Biden: It Will Take 6 Months to Fix Trump Border Policies

'The timeline is to do it so that we, in fact, make it better not worse'
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Dec 22, 2020 5:46 PM CST
Biden: It Will Take 6 Months to Fix Trump Border Policies
President-elect Joe Biden speaks at the Queen Theater in Wilmington, Del., Tuesday, Dec 22, 2020.   (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

President-elect Joe Biden says he won’t immediately roll back President Trump’s actions on immigration despite some advocates pushing for action as soon as he takes the oath of office in January. Biden said Tuesday that he will work to undo his predecessor’s actions and will focus on "humane" immigration policies that reunify families separated by the Trump administration at the US-Mexico border but it will take time, the AP reports. The Democrat said it may take six months to lift Trump’s immigration restrictions. "The timeline is to do it so that we, in fact, make it better not worse," Biden said Tuesday, per the Washington Post. "I will do what I said. It’s going to take—not Day 1—it’s going to take probably the next six months to put that in place."

The president-elect said his administration needs to ensure that rolling back those policies does not create any new crises and must also ensure there’s enough funding for asylum judges and for policy changes. Biden said he’s working with immigrant advocates and having discussions with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador and Latin American leaders. On Monday, incoming domestic policy adviser Susan Rice told Spanish news agency EFE that asylum seekers should not expect the border to fully reopen on Jan. 20. "Our priority is to reopen asylum processing at the border consistent with the capacity to do so safely and to protect public health, especially in the context of COVID-19," she said.

(More Joe Biden stories.)

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