NATIONAL HARBOR, Maryland — Gov. Kristi Noem (R-SD) slammed President Joe Biden on Friday for his lack of action to address illegal immigration on the southern border, claiming he has the authority to “change everything within 24 hours” with the laws already in place.
“Joe Biden saying he needed a bill to make a difference was a lie,” she told the Washington Examiner in an interview at the American Conservative Union’s 2024 Conservative Political Action Conference.
“[Biden] could right now, today, implement the same policies that President Trump had in place when he was in the White House,” the governor said.
As to what this would include, the South Dakota governor said Biden could take action to put in place a “Remain in Mexico” style policy, secure the border, and allow Border Patrol agents to do their jobs without being restricted by his administration.
The “most disturbing” part, she explained, is Biden “knew that he could reverse his own policies,” which Noem claimed would usher in an immediate change. “He didn’t have to wait for Congress,” she added.
Noem was one of several prominent Republicans who came out against a bipartisan border and immigration measure in the Senate, which former President Donald Trump had also denounced.
“I felt like it was codifying illegal immigration,” she said of the border legislation. “You would have put in statute the ability for people to come to this country illegally.”
According to her, since Biden can address much of the problem at the southern border without additional legislation, it isn’t necessary to pass a bill. And it was “a terrible bill,” at that, she said. “It literally set a number of people who were allowed to come here illegally and not through our immigration process,” she added.
Noem has used her position as South Dakota governor to try and address the border, where she believes the Biden administration is failing, sending the state’s National Guard for the fifth time.
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“They’ll actually be engineers constructing the barrier that is working,” she said of the latest trip.
Despite its distance from the southern border, Noem said, “people in South Dakota are living with the the effects of that open border policy every single day.”
