WASHINGTON – House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., led more than 60 House Republicans to Eagle Pass, Texas, to tour the southern border on Wednesday as they seek to dial up pressure on the White House and Democrats over the migrant crisis at the border.
Speaking in the border town, Johnson blamed President Joe Biden and congressional Democrats for the surge in migrant crossings, as he pushed Republicans’ hardline border and immigration policy proposals.
“It’s a disaster of the president’s own design,” Johnson said at a news conference Wednesday afternoon, flanked by GOP lawmakers. “The administration has done next to nothing to protect the border but we’ve all seen with our eyes, they have opened the border wide to the entire world.”
Johnson continued to push for a sweeping GOP border policy bill passed last year – referred to as H.R. 2 – and called it a “necessary ingredient” to addressing the crisis at the border.
The White House derided the trip and shifted the blame towards House Republicans instead, saying the onus is on them to take up Biden’s proposed immigration reform policies. That includes his supplemental request that provides foreign aid along with additional border security.
“House Republicans have obstructed his reform proposal and consistently voted against his unprecedented border security funding year after year, hamstringing our border security in the name of extreme, partisan demands,” Andrew Bates, a White House…
