Trump and Biden’s border battle

President Joe Biden and former president Donald Trump made dueling visits to the southern border this Thursday, as the issue of immigration becomes the political priority of millions of Americans.

The latest Gallup survey (February 1-20) reveals that immigration ranks as the most important problem ahead of the 2024 presidential election. For context, 28 percent of Americans see the issue as the most crucial one, which is more than the following issues combined: federal deficit (3 percent), crime and violence (3 percent), foreign policy/foreign aid/focus overseas (3 percent), poverty/hunger/homelessness (6 percent) and inflation (11 percent).

The momentum is on Trump’s side, as he’s the candidate who made immigration his top issue since he descended the famous escalator to announce his candidacy in 2015. Still, Biden is attempting to better his image, blaming electorally-motivated Republicans for the porous border and calling for bipartisanship. 

During his remarks in Brownsville, Biden attempted to portray himself as the unifier, extending an olive branch to his political competitor. He called on the former president to join his efforts in advancement of policy, not politics, following the failure to pass a controversial Senate immigration bill — which Trump lobbied against — in Congress. 

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

While Biden extended his hand, speaking in Eagle Pass, Trump pointed his finger directly at him. Diving into recent crimes committed by illegal migrants, including the killing of a nursing student in Georgia at the hands of a Venezuelan illegal immigrant, Trump placed all blame on the Biden administration.

Biden has “the blood of countless innocent victims” on his hands, Trump claimed, labeling the trend “Biden migrant crime” — “a new form of vicious violation to our country.”

“The majority of Democrats and Republicans in both houses supported [the failed border bill] until someone came along and said ‘Don’t do that, it’ll benefit the incumbent,’” Biden said in 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.”

“Let’s remember who we work for for God’s sake,” Biden said. “We work for the American people,” imploring Republicans in Congress to “show a little spine.”

Trump’s rejection of the notion that this is a bipartisan issue was accompanied by other gruesome stories. Aside of the Georgia killing, an incident involving the raping of a minor was shared by the Republican candidate: “Just four days ago, an illegal alien in Louisiana was arrested for brutally raping a fourteen-year-old girl while holding a knife to her throat, and he then allegedly robbed a man who was getting out of his car in front of his home and repeatedly stabbed him in the face, in the back, in the face many, many times.”

With Trump’s rhetoric on immigration intensifying, Biden, who first came to visit the border three years into his presidency, has been forced into a position where he must appear strong. Yet as Trump promises to finish the wall and authorize the largest deportation operation in American history, it is unclear how exactly Biden could manage to win the issue without dissatisfying a large segment of his progressive base. 

-Juan P. Villasmil

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On our radar

GARLAND v. CARGILL The Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday in a case brought by the DoJ seeking to uphold the ATF’s ban on bump stock accessories, which it reclassified as machine guns in 2018 at the behest of the Trump administration. 

TRANSCRIPT RELEASED The House Oversight Committee dropped the full transcript of Hunter Biden’s five-hour deposition on the public. Reporters have noted discrepancies in the purported timelines of Hunter’s business dealings, particularly with Chinese energy company CEFC. 

BRITT’S TIME TO SHINE Alabama senator Katie Britt has been chosen to give the official Republican response to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, which will be delivered next Thursday, reports say. 

Haley preaches to the choir in downtown DC

The hottest room in DC this lunchtime was upstairs at the Madison Hotel downtown, where presidential long-shot Nikki Haley addressed a crowd of Washington Republicans. Physically, that is: the ballroom was absolutely sweltering as 200 or so people lined up and crammed in to see Haley make her case. Around the room, reporters from Politico and Slate were vox-popping fans of the former UN ambassador. 

The DC primary opened voting today — and the Madison is the only place where registered Republicans can vote. Forty-five minutes late Haley was introduced by Patrick Mara, chair of the DC GOP, who offered her a golden opportunity to talk about a local issue with national interest: crime. “We have a public safety issue in DC, we have a crime crisis in the District of Columbia,” he told the crowd, before introducing Haley. “Who says there are no Republicans in DC?” she began. 

Ignoring the open goal that Mara had set her up for, Haley then trotted out a version of the same remarks she’s given for over a year: taking a fiscal conservative line, mentioning earmarks, “Don’t you think it’s finally time we had an accountant in the White House?”… on and on she went. In her half-hour speech, she vouched for term limits, and mental competency tests for politicians: “Congress has become the most privileged nursing home in the country — we need to know they’re on the top of their game.” On immigration, “We will defund sanctuary cities once and for all” and on the border deal, “Trump needs to stay out of it altogether and let us move on.” She delivered a tweaked version of the “twelve fellas down, one to go” which she was heavily mocked online for when it was accidentally published in a tweet storm last month. “I defeated a dozen other fellas, I just got one more I gotta catch up to.” Much neater. 

Ultimately, Haley took aim at Trump’s selfishness and chances at winning the general. “At no point is he ever talking about the American people,” she said. “He cannot win a general election — it is madness!” one attendee heckled. “Right?” agreed Haley. “How many more times to we have to lose before we say maybe Donald Trump is the problem? “Don’t take it from me: look at the polls.” Haley was referring to head-to-head match-ups showing her performing better than Trump against Biden. But there are some other polls she should be looking at: the GOP primary ones that don’t show her winning a single state. 

Can she convince Republican primary voters to pick her over Donald Trump? Nothing in her tired remarks suggested she was making a case to the MAGA mob that’s turned out in droves in the contests so far. The donor money is drying up — but the Haley campaign will stagger on, at least as far as Tuesday. After that, perhaps her best bet is a Marianne Williamson-esque un-suspension in case something happens to Trump between now and the convention.

–Matt McDonald

More mass media layoffs

In what seems to be a weekly occurrence, another suite of outlets fired hundreds of journalists, the latest in a series of layoffs hitting the media world. Over 500 journalists lost their jobs in January 2024 alone — as outlets such as BuzzFeed closed their news divisions, with more cuts still to come.

On a national level, VICE and CBS News are the latest outlets to fire hundreds — including, controversially, acclaimed investigative reporter Catherine Herridge. The Wall Street Journal even doubled down on staff cuts this week, eliminating several reporting jobs located around the world — including at the Vatican, at a time when Pope Francis’s health is a constant source of coverage. 

Locally, the capital’s DCist was shuttered, the latest in a series of hollowed-out local news sources. The firings come as George Soros’s Soros Fund Management is poised to dominate Audacy, one of the largest podcasting companies in America. 

Meanwhile, on the cable news side of things, even star talent’s hefty salaries aren’t necessarily safe. CNN is reportedly planning massive cost savings as TV viewership plummets. “If you work at CNN your compensation is going to go down dramatically over the next… five years,” one analyst told the Wrap; anchors like Jake Tapper, Anderson Cooper and Wolf Blitzer all reportedly make between $8 and $20 million every year. “Networks can only afford to shrink their newsrooms a dozen reporters at a time for so long before people start to question how the big names are still making tens of millions,” Mediaite notes, likening the situation in many newsrooms to the show Survivor.

Of course, hirings and firings are standard fare in any industry. But as Jonathan Kay noted, “journalism is the only field I’ve seen where they’re treated as an unfathomable affront to the cosmic order, as opposed to normal economics.” The Quillette editor added that “it doesn’t help journalism to cast every act of downsizing as a crime against truth telling. Sometimes it just means no one wants what you’re selling.”

As we barrel into a general election, it’s an odd time for so many journalists to lose their jobs. Is Donald Trump no longer the ratings panacea he once was?

–Matthew Foldi

Naughty Joe Biden

Last week, Cockburn was mortified to hear of President Biden jokingly bragging about “good sex” with Jill being the secret to his marriage’s success. Now it seems there’s not a family member with whom he won’t discuss the birds and the bees. Here’s Tyler Pager in today’s Washington Post:

In the early months of his presidency, as the pandemic dragged on with its stifling restrictions, President Biden often delivered a favorite monologue to aides: he was worried about young people’s mental health, he said. High school seniors were missing prom and graduation. He wanted to know how college students went on dates.

Specifically, Biden wondered how young people could “make love” under the circumstances, according to two aides who heard the president use that phrase multiple times during his first year in office. Biden’s fixation on loneliness among young people, the aides said, grew out of his near-daily conversations with his grandchildren.

Please, Grandpa, no! The purpose of the piece is to demonstrate how President Biden’s decisions are still shaped by the conversations he has with his family, confidants and “normal folk.” Perhaps this means we’re about to see a White House initiative to get zoomers breeding.

Either way, it’s good to know that Joe’s dwelling upon the problem Ani Wilcenski highlighted in the cover story of this month’s magazine…

–Cockburn

From the site

Ben Domenech: Mitch McConnell and the party of Trump
Lionel Shriver: Google’s new AI app erases white people

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