Joe Biden's Border Visit Outrages Trump Campaign

Former President Donald Trump's campaign has lashed out against President Joe Biden's plans to visit the U.S.-Mexico border on Thursday.

The White House made the announcement of the visit on Monday, setting in motion Biden's first visit to the U.S.-Mexico border since January of last year. This comes amid sustained criticism from Republicans, who claim that the Biden administration has not done enough to address the recent influx of migrants crossing into the U.S. The White House and other Democrats have, in response, slammed Republicans for refusing to support the recent bipartisan Senate bill that included major border security reforms.

Biden previously said that the country's immigration system has been broken for too long, and that the bill would fix it.

"It will make our country safer, make our border more secure, treat people fairly and humanely while preserving legal immigration, consistent with our values as a nation," he said.

This comes as there were more than 2.4 million migrant encounters at the southern border during the 2023 fiscal year, up from roughly 1.7 million in 2021, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) data.

"Biden will travel to Brownsville, Texas to meet with U.S. Border Patrol agents, law enforcement officials, and local leaders," the White House said in a statement. "He will discuss the urgent need to pass the Senate bipartisan border security agreement, the toughest and fairest set of reforms to secure the border in decades. He will reiterate his calls for Congressional Republicans to stop playing politics and to provide the funding needed for additional U.S. Border Patrol agents, more asylum officers, fentanyl detection technology, and more."

The planned visit to Brownsville, a city situated on Texas's Gulf Coast, will come at the same time that Trump, the frontrunner for the 2024 GOP presidential nomination, is scheduled to make a visit to the southern border as well. Trump will make an address near Eagle Pass, over 300 miles from Brownsville and the site of considerable conflict between federal and state agents in recent weeks. In a statement on Monday, Trump's presidential campaign released a statement lashing out against Biden's visit.

"Crooked Joe Biden has had three years to visit the border and fix the crisis he created," Trump campaign press secretary Karoline Leavitt wrote. "Now Biden's handlers are sending him there on the same day as President Trump's publicly reported trip, not because they actually want to solve the problem, but because they know Biden is losing terribly. Biden's last-minute, insincere attempt to chase President Trump to the border won't cut it — Americans know Biden is single-handedly responsible for the worst immigration crisis in history and the ensuing Biden Migrant Crime Crisis affecting every community in our Country."

Newsweek reached out to the White House via email on Monday afternoon for comment. Any responses received will be added to this story in a later update.

Trump has recently faced heavy criticism from Democrats after it was reported that his influence was responsible for GOP lawmakers in Congress refusing to support the Senate border bill. The former president has been accused of demanding Republicans oppose anything less than a "perfect" border deal, so as to allow himself to continue campaigning against Biden on border matters.