Biden Still Has No Plan to Visit the Border

White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked straight up by a reporter on Monday if the President has any plans to go to the border.

“I know you’ve been asked about this before, but just yesterday, Rep. [Henry] Cuellar [D-Texas] told Face the Nation that he wants to see President Biden go to the border,” the reporter began. “He said it doesn’t have to be for a photo-op.”

“So does the President have any plans to go to the border? Is now a good time?” he asks.

“Like you said, I’ve addressed this before,” Jean-Pierre begins. “Look, the President’s focus right now is to come up with solutions, is focused on making sure that we have the resources to manage the challenges that we’re seeing at the border.”

She continues, “And right now, as you know, we have a budget request in front of Congress. And again, if congressional Republicans are serious about dealing with the challenges that we’re seeing at the border, they will assist.”

The Biden administration has asked congress for $3.4 billion in anticipation of the surge of migrants that is expected following the expiration of Title 42.

Rep. Cuellar, whose district in Texas covers around 200 miles of the U.S.-Mexico border, told Face the Nation on Sunday that Biden’s plan to address the migrant crisis will not fix the problem, and that he need to do more than simply blame Republicans.

“that [$3.4 billion] is going to be used for processing, is going to be used for food and shelter and transportation and migrants,” he says. “It doesn’t address the issue that we’re facing at the border … it doesn’t really talk about security.”

He also called on Biden to visit the border to show some leadership.

“He doesn’t have to go there for just a photo op. But you know, a leader has to show images of being up there in the front. He can do that,” Cuellar said.

Jean-Pierre claims that the administration is “really truly addressing this challenge.”

“We’re surging resources to the border… we saw from the graphs what that looked like.”

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