President Joe Biden's visit with Border Patrol agents in El Paso, Texas, fell far short of guaranteeing U.S. immigration policy will improve conditions there, Mark Morgan, former acting Commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said Monday.
In an interview on Newsmax's "Wake Up America," Morgan said the massive influx of migrants "is a disaster that was self-inflicted."
"I'm glad he went," Morgan said of Biden's quick-stop visit with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott at the southern border.
"The president is where exactly he should be," he said, but noted "I also think that critics like Gov. Abbott are …justified in their criticism that it's a little too late and a little too little. This isn't like a natural disaster. This is a disaster that was self-inflicted. This administration, this president created this disaster."
Morgan said he's "very skeptical" that anything will change because of the visit — and blasted the lack of any Republican participation on the trip.
"Not a single Republican politician was on the trip," Morgan said. "Governor Abbott had to fly down there at the last minute because he got a call from a Biden staffer saying, 'Hey you can join him on the tarmac if you want to.' But there was no substantive discussion between the president and Governor Abbott. … President Biden didn't spend a tremendous amount of time one-on-one with the governor, actually engaging him."
Morgan said he suspects Biden was "told he had to" make the border stop on his way to meetings in Mexico.
"I think he was told he had to go down there," Morgan said. "And that's a big difference …when the reporters shouted a couple of questions out, one of his response was exactly what we would expect. 'Well, I was told they need a lot more resources.' Yeah, of course.
"You're never going to hear anybody on the front line saying you need less resources. But make no mistake. That's not the issue here. They have the same amount of resources they had on the Trump administration before this catastrophe. … This is a policy issue at the end of this president's pen."
According to Morgan, Biden likely "had no choice" but to make the Texas border stop on his way to Mexico.
"There was no way he could literally fly over our border into Mexico and not stop," Morgan said, adding "I think it is insulting. ... I think that's why we're not going to see anything substantively changed from this meeting" in Mexico.