Biden vows to ‘shut down the border’ if Senate immigration bill is passed

Joe Biden said on Friday that the border deal being negotiated in the US Senate was the “toughest and fairest” set of reforms possible and vowed to “shut down the border” the day he signs the bill.

The bipartisan talks have hit a critical point amid mounting Republican opposition. Some Republicans have set a deal on border security as a condition for further Ukraine aid.

Earlier in the day, the House speaker, Mike Johnson, said the deal is “dead on arrival” in its current form, according to a letter to Republican lawmakers in the House of Representatives reviewed by Reuters.

Biden, a Democrat seeking another term in the 5 November elections, has grappled with record numbers of migrants caught illegally crossing the US-Mexico border during his presidency. Republicans contend Biden should have kept the restrictive policies of Republican former President Donald Trump, the frontrunner for his party’s nomination.

“What’s been negotiated would – if passed into law – be the toughest and fairest set of reforms to secure the border we’ve ever had in our country,” Biden said in a statement.

“It would give me, as President, a new emergency authority to shut down the border when it becomes overwhelmed. And if given that authority, I would use it the day I sign the bill into law.”

The White House has agreed to new limits on asylum at the border, including the creation of an expulsion power that would allow migrants who cross the US-Mexico border illegally to be rapidly returned to Mexico if migrant encounters surpass 4,000 per day, three sources familiar with the matter said.

If encounters pass 5,000 per day, the use of the expulsion authority would become mandatory, according to the sources who requested anonymity to discuss details of the