White House, State Department Won’t Say Whether They Asked Mexico to Crack Down on Immigrants

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The Biden administration is refusing to say whether it asked Mexico to assist with cracking down on immigrants headed for the United States border.

Asked about the situation, a State Department spokesperson said the U.S. “appreciated” Mexico’s effort to stop migrants from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras from reaching American soil, according to a Reuters report, but refused to say whether administration officials asked Mexico to take action. The White House, meanwhile, did not respond to a request for comment.

The refusal to comment came as four people familiar with the matter said Mexican authorities were preparing to crack down on immigrants illegally entering the country on their way to the U.S. “The operations will be more frequent, more continuous, and we will be taking part,” said a member of Mexico’s National Guard.

The border has been besieged since President Joe Biden took office in January, with Customs and Border Protection intercepting the highest number of immigrants attempting to enter since 2019. One such “caravan” of migrants made headlines this month for wearing shirts with the words, “Biden please us in.”

“They see him as the migrant president, and so many feel they’re going to reach the United States,” Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said of Biden this month. “We need to work together to regulate the flow, because this business can’t be tackled from one day to the next.”

In an interview with George Stephanopoulos over the weekend, Biden denied that he was provoking the surge. “The idea that Joe Biden said, ‘Come’ — because I heard the other day that they’re coming because they know I’m a nice guy,” Biden said, prompting Stephanopoulos to interject, “They’re saying this!”

“Here’s the deal, they’re not,” Biden replied.