White House: US, Mexico Hold 'Productive' Meeting Amid Record Migrant Crossing

Facts

• The White House has described more than two-hour-long, closed-door border talks between top officials in the Biden administration and Mexican Pres. Andrés Manuel López Obrador that took place Wednesday in Mexico City as 'productive.'¹
• Mexico reportedly shared plans to crack down on migrant smugglers, with its top diplomat Alicia Bárcena revealing that discussions also covered the importance of the US-Mexico economic relationship and the so-called underlying causes of migration, such as poverty, violence, and family reunification.²
• On Thursday, López Obrador added that an agreement had been reached to normalize rail crossings and border bridges in Texas and Arizona, which were closed or partially suspended in recent days to press Mexico to do more to prevent migrants hopping freight cars, buses, and trucks to the border.³
• This comes as the unprecedented migrant surge across the US-Mexico border represents a potential humanitarian disaster and political crisis for US Pres. Joe Biden, with a single migrant caravan of thousands of people located in the Mexican state of Chiapas currently heading toward the border.⁴
• In the 2023 fiscal year, which ended Sept. 30, roughly 2.5M people were apprehended after unlawfully entering the southern border, while an estimated 670K 'gotaways' ducked authorities to get into the US. Last week, the US Border Patrol registered a new all-time high for illegal crossings in a single day — 14,509 encounters.⁵
• According to a Pew Research poll conducted from Nov. 27 to Dec. 3, two-thirds of Americans doubt Biden's ability to make wise decisions on immigration policy. Only 9% of the respondents were 'very confident' in his ability to address immigration concerns in the coming year.⁶

Sources: ¹CBS, ²CNN, ³The Hill, ⁴The Guardian, ⁵New York Post and ⁶Pew Research Center.

Narratives

• Republican narrative, as provided by Breitbart. Even though the border crisis has reached breaking point and the mainstream media is expressing concern, Joe Biden has refrained from using the legal tools at his disposal to fix the problem once and for all. It's outrageous that the White House is begging Mexico, which has long been complicit in migrant smuggling, for help simply because they want to avoid border negotiations with Republicans.
• Democratic narrative, as provided by The New York Times. Mexico and the US must increase cooperation and enforcement at the border to slow the surge in illegal crossings — these latest talks reflect progress towards this goal. Only improved diplomacy with Mexico and other Latin American nations, geared towards helping them thrive socially and economically and fight drug trafficking, can offer a sustainable response to solve the southern border crisis.

Predictions