On Wednesday’s edition of NBC’s “MTP Now,” NBC News Chief Political Analyst Chuck Todd stated that Democrats don’t want to talk about immigration and President Joe Biden clearly flipped from where he was when he ran in 2020 and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) has been vindicated that Biden would only listen when Democratic officials complained about having to deal with migrants.
Host Gabe Gutierrez said, “A couple of years ago, Democrats really didn’t want to talk about immigration, this was up until just a few months ago. So, talk to us about how dramatic a shift this is for the Biden administration, and for, more generally, Democrats heading into this election.”
Todd responded, “Well, certainly, if you compare to what — how Joe Biden campaigned in 2020 on this issue versus today, it’s a really sort of — it can feel a bit whiplashy. … And obviously, they’ve been worried about the — the reason they don’t want to talk about it is because they know the politics is — it just divides the party.”
Later, Gutierrez asked, “[W]hat Greg Abbott did…busing migrants to Democrat-led cities, it was viewed as a political stunt by some, but the mayor of New York, the mayor of Chicago, the mayor of Denver, the governors of several states really then started looking at this issue in a different way, because it wasn’t just border towns now. And I know you’ve made the point before, political stunt aside, did that tactic work, and is that partly responsible for why we’re here right now with the administration?”
Todd responded, “I think 100% that tactic worked. … [T]he point Abbott was trying to make is, hey, if folks that aren’t in Texas had to deal with what we were having to deal with, they might have a different attitude. Well, it turns out, they were right. We’ve seen Mayor Adams (D), you’ve seen Gov. Pritzker (D), Gov. Polis (D) in Denver, and the mayor of Denver, they’ve all — I do believe they put this pressure on the federal government. And what Abbott would say is, they weren’t listening to me, maybe they’ll listen when Democratic mayors complain, and on that score, he was right, because now they’ve changed tactics.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
