I’ve generally been of the opinion that Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Laredo) gets a raw deal from progressives too much, given that I believe he’s the only guy who can hold this district and I believe he does want to try to ensure things like the ultimate passage of President Biden’s immigration package with a few Republican votes (something I think is important to ensure it endures and isn’t as politicized as the ACA turned out to be).
However, I’m not impressed to see Cuellar being cited yet again by anti-immigrant groups like the Center for Immigration Studies, and being used as a prop to justify their positions. I won’t link to CIS’ website, but this is from something they posted yesterday.
In an interview with NBC News on April 30, President Joe Biden stated that “we have now gotten control” at the border, premised on the fact that the number of unaccompanied alien children (UACs) in Border Patrol custody has dropped. Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas), however, disagreed on Fox News on May 2, asserting: “To say that we have everything under control — you know I'm supportive of President Biden, I'm a supporter of his — but we're not paying attention to the border's communities.”
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The president and major news outlets seem to be pushing the same story — that because children are not sleeping on the floor in Border Patrol stations for days under Mylar blankets, the Southwest border is under control. As noted, that is not how Rep. Cuellar views it.
Responding to the president’s failure to discuss the situation at the border in his April 28 joint address to Congress, Cuellar stated: “There is a border crisis, no ifs, ands, or buts about it.”
It’s worth noting that Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Arizona) is also being used similarly by CIS.
And remembering that CIS is a designated hate group with white nationalist ties according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
The situation at the border is very complicated, and the Biden Administration doesn’t have it entirely right. They’ve kept a lot of Trump policy on the books. It's making things worse. And things are not good. But Cuellar has got to start finding a way to talk about this without making himself into prop that is routinely deployed by the very worst people engaged in immigration debates.