Mexico’s President Praises Biden for Not Building a Wall

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has praised President Joe Biden for taking a stand against the U.S. border wall, and criticized conservatives during the North American Leaders’ Summit on Tuesday. This comes at a time when illegal immigration is on the rise across the United States’ southern border.

“You, President Biden, you are the first president of the United States in a very long time that has not built not even one meter of wall. And that—we thank you for that, sir, although some might not like it—although the conservatives don’t like it,” Lopez Obrador In a joint press conference.

Biden was thanked by he for keeping a “relationship of cooperation” With Mexico and for not submitting Mexicans who are “live and work in a very honest fashion” The United States is a hotbed of harassment. “They’re not suffering raids as it unfortunately used to happen in the past,” The Mexican president also added.

Lopez Obrador asked Biden for his insistence that Congress be reelected “regularize the migration situations” Millions of Mexicans are now living in America.

Biden released an acknowledgment on January 21, 2021, just one day after becoming president. Executive Order That halted construction on the border wall commented that a large wall that spans the entire southern border was necessary. “not a serious policy solution” And a “waste of money.”

Trump’s administration authorized and constructed 450 miles of wall between 2017 and 2020.

In July last year, the Department of Homeland Security announced that the remaining funds, which were allocated for the construction of the wall along the Mexico–U.S. Rest of the funds that were not used to construct the wall at Mexico-U.S. Border would be used for other purposes. “environmental remediation and mitigation” also for installing cameras, lighting, or detection technology in areas where barriers are already in place.

Migration Jump

The illegal immigration to the south border has increased dramatically under the Biden administration. In fiscal 2020, there were 458,088 arrests. This number rose 278 percent to 1.73 Million in fiscal 2021. Data From U.S. Customs and Border Protection, (CBP).

In fiscal year 2022, the number of apprehensions grew to 2.3 million. The total number of apprehensions in fiscal year 2023 exceeded those of fiscal 2020. Steven Kopits of Princeton Policy Advisors said that the increase in border crossers will continue to grow this year.

Kopits previously forecasted around 2,000,000 apprehensions by 2021 and 2.3 Million for 2022. That is close to what actually happened. Kopits expects apprehensions in 2023 to reach 2.6million, which is another record in terms annual illegal immigration.

If Kopits’s projections are true, it would mean that 6.9 million illegal aliens would have been apprehended between 2021 and 2023 under the Biden administration.

GOP Action

Biden visited the border on Sunday for the first time in his presidency. House Republicans will investigate Biden’s border security policies.

Rep. Mark Green, a Republican from Tenn., was recently appointed by the House Steering Committee chair of the House Homeland Security Committee. He has committed to fighting for a stronger U.S. frontier.

“For the sake of our national security and homeland security, we must secure our border,” Green In a statement to Fox “We have no choice. We will empower our brave CBP agents to do their jobs and hold President Biden and [Department of Homeland Security] Secretary [Alejandro] Mayorkas accountable for the crisis that they created.”

Biden was elected president in January 2009. He has oversaw more illegal border crossings than ever before and over 1.2million known getaways. The term “gotaways” Illegal immigrants are those who have been spotted or recorded on camera, but were not captured or processed by authorities.

Naveen Atrappully is a reporter for The Epoch Times covering world and business events.