After two years in office, Joe Biden made his first visit as president to the U.S.-Mexico south border under heavy criticism of his administration’s migration crisis management.

Although he apparently found no migrants at El Paso County’s Migrant Services Center, Biden inspected a busy port of entry in his first stop and then walked along a metal fence that separates the U.S. city of Ciudad Juarez.

Biden faces criticism from both Republicans, who blame his administration for the border crisis, and from immigrant rights activists, who accuse him of establishing cruel policies not far different from Donald Trump’s.  On January 5, the president said the U.S. will immediately begin refusing Cubans, Haitians and Nicaraguans who cross the Mexican border illegally and urged immigrants not to appear at the border and to apply for their visas legally.

According to the Associated Press, In a sign of the deep tensions over immigration, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a Republican, handed Biden a letter as soon as he touched down in the state that said the ‘chaos’ at the border was a ‘direct result’ of the president’s failure to enforce federal laws. Biden later took the letter out of his jacket pocket during his tour, telling reporters, ‘I haven’t read it yet’.”

Biden’s visit was scheduled at a time when border crossings had already dropped drastically in El Paso. Still, CNN’s RosaFlores reported on Sunday [8] that hundreds of migrants, including children, were living on the street after crossing into the United States in El Paso. And nearly 1,000 additional migrants were in federal custody in detention facilities in El Paso on Sunday, according to the City of El Paso’s migrant dashboard”.

According to the Associated Press, El Paso County Judge Ricardo Samaniego welcomed Biden’s visit, but said a current lull in arrivals prevented the president from seeing how large the group of newcomers has been.

El Paso is currently the biggest corridor for illegal crossings, in large part due to Nicaraguans fleeing repression, crime and poverty in their country. They are among migrants from four countries who are now subject to quick expulsion under new rules enacted by the Biden administration in the past week that drew strong criticism from immigration advocates. According to the same publication, “Biden’s recent policy announcements on border security and his visit to the border were aimed in part at blunting the impact of upcoming investigations into immigration promised by House Republicans”.

The numbers of migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border has risen dramatically during Biden’s first two years in office. There were more than 2.38 million stops during the year that ended Sept. 30, the first time the number topped 2 million.

“The U.S. will also turn away migrants who do not seek asylum first in a country they traveled through en route to the U.S. Migrants are being asked to complete a form on a phone app so that they they can go to a port of entry at a pre-scheduled date and time”, the Associated Press reported.

Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters aboard Air Force One that the administration is trying to “incentivize a safe and orderly way and cut out the smuggling organizations,” saying the policies are “not a ban at all” but an attempt to protect migrants from the trauma that smuggling can create.