President Joe Biden left the White House for Arizona on Tuesday morning to visit the site of a new computer chip plant, and highlight how his policies are creating jobs —but said he will not travel to the border to see the immigration crisis for himself.
‘Because there are more important things going on,’ he told reporters who quizzed him on the decision just before boarding Marine One.
‘They’re going to invest billions of dollars in the new enterprise in the state.’
His dismissive comments triggered the ridicule of Republicans, who have been urging Biden to see visit the border and witness the problems there firsthand.
President Joe Biden spoke to reporters as he left the White House. He said there were more important things going on in Arizona than the border crisis, before his visit to a new chip manufacturing plant, which is part of a $40 billion investment
Biden will be only a little more than 100 miles from the border with Mexico during his trip
Republicans, such as Nathan Brand of the Republican National Committee, said Biden was wrong to so quickly dismiss the crisis at the southern border
‘Disgusting,’ tweeted Republican Kari Lake, who has not conceded defeat in her campaign to be governor or Arizona.
‘Joe Biden visits Arizona and accidentally confirms what we all knew: he does not care one bit about the border crisis.’
John Cooper, of the Heritage Foundation, tweeted, ‘Tell that to Border Patrol.’
Biden will be a little more than 100 miles from the border during his visit.
He has not travelled to the border at all as president, despite it providing one of the biggest challenges to his administration with soaring numbers of crossings, human trafficking and fears that it is the main pathway into the country for deadly, smuggled fentanyl.
Each year of his presidency has brought new records for border encounters. In 2021, they hit 1.7 million and in 2022 reached 2.3 million.
Critics accuse him of abandoning security officers on the frontlines.
Republicans are urging the president to see the crisis at the southern border first-hand. Pictured: Migrants try to cross the Rio Grande in Piedras Negras, Mexico, on Nov. 16, 2022
Migrants, mostly from Nicaragua, board a bus after being released by U.S. Border Patrol on Monday evening in El Paso, Texas, another crossing hotspot
The first month of Fiscal Year 2023 showed more than 230,000 encounters with CBP, the third-highest month in recent history, all occurring under President Joe Biden
Instead Biden will be joined by Apple chief executive Tim Cook when Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. will announce plans to increase its investment in the state to $40 billion with a second production facility.
It is the company’s biggest investment overseas — and one of the biggest foreign direct investments in U.S. history.
Cook and Biden will visit the building site where a $12 billion plant is rising in Phoenix.
It is part of a push to bring more chip makers to the U.S. and head off supply chain disruptions that cost billions of dollars in sales.
His visit coincides with voting in Georgia’s Senate run-off, a tight contest that Biden has avoided.
Biden will be joined in Arizona by Tim Cook, chief executive of Apple, at the chip plant
The new plant will produce some of the most advanced chips in the world
Instead, he visits another battleground state, where hardline election deniers backed by Donald Trump lost campaigns in last month’s midterms.
A White House official said the investments would create 10,000 high-tech and high-wage jobs, as well as more than 10,000 construction jobs.
‘They will produce some of the most advanced, leading-edge chips in the world for top tech companies like Apple,’ said the official.
A day earlier, the White House dismissed Republican calls for him to visit the border as a stunt.
‘If Republican officials truly, truly want to deal with immigration, they truly want to deal with the border – then they would stop doing political stunts and actually work with us on the plan that we have put forward, which they have not,’ said Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre.
‘And that’s what we want to make very loud and clear.’