Three Democratic lawmakers slammed the Biden administration over the border crisis that has unfolded on its watch, saying that the messaging from the administration needs to change quickly.
Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-TX) warned in multiple interviews this week that the Biden administration has a serious problem with the message they are broadcasting to the world, even as Biden attempted to sound tough in recent interview by telling migrants not to come to the United States. Mexico has also recently expressed concern that Biden is fueling illegal immigration and creating business for the drug cartels.
“Well, first of all, if you tell people ‘don’t come now, come later,’ I mean we got to have a more concise, clear message and say, you know, you can’t … come if you don’t do this correctly,” Cuellar said. “Message number one from the administration has to be changed.”
Cuellar said it signals to migrants they can come when they see pictures on social media of people crossing rivers. “And the third message is what I call the criminal organization, the criminal organization are aggressively marketing it, because the more people they come and get, the more money they make,” Cuellar said. “So the message from administration is not sinking in over there. But when they see people coming across or the criminal organizations that are marketing, that’s what they’re hearing down there.”
During a CNN interview this week, Rep. Raul Ruiz (D-CA) was asked, “When it comes to immigration, President Biden saying very clearly in an interview, ‘don’t come here’ to migrants. Is that enough?”
“You know, no, that’s not enough,” Ruiz responded. “I mean, one is it’s very important that people realize that we’re in the middle of a pandemic and that it’s not safe for them, especially with the cartels and the coyotes that are taking advantage of them and re-traumatizing them during the journey.”
Democrat Rep. Raul Ruiz: Biden not doing “enough” to address border crisishttps://t.co/p5S5WjQ4e6 pic.twitter.com/OSOFevGUO8
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) March 17, 2021
In a separate interview this week, Cuellar said that he was on the phone with the Biden administration during their first week, urging them to come to the border to see what is happening because it was already becoming a serious situation.
“And so I’ve been warning the administration, there’s a couple of things we need to do,” Cuellar said. “First, we got to understand that there’s three messages. The administration’s message has to be better. You can’t say, ‘Don’t come now, come later.’ That’s a bad message. It’s got to be clear and concise. Don’t come in here illegally, that should be the message. Message number two is what I call the network of friends and family. ‘Hey, Pedro, I was able to come over, you ought to come over,’ and they see images like what you’re playing right now. People coming across. Yeah, so of course they’re going to come here.”
“Third message, real quickly, the criminal organizations,” Cuellar added. “That is a powerful message because they charge an average of $6,000. Imagine we had 100,000 people that crossed in February, do the math that $600 million dollars that they made, so they got an incentive to recruit, aggressively recruit. I just got off the phone with somebody in Mexico and they went over some things. It’s exactly what I’m telling you. We got to go after the, cut off the money that are going to the drug cartels, otherwise we feed them and we feed them and we feed them.”
Rep. Vincente Gonzalez (D-TX) said what is currently happening on the border under Biden’s leadership “cannot be the norm” and that the mixed messaging coming from the administration was “very concerning.” Gonzalez also said that Biden needs to put a plan in place that does not “incentivize” illegal immigration.
Border State Dem Rep Vicente Gonzalez: Biden’s “very concerning” messaging/agenda on the border “cannot be the norm” https://t.co/rpeUAAvdVh pic.twitter.com/9pAKmyEhvi
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) March 14, 2021
Dem Rep. Vicente Gonzalez on Biden’s border crisis: we need a plan that doesn’t incentivize illegal immigrationhttps://t.co/t2ezqkRPMG pic.twitter.com/pIM1NNfUYy
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) March 14, 2021