White House seizes on Mitch McConnell saying Trump stalled action on border security

WASHINGTON — The White House is seizing on remarks by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell that former President Donald Trump was resistant to accepting any bipartisan compromise to toughen border security laws.

The comments from McConnell, R-Ky., came hours before the Senate passed a sweeping $95 billion foreign aid package providing assistance to Ukraine and Israel, capping months of internal GOP infighting that culminated in no immigration add-ons.

“This week Senator McConnell explicitly said why the toughest, fairest bipartisan border legislation in modern American history is stalled: ‘our nominee for president did not seem to want us to do anything at all,’” White House spokesperson Andrew Bates told NBC News in an email Thursday.

“After President Biden worked with Republicans and Democrats in the Senate to assemble a landmark deal that secured the border and cracked down on fentanyl, congressional Republicans have been direct about why many of them sided with drug cartels and human smugglers over the Border Patrol Union and the Chamber of Commerce — because Donald Trump told them to,” Bates added, while also noting the declining crime rate nationwide. “President Biden will not allow extreme Republican officials to endanger American communities. He will keep fighting for the toughest, fairest border security deal in decades.”

The White House’s swipe at Trump and Republicans comes in the midst of a campaign between Biden and the ex-president. Trump has made anxieties about the immigration and the asylum system a central component of his pitch to voters, and surveys show voters trust Trump over Biden by wide margins on handling the border.

Biden is trying to neutralize his vulnerability by arguing that Trump doesn’t