Biden previews immigration policy visions ahead of debate
WASHINGTON — Vice President Joe Biden continued to ramp up his attacks on President Donald Trump Monday with harsh criticism of the administration’s hardline position on immigration, just days ahead of the first Democratic presidential debate in Southern Florida.
In a Miami Herald op-ed, Biden writes that Trump continues to threaten U.S. relations with Latin America by relying on campaign tactics of “vilifying immigrants to score political points.” He lists the administration’s latest threat to immediately deport thousands of undocumented immigrants, the decision to end aid to Central American countries and continued “horrifying scenes” of families detained at the border as examples to contrast the leadership he says would bring to the presidency as an experienced foreign policy expert.
“It’s clear Donald Trump is only interested in using his policies to assault the dignity of the Latino community and scare voters to turn out on election day, not addressing the real challenges facing our hemisphere,” he writes.
He adds, “at a time when the challenges we face demand a united, regional response, Trump repeatedly invokes racist invective to describe anyone south of the Rio Grande, including calling migrants ‘animals.’”
Biden says that Trump’s signature “build the wall” mantra is “a slogan divorced from reality.”
The “true solution” is to address the root causes of the migrant flow from Central America, Biden argues, calling for returning to a strategy he helped lead in the Obama administration to support economic and security initiatives in the Northern Triangle countries.
Biden calls for Congress to pass the DREAM Act to finally allow undocumented immigrants to come “out of the shadows through fair treatment, not ugly threats.” He also targets Trump’s “increasing belligerence” in handling the Venezuelan crisis and calls for granting temporary protected status to refugees from the South American country.
The broad immigration policy overview in the Miami Herald comes after Biden attacked what he called the “mindless” Trump approach to immigration in an interview Saturday with MSNBC’s Al Sharpton.
“Not only is that cruel, but imagine what it says to the rest of the world about who we are,” Biden said of children in detention centers. “This is absolutely mindless what he’s doing.”