesternmost country in the United States, as well as those from Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, and other countries.
Among other things, the White House has established a system for granting parole on humanitarian grounds to applicants from Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba, and Haiti.
Measures also include the establishment of Safe Mobility Offices in about three Central American countries to facilitate the relocation of asylum seekers. An action carried out in cooperation with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
The Biden administration declined from the start to push an open border policy, but the majority of candidates accused it of opening the border, despite the government’s recent measures The number of border crossings on the southern border has been reduced Figures not seen in years.
South Carolina Senator Tim Scott said he supports doing away with the so-called sanctuary Cities, reinstating Title 42, and continuing construction of the border wall, a project widely appreciated by Trump.
Maca Casado, the spokesman for the Democratic National Committee across the country, concludes in statements to the VOA: “President Biden inherited an immigration system and a chaotic immigration situation. In the previous government, children were locked up and separated at the border; the situation at the border was chaotic.”
