It Won’t Be Easy for Democrats to ‘Flip’ the Border-Security Issue

It’s unclear Democrats can turn around perceptions of the situation on the border by November. Photo: Chandan Khanna/AFP via Getty Images

Within the back-and-forth maneuvering inside the Beltway is an audacious Democratic plan to turn a major election-year vulnerability into an advantage. Even as the “crisis” (a term Democrats used to dispute or even mock) on the southern border is emerging as a voter concern rivaling the economy, the Biden administration and its congressional allies are trying to spring a trap on the GOP, in part by exploiting differences between House and Senate Republicans on a proposed deal pairing immigration-policy changes with fresh aid for Ukraine and Israel.

Senate Democrats (with the president’s backing) plan to send a package over to the House that includes some significant concessions on the handling of migrants at the border. If the package is enacted, Democrats believe they can more or less take border security “off the table” for November by touting a bipartisan remedy for what is perceived as an uncontrolled influx of asylum seekers. If House Republicans kill the deal as inadequately savage on border security, as House Speaker Mike Johnson has strongly hinted they might, then Democrats hope to “flip” the issue by pointing out that the GOP is elevating election-year political considerations over the policy outcomes they claim to want. The lurid picture Democrats are painting of cynical Republican demagoguery on immigration has been strengthened by the very visible role of Donald Trump — to whom GOP elites are now pledging allegiance after much initial resistance — in nixing any deal with Biden on the subject. Indeed, Trump seems to be insisting on credit or blame for the impending collapse of negotiations in Congress, as Business Insider reports:

During a campaign appearance in Las Vegas, Trump spoke out against congressional efforts to broker an immigration agreement amid the former president’s sustained attacks against President Joe Biden on the explosive issue.

“As the leader of our party, there is zero chance I will support this horrible open borders betrayal of America,” the former president told his supporters. “I’ll fight it all the way. A lot of the senators are trying to say, respectfully, they’re blaming it on me.”

“I say, that’s OK,” he continued. “Please blame it on me. Please.”

So is the Democratic gambit likely to work in reducing or even eliminating their vulnerability on what even Biden is now calling a “crisis” on the border? That’s less clear, despite Trump’s thump-chesting rejection of any responsible course of action.

For one thing, there’s a good chance that the congressional foreign-aid–border package will collapse in the Senate with Democratic as well as Republican complicity before it can be killed in the House in a way that makes Johnson and his master Trump the clear culprits, as Punchbowl News reports:

Some Hispanic Democrats strongly dislike the immigration and border security policy changes. Progressive Democrats will oppose Israel funding. Let’s assume that somewhere between five to eight Democrats vote against the package. That number is very fluid.

This puts McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer in a rough spot. You need 60 votes to pass anything in the Senate, of course. In this case, they start with 40-odd Democrats. As we suggested, McConnell will likely want a majority of Senate Republicans in order to move forward. Can McConnell, Lankford, Senate Minority Whip John Thune, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and others swing that kind of vote?

If not, responsibility for the debacle could be diffused. And in that circumstance the party controlling the White House will probably be held more accountable than its partisan opponents. The underlying peril for Biden and Democrats is intensified by the fact that they simply aren’t trusted much by voters on border security specifically and immigration policy generally.

A CBS–YouGov survey earlier this month showed that the border situation was perceived as a “crisis” or a “problem” by 93 percent of voters with Biden’s job-approval ratio on immigration falling to 30 percent approval to 70 percent disapproval. The president’s approval rating was even worse in a January 14 ABC–Washington Post poll: 18 percent approval to 63 percent disapproval with this context: “Biden has the lowest rating on immigration for any president in past ABC News–Washington Post polls to ask the question since January 2004.” There’s not much question that border-security concerns are contributing to Trump’s relatively strong position in 2024 general-election trial heats against Biden. A November 2023 Marquette Law School survey gave Trump a 23 percent advantage over the incumbent on this topic.

Perhaps more crucially, the lack of trust in Biden on this issue is infecting his party’s credibility as well. A November 2023 NBC News poll gave the GOP a 30-point advantage on “dealing with border security,” the largest margin found for either party on any issue.

Changing the perceptions of major political parties on hot-button issues is never easy. For example, Republicans have never been trusted to tamper with Social Security and Medicare, as they have learned again and again, and are in serious danger of losing all credibility on reproductive-rights issues. Perhaps Democrats aren’t in that fraught territory on immigration policy, but they could have an extra burden of persuasion on the subject. And despite all the Republican disarray on the proposed border–foreign-aid deal, Democrats don’t have total flexibility, either: Republican gains among Latino voters, which represent an existential threat to Democrats, could be enhanced by a misstep on immigration policy, particularly if pro-immigrant advocacy groups cry betrayal.

Certainly, Republicans believe Democrats lack basic credibility on the border and immigration. As Mike Johnson has clearly signaled, the emerging party line is that toughening immigration laws won’t work because Biden won’t enforce them in any event. That’s also the messaging underlying the House GOP drive to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas for what they call a “willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law.”

Without much question, this is a high-stakes game going on between the two parties with many migrant lives, and perhaps the outcome of the upcoming election, in the balance.