On Tuesday’s broadcast of CNN’s “The Lead,” Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO) stated that “Democrats have always” taken the border “very seriously.” But “truth is not an impediment” to President Donald Trump, “He just says whatever he thinks to get people afraid. And, in truth, the Biden administration did quite a bit to try to enforce the border.”
Host Jake Tapper asked, [relevant exchange begins around 1:00:45] “Do you ever wonder if the Biden administration had done more to enforce the border and to take the crisis at the border more seriously in 2021, 2022, then Donald Trump wouldn’t have been able to run as strongly on this issue? In other words, if Democrats had taken this more seriously, then you wouldn’t be dealing with Tom Homan and Donald Trump on the issue?”
DeGette responded, “Democrats have always taken this very seriously. We think that we need to have a strong border. We think we need to enforce the laws to make sure that criminals are deported. But Donald Trump doesn’t — truth is not an impediment to him. He just says whatever he thinks to get people afraid. And, in truth, the Biden administration did quite a bit to try to enforce the border. People coming in was decreased last year. What we need to do now is Congress should get — I’ve been in Congress for a long time. We’ve been trying to do a comprehensive immigration policy. Politics always gets in the way. But, in this situation, I think we can agree, we should have a strong border, we should make sure criminals are deported, and then we should work to make sure that we have the workers we need, both the high-tech visas, but also the agriculture workers, the people we need in the ski industry, in the construction industry in Colorado. And we need to get a regular process to it. It’s not helpful when we have 12 million people who are here, virtually all of them who are not disobeying any laws, who are working. We should have bipartisan agreement. We’d be happy to work with the Trump administration. But, instead, I think what Donald Trump wants to do is just prey on people’s fears. And that’s a shame.”
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