Washington — President Biden is set to visit the southern border on Thursday. But his won’t be the only visit to the region— former President Donald Trump will also make an appearance in a different Texas border town, in a split-screen evident of the political moment.
Mr. Biden is visiting Brownsville, Texas, where he’s set to meet with border patrol agents, law enforcement officials and local leaders, the White House said. He’ll deliver remarks to “highlight the need for Congress to pass the bipartisan border security agreement” negotiated in the Senate that Republicans rejected earlier this month when Trump intervened.
Meanwhile, the former president and the frontrunner for the Republican nomination is set to appear in Eagle Pass, Texas, a little more than 300 miles from the president. Trump is expected to deliver remarks Thursday afternoon, while his campaign is lambasting Mr. Biden’s visit as a “last-minute, insincere attempt to chase” him to the border.
But Mr. Biden told reporters that he’s been planning the visit for Thursday, adding that “what I didn’t know is my good friend is apparently going” on the same day.
The border has become a political flashpoint in recent months amid record levels of migrant arrivals. Republicans have railed against the Biden administration for its handling of the southern border. In a rare move earlier this month, House Republicans voted to impeach Mr. Biden’s chief border official, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. And the GOP has repeatedly called on Mr. Biden to take executive action on immigration.
Still, Democrats have attempted to go on offense on the immigration issue after Republicans rejected the long-sought border deal that would have marked the first comprehensive border security policy reform in Congress in decades. Congressional Democrats and the White House have pointed to the flip flopping, accusing Republicans of seeking to use the border as political fodder rather than seeking to address the issue.
The visit comes ahead of Mr. Biden’s March 7 State of the Union address, and as the White House has been weighing whether to severely restrict access to the U.S. asylum system, sources previously told CBS News. For Mr. Biden, the visit marks his first to the southern border since a trip to El Paso in January 2023.
“He wanted to show that it was important for him to go down there to hear from Border Patrol agents, to hear from first responders on what’s going on on the ground,” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean Pierre told reporters on Wednesday. “And he also wants to lay out the work that he has been able to do with senators in a bipartisan way.”