Americans Top Concern Going Into 2024 Election Is Border Policy And Immigration

U.S. and Mexican officials are coordinating at an “unprecedented level” on border policy as the 2024 presidential election nears according to The Wall Street Journal.

Border agents encountered close to 84,000 people arriving from the southwestern land border in June, a new low since December of last year when more than 250,000 encounters were reported. 

It is therefore the lowest monthly figure under President Joe Biden, but higher than the average monthly number during Donald Trump’s administration. 

The WSJ also reported that “unpublished Customs and Border Protection data” indicates July border encounters could dip to 57,000 – or the lowest since 2020 if confirmed by the agency.

“The moves mark an unprecedented level of cooperation between the U.S. and Mexico, both motivated by presidential elections this year, to bring down illegal border crossings in hopes of diverting attention away from the issue,” the WSJ reported.

The newly released numbers on illegal immigration come at a time when, heading into the 2024 election cycle, Americans continue to rate immigration as one of their number-one concerns – however these figures could play right in Vice President Kamala Harris’s wheelhouse.

This is exactly what the administration wanted. 

“This is just what the administration wanted. Not that Democrats are going to win on this issue, but that chaos at the border won’t be on the front pages anymore,” Andrew Selee, president of the nonpartisan Washington think tank Migration Policy Institute, told the WSJ.

But National Border Patrol Council Executive Vice President John Anfinsen pushed back in late July, saying that despite the lower numbers being reported – which seem to indicate an improvement with regard to border security – he’s seen no such thing.

But he said, “Instead of crossing illegally between the ports, asylum seekers, many of whom are only seeking to abuse the system, are now primarily showing up at ports of entry and airports,” he said.

Trump and other Republicans have criticized Harris, who rose to the No. 2 spot on the Democratic ticket when Biden bowed out last month as some of America’s diplomats headed home for a reprieve after tens of thousands more migrants came across southwest border over past three-and-a-half years or so than had been entering during his two terms in office.

Soon after the Biden administration began, Harris was named to be in charge of addressing “root causes'” of migration. After a visit to the southern border in El Paso, Texas five months into her term as vice president, encounters kept rising for three more months.

In a WSJ poll conducted at the end of last month, voters preferred Trump over Harris on dealing with immigration policy by 13 points.

Mexican officials are believed to be worried about a second term for Trump, who has pledged mass deportations if he is reelected – hundreds of thousands could end up in Mexico as the rate reaches 300,000 this year. The Biden regime has similarly partly granted the wishes of Mexico’s leftist government in administering matters related to illegal immigration.

Mexico City requested that Biden wait until after Mexico’s presidential election, which is scheduled for June 6th to release an executive order on illegal immigration earlier this year.

Biden signed his executive order on June 4, two days after the Mexico election.