Republicans at the RNC are focusing on immigration – but where does Biden stand?

Immigration has become a key issue for voters going into the elections in November

A migrant stands with his daughter while waiting to be apprehended by US Customs and Border officers in Ruby, Arizona. Getty Images / AFP

At this week's Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the conversation has been focused on a topic that frequently tops the list of important issues for American conservatives: immigration.

Events and speakers have told of the dangers facing the country due to the current border policy, and US President Joe Biden is the focal point of blame.

Mr Biden is heading into the elections in November while trying to strike a balance on immigration, one of the most divisive issues in US politics.

He announced two major immigration moves last month – one protecting undocumented spouses of Americans from deportation, the other restricting asylum at the US southern border.

Immigration, particularly the historic numbers of people arriving along the sprawling US-Mexico border, has emerged as a major concern for voters in this election.

“We can both secure the border and provide legal pathways to citizens,” Mr Biden said after announcing measures to give hundreds of thousands of undocumented spouses of Americans a path to citizenship.

A week earlier, he signed an executive order that significantly limited access to asylum for migrants arriving at the Mexican border.

The two moves drew criticism and praise, along party lines.

Migrant advocates and progressives hailed his directive on undocumented spouses, while a coalition of rights groups filed a lawsuit against the new border restrictions, saying they breach US and international law.

“We are disappointed in the order and think it's illegal, and we have sued,” Lee Gelernt, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union, told The National.

“This executive order is inconsistent with the asylum laws Congress has passed and the executive branch has exceeded its authority.”

Meanwhile, Republican leaders have accused Mr Biden of pulling election-year stunts that will encourage more migrants to come.

“Just two weeks ago, the President pretended to crack down on the open-border catastrophe by engaging in an election-year border charade,” Mike Johnson, the Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, said on X.

“Now he’s trying to play both sides and is granting amnesty to hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens.”

One of the major talking points at the RNC so far has been the amount of crime reportedly being perpetrated by undocumented immigrants in the country.

A 12-year-old girl was killed in Houston last month, allegedly by two Venezuelan men who were in the country illegally, and another man who had migrated from Venezuela pleaded guilty to the murder in Georgia this year of Laken Riley, 22.

Speakers at the event have included the family of Rachel Morin, a Maryland woman whom prosecutors say was raped and killed by a fugitive from El Salvador.

Researchers at Stanford University, however, have found that immigrants are 60 per cent less likely to be incarcerated than US-born people.

Record numbers of migrants from Central and South America and elsewhere fleeing poverty, violence, climate change and political persecution have been arriving at the US southern border, overwhelming law enforcement agents as well as immigration judges and courts.

This has created a major liability for Mr Biden, as his Republican rivals have seized on the situation to paint the President as weak on border management.

“It's clear that the President felt political pressure to act,” Aaron Reichlin-Melnick, policy director at the American Immigration Council, told The National.

“Unfortunately, what he's actually done is not going to make a meaningful difference in the situation at the border and that's because the President cannot simply seal off the border with the stroke of a pen.”

Since taking office in 2021, Mr Biden has sought to thread a needle, observers say, by being seen as tough and effective in deterring new arrivals at the border, while also humane and intent on keeping families together.

Adopting a “carrot and stick” approach, he has paired imposing restrictions on asylum at the border with an expansion of legal ways for migrants coming from specific countries, including Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela.

The White House says the expansion of lawful pathways for migrants of certain nationalities has been combined with measures in which those who do not avail themselves of those opportunities are removed.

Amid continued high arrivals of unauthorised crossings at the border, the Biden administration has sought to work with Congress on immigration.

Early in his administration, Mr Biden tried to pass legislation that would have established a pathway to citizenship to the estimated 11 million undocumented migrants living in the US.

In February, he tried to push through a bill that would have limited the number of migrants at the border.

Both efforts were blocked by Republicans.

Mr Biden has also sought to address the “root causes” of migration in the region by funding development and job opportunities in Central America.

At the same time, he has expanded US reliance on Mexico to take back asylum seekers, a move that has been criticised by rights groups as unlawful and dangerous.

Polls show that voters believe Mr Biden's Republican rival would better handle the issue.

Mr Trump made being tough on immigration a main policy goal during his time in office.

He tried to instate an asylum ban, expanded construction of the border wall with Mexico, separated migrant parents from their children and passed legislation banning citizens from several Muslim-majority countries from entering the US.

If elected to a second term, he has vowed to intensify his anti-immigration stance and conduct mass deportation for undocumented migrants. This is a message that has resonated with his supporters, and beyond.

Mr Biden appears to have borrowed policy ideas from Mr Trump and largely relied on deterrence when it comes to immigration, Maureen Meyer, vice president for programmes at the Washington Office on Latin America, told The National.

“On the one hand, we have important steps taken by the Biden administration to expand legal pathways,” she said.

“On the other, though, we still see an administration that has relied, just like its predecessor, on deterrence and enforcement as the key part of the strategy.

“I think it was clear after the first few months of the Biden administration that the message they wanted to convey is: don't come.”

In 2020, Mr Biden ran on a campaign promise to undo Mr Trump's anti-immigrant legacy and be more welcoming towards migrants.

There are now indications that Latino and progressive voters, who comprise a critical bloc in his re-election effort, might punish him in November for failing to deliver on that promise.

A recent poll of Latino voters conducted by Equis found that 72 per cent of respondents gave “broken promises” by Democrats as a top concern, with 65 per cent giving the failure to deliver on a pathway to citizenship for undocumented people.

Only 38 per cent said they trust Mr Biden and his Democratic Party on immigration.

“You have seen the Biden administration abandon a lot of the high-minded goals that they had when they took office,” Mr Reichlin-Melnick said.

“It has really transitioned to a stage where they are saying, we may not go as far as the Trump administration for people who are coming, but we clearly share the Trump administration's desires to use as many tools available to them to stop people from crossing.”