Biden border order keeps US as ‘beacon’ of freedom: South Carolina rep.

(NewsNation) — President Joe Biden is facing backlash after signing executive action that would bar migrants from being granted asylum when U.S. officials deem that the southern border is overwhelmed.

South Carolina Rep. James Clyburn joined NewsNation’s “The Hill Sunday” to discuss the response to the legislation, saying the move found common ground between Democrats and Republicans.

“There’s nothing in here about separating children from their parents, which seems to have been the centerpiece of the last administration. That is not what Joe Biden is doing. We’ll try to keep the law, remain humane, and keep our beacon as a free, welcoming country. Continue that at the border and elsewhere,” Clyburn said.

The Democratic president had contemplated unilateral action for months after the collapse of a bipartisan border security deal in Congress that most Republican lawmakers rejected at the behest of former President Donald Trump, the presumptive GOP presidential nominee.

Biden said he preferred more lasting action via legislation but “Republicans have left me no choice.” Instead, he said he was acting on his own to “gain control of the border” while also insisting that “I believe immigration has always been the lifeblood of America.”

“I’m one who believes that executive orders ought to be used more frequently by this administration because everybody can see that the other side is hell-bent on maintaining talking points, and not interested at all in trying to find resolution to this problem,” Clyburn said.

The order will go into effect when the number of border encounters between ports of entry hits 2,500 per day, according to senior administration officials. That means Biden’s order should go into effect immediately because the daily averages are higher now.

Average daily arrests for illegal crossings from Mexico were last below 2,500 in January 2021, the month Biden took office. The last time the border encounters dipped to 1,500 a day was in July 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.