'Political pandering': GOP lawmakers rip Biden's 'mass amnesty' order as election-year ploy
Top House Republicans are criticizing President Biden's new executive order that's expected to shield as many as 500,000 illegal immigrants from deportation.
"President Biden’s election-year, 11th-hour ploy for mass amnesty is not surprising, but it is an important reminder for anyone who doubted: This administration was never serious about securing the border," House Homeland Security Committee Chair Mark Green, R-Tenn., told Fox News Digital.
"By allowing otherwise inadmissible aliens to remain in the country indefinitely through a ‘parole-in-place’ sleight of hand and to receive generous, taxpayer-funded benefits, this president is sending a loud and clear message to any would-be border crosser that the door is not only wide open, there’s a welcome mat."
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Biden unveiled a plan on Tuesday aimed at giving undocumented spouses of U.S. citizens a pathway to permanent residency if they have lived in the U.S. for at least 10 years and satisfy legal requirements.
In addition to protecting a half million undocumented spouses, the order also protects 50,000 noncitizens under age 21 whose parent is married to a U.S. citizen, the administration said.
But GOP lawmakers like Green dismissed it as a cynical bid to win over Hispanic and Latino voters ahead of the November election.
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"Joe Biden is a failed president kowtowing to the same left-wing radicals who pushed him to throw open the border in the first place. Americans are begging for more border security, but the Administration’s misplaced mass amnesty plan encourages even more illegal immigration," National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Richard Hudson, R-N.C., told Fox News Digital.
Rep. August Pfluger, R-Texas, a member of the Homeland Security Committee, said, "Within the same month, he pretended to shut down the border with a meaningless executive action, and now he is granting mass amnesty to half a million illegal migrants. This is political pandering in an election year at its finest."
Biden's executive order inspired praise from Democrats in the House.
"President Biden's actions will keep American families together," Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chair Nanette Barragan, D-Calif., said on X. "In California it means possible relief for up to 120,000 non-citizen spouses and provide many of our DACA recipients and Dreamers the opportunity to continue their pursuit of the American dream."
Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., wrote on X, "President Biden's executive action is the most significant positive policy change for immigrants and their families since the DACA program in 2012."
The amnesty order comes after Biden issued another directive this month severely restricting asylum claims at the southern border.
But the president's Republican critics have dismissed that effort as too little, too late, as major cities far from the border are now grappling with the effects of the migrant crisis.
"Just two weeks ago, the President pretended to crack down on the open-border catastrophe by engaging an election-year border charade. Now he’s trying to play both sides and is granting amnesty to hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens," Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said in a Tuesday afternoon statement. "The President may think our homeland security is some kind of game that he can try to use for political points, but Americans know this amnesty plan will only incentivize more illegal immigration and endanger Americans."
Fox News Digital reached out to the White House for comment.