AOC Is Holding Biden To His Immigration Policy Promises As She Slams Texas Border Conditions
Migrants on the border, including more than 4,000 children, are still in crisis.
Getty US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is speaking out against President Biden’s immigration policies as she slammed the overcrowded conditions for immigrants at the US-Mexico border.
AOC gave a deep and impactful critique of the current border crisis as she exposed the “inhumane,” “barbaric,” and “horrifying” conditions in a virtual town hall meeting.
Ocasio-Cortez also shared her perspective on her Instagram stories in response to criticism from a follower who asked why she wasn’t addressing the issue like had in the past.
This is a common criticism that has followed Ocasio-Cortez into Biden’s presidency as many have accused her of going easy on Trump’s successor. However, the congresswoman rejected this view and detailed in-depth the changes she wanted to see in how Biden’s administration approaches the crisis.
She pushed back against her critics and the rhetoric around immigration policies which she said has historically been “driven by people who could not care less.”
Her comments show a growing need for more cross-party constructive criticism, even if it means going after your own.
In this post-Trump world, it can be easy to think that Biden’s election is the only change we need, but even his supporters must continue to be his harshest critics if we want to see the changes we were promised.
We have all seen enough blind, undying support toward a president in the last term, and doing the same with Biden will only perpetuate other problems.
AOC is leading the charge on holding Biden accountable.
Resolving the immigration crisis was one of Biden’s chief concerns during his campaign and certainly one of the many reasons Americans voted for him on election day.
Trump-era anti-immigration policies cannot be undone overnight but the lack of progress made so far in Biden’s term has only deepened the crisis.
AOC, who backed Biden in the election, is leading by example as she urged her supporters to hold Biden accountable for fulfilling his promises.
“The fact that this keeps happening is a political failure of both parties,” Ocasio-Cortez said, and while she recognized that we have seen a slight easing on immigration policies in Biden’s term, she said this is no excuse for complacency. “We should be doing better by now.”
Biden has put a blanket ban on deportations, but many have called for the decriminalization of immigration in order to reunite previous deportees with their families in the US.
Currently, there are more than 4,000 migrants being held in cramped conditions in a Texas tent. Many of them are children.
Two unaccompanied migrant children at a processing checkpoint in Roma, Texas, on March 27, 2021 via Getty Images.
AOC critiqued the choice of language used by people talking about this “surge” in migration as she argued the term was rooted in white supremacy and designed to make migrants look like “insurgents” or a “threat.”
Biden and AOC have different definitions of the crisis.
Ocasio-Cortez also made a necessary distinction between the root cause of migration and the outcomes of this cause.
Much of Biden’s approach to this crisis has been about telling migrants not to cross the border which has thus far proved unsuccessful. For many, this is not a journey made by choice as economic and climate crises continue to uproot families in the global south.
AOC told her Instagram followers, “It’s not a border crisis, it’s an imperialism crisis, it’s a climate crisis, it’s a trade crisis.”
She argued that the situation at the border was a manifestation of decades of US “interventionist history in foreign policy” which has destabilized many of the countries people migrate from.
Ocasio-Cortez also pointed out that while the US contributes to higher levels of carbon emissions than most countries, we don’t experience the outcomes of climate change as drastically as countries in the global south.
Her comments revealed that progress is not meaningful if it’s happening at a slower rate than the problems that need to be addressed.
She struck a somewhat hopeful tone as she expressed how willing the Biden administration is to end the crisis in comparison to administrations past,
“I’ve been in contact with the Biden administration personally. What is different is they’re trying to figure out…how to find the resources to end his problem.”
Alice Kelly is a writer living in Brooklyn, New York. Catch her covering all things social justice, news, and entertainment.