President Joe Biden is visiting the US-Mexico border for the first time since taking office, tackling one of the most politically charged issues in the country.

His visit on Sunday was not expected to result in new policies, but rather to demonstrate that he is taking the issue seriously and to strengthen relations with Border Patrol agents, some of whom have bristled at the rollback of hardline enforcement policies by the White House.

President Biden announced on Thursday his administration’s plan to block Cuban, Haitian and Nicaraguan migrants at the border, expanding the nationalities of those who can be expelled back to Mexico.

The long-term goal of Congress reforming America’s creaky immigration system is unlikely to succeed given Republicans’ newly assumed control of the US House of Representatives.

Right-wing politicians have repeatedly torpedoed US immigration reform proposals over the past two decades.

President Biden sent Congress an immigration reform plan on his first day in office two years ago, but it floundered due to opposition from Republicans, who also blocked his request for $US3.5 billion ($A5.1 billion) to beef up border enforcement.

Republicans are pushing their own plans for the border following a midterm election in they seized a narrow majority in the House of Representatives.

Texas’ Republican Governor, Greg Abbott, met President Biden in El Paso and handed him a letter outlining five steps to address the border crisis – including detaining the millions of people in the United States illegally.

Republican US Representative Jim Jordan told Fox News on Sunday that his party could help the Democrats – but only if President Biden adopted the enforcement policies of former President Donald Trump.

Those policies included separating children from their migrant parents as part of a “zero-tolerance” approach to deter illegal immigration.

“They’ve allowed now a situation where frankly, we no longer have a border,” Mr Jordan said.

President Biden, joined by Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas, is expected to meet in El Paso with congressional politicians, local officials and community leaders.

Mr Mayorkas on Sunday said two of the key elements leading to increased numbers of migrants making their way to the United States – international crises and legislative stasis – were outside the president’s control.

“We’re just dealing with a broken system,” Mr Mayorkas told reporters aboard Air Force One on the way to Texas.

The White House said President Biden would assess border enforcement operations in El Paso, where the Democratic mayor declared a state of emergency last month, citing hundreds of migrants’ sleeping on the streets in cold temperatures and thousands being apprehended every day.

US border officials apprehended a record 2.2 million migrants at the border with Mexico in the 2022 fiscal year that ended in September, though that number includes individuals who tried to cross multiple times.

At the same time as he expanded his authority to expel migrants, President Biden on Thursday opened legal, limited pathways into the country for Cubans, Nicaraguans and Haitians – allowing up to 30,000 people from those three countries plus Venezuela to enter the country by air each month.

– AAP

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