Biden and Trump’s dueling visits to the border

President Joe Biden and his political opponent Donald Trump both agree: The situation along the US-Mexico border needs to change. But their extraordinary dual visits to Texas showed that the likely 2024 general election rivals could not be further apart on how to obtain that goal.

In a rare overture for what otherwise promises to be a highly toxic and politically charged campaign, Biden extended an olive branch to Trump during his remarks in Brownsville, entreating the former president to join his efforts to get Congress to reconsider a bipartisan border agreement – one that Trump effectively scuttled by signaling to congressional Republicans that he was opposed to it.

“Join me – or I’ll join you – in telling Congress to pass this bipartisan border security bill,” Biden said, addressing Trump directly. “We can do this together.”

A truce seems unlikely. Just moments before, speaking in Eagle Pass, Trump blamed Biden directly for recent crimes that migrants were accused of committing across the country, using visceral language to describe the recent killing of a Georgia nursing student allegedly at the hands of an undocumented Venezuelan migrant.

“The United States is being overrun by the Biden migrant crime,” Trump said in Eagle Pass, adding that Biden has “the blood of countless innocent victims” on his hands.

It was an example of Trump’s crystal-clear – if bellicose and fear-mongering – messaging on the issue that has been a hallmark of his political career. Biden, meanwhile, simultaneously blamed Trump for the failure to get a bill done while also trying to convince the former president to work with him, highlighting the difficulty for Biden in talking about an issue that he only recently has decided to embrace given that it appears set to be one of the key factors in the election.

Biden makes an overture to Trump as he tries to seize a political opening

Following the failure earlier this month of the bipartisan border bill, Biden vowed to make his case for reform directly to the American people – effectively punting what has been his most vexing domestic challenge to Trump.

The failure of the bill allowed Biden the opportunity to say that a deal had been brokered on immigration – and it was Trump who ended hopes of an agreement. Biden’s remarks on Thursday were more tenuous than his more forceful attempts to shift the blame for the border situation earlier in the month, attempting to uphold the veneer of bipartisan cooperation.

“The majority of Democrats and Republicans in both houses supported this legislation until someone came along and said ‘Don’t do that, it’ll benefit the incumbent,’” Biden said Thursday in a reference to Trump.

“That’s a hell of a way to do business in America for such a serious problem,” he added. “We need to act.”

Biden implored Republicans to “show a little spine.”

“Let’s remember who we work for for God’s sake,” he said. “We work for the American people.”

Addressing Trump, Biden said: “So instead of playing politics with the issue, why don’t we just get together and get it done?”

It’s an unlikely prospect. CNN has reported that Trump has lobbied Republicans both in private conversations and in public statements on social media to oppose the border compromise being delicately hashed out in the Senate, according to GOP sources familiar with the conversations – in part because he wants to campaign on the issue this November and doesn’t want Biden to score a victory in an area where he is politically vulnerable.

The political bickering has had significant international reverberations. Leading House Republicans demanded that any further security funding for Ukraine’s fight against Russia be tied to significant immigration-related concessions from the Biden administration. The deal’s collapse not only dashed any hope of progress on the border, but also effectively torpedoed vital US assistance to Ukraine – which has experienced significant recent battlefield losses in the absence of further US-funded ammunition.