President Joe Biden faces a dilemma. And how he responds to it may determine whether he’s re-elected in 2024. On the one hand, he has young voters and Latinos of all ages who supported him in 2020 and want him to fulfill his day-one promise of immigration reform. On the other hand, there’s a recent poll showing that almost two-thirds of U.S. adults think Biden “should be tougher” on immigrants crossing the border.
Republicans are being told by former President Donald Trump to let the issue get worse so that Trump can use it against Biden in November.
Though he seems inclined to address the issue in ways Republicans would prefer, those Republicans are being told by former President Donald Trump to let the issue get worse so that Trump can use it against Biden in November. Reports of GOP infighting might make for good political headlines, but it’s hard to believe that Republicans will suddenly challenge Trump to give Biden a political victory. It’s a lose-lose situation.
Bill Clinton faced a similar situation in 1996, and his decision to get tough on the border set the country on a path it remains on today. Recent remarks from Biden indicate that he’ll likely follow the same Clinton playbook in an attempt to attract more moderate, independent and Republican voters.
“I believe we need significant policy changes at the border, including changes in our asylum system to ensure that we have authorities we need to control the border,” Biden told a group of mayors this month. To slow down Trump on this specific issue, Biden’s strategy appears to be to try to out-Republican the Republicans.
That strategy has already angered the progressive wing of the Democratic Party.
“We’re going to hurt immigrant communities and a progressive base that needs to see a difference between Donald Trump and Joe Biden on immigration,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, explained earlier this month when news of a potential bipartisan deal was becoming a real possibility.
“There is clearly a difference on many other things [between Biden and Trump], but on immigration, which is the issue that animates a lot of folks in our progressive base and certainly immigrants in Georgia and Arizona … this is going to hurt us,” Jayapal added. “Because we’re not going to actually solve the problem that needs to be solved.”
Biden is instead banking on immigration reform not being an issue that will move the needle with his base. It is a point that others have raised during this period of political negotiation. As Republican strategist Mike Madrid writes in a recent New York Times opinion piece about Biden’s lose-lose situation, “Immigration, the undocumented and related issues have been overemphasized by institutional Democratic Latino voices, including consultants and organizations vested in an outdated narrative.”
Polls indicate a drop in support and enthusiasm among key sectors of Biden’s winning coalition, including young voters and Latinos. With traditionally blue states calling for congressional action on what the right calls the “Biden border crisis,” the idea that we’re a “nation of immigrants” has been lost.
Clinton’s tough talk on immigration was a linchpin of his re-election campaign against Bob Dole in 1996.
A January poll from CBS News says “the percentage who think the Biden administration should be tougher on immigrants trying to [cross the U.S.-Mexico border] is up to the highest percentage yet.” Sadly, close to half of all American voters agree with Trump’s comments that immigrants are “poisoning the blood” of this country, and Biden’s choices to push for more transformational changes to immigration policy are extremely limited.
Clinton’s tough talk on immigration was a linchpin of his re-election campaign against Bob Dole in 1996. Back then, national sentiment against increased levels of immigration was at an all-time high, according to Gallup’s historical tracking. An overwhelming 65% of Americans felt there were too many immigrants in this country. At present, more than 40% want to decrease immigration.
Biden appears to be thinking that if he can neutralize Trump’s attacks on him on immigration, that issues including the economy, women’s rights and existential threats to democracy will still be enough to motivate Biden voters to give him a second term. It’s a gamble, and as is the case with all gambles, there are no guarantees it will pay off. The path that Clinton rode to a landslide victory in 1996 doesn’t fully translate to 2024 because there are more eligible Latino voters than ever. Pew Research estimates that number to be around 32 million. It’s hard to predict if Biden’s broken promises will move this electorate to fully reject him. From the looks of it so far, Biden’s 2024 strategy does not include expanding the Latino base. In a Boston Globe story about the way that Republicans have shifted the immigration debate so far to the right, Luis Gutiérrez, a former Democratic member of the House from Illinois, blamed “a tone-deaf president of the United States.” From the looks of it so far, Biden’s 2024 strategy does not include expanding the Latino base. Latino voters helped Biden win in 2020. Will Biden now concede a loss on immigration in the short term in an attempt to win the longer game? It’s tragic, and it’s painful, and Biden’s choice to be more like Trump on immigration can certainly backfire on him. Most Republican voters, like Trump, will never Biden any credit on immigration, no matter what he does, and by alienating progressive and Latino voters, Biden may lose support from a demographic that was enthusiastic about him. But he seems to have clearly decided that disappointing them might be the only viable strategy to win again.
Julio Ricardo Varela is the founder of The Latino Newsletter. 
