- President Joe Biden introduced a new immigration policy Tuesday
- READ MORE: Illegal immigrants married to Americans will have a pathway
- Biden criticized Trump for wanting to put migrants in detention camps
President Joe Biden insisted Tuesday that he's not 'playing politics' with immigration policy, at the same event where he ripped into former President Donald Trump for promising to put illegal immigrants in detention camps.
At an East Room event, Biden rolled out a new policy that would allow roughly 500,000 undocumented spouses of U.S. citizens a pathway to citizenship if they've lived in the country for at least 10 years.
Biden suggested the election year move was happening this summer to prevent some of the deportations that Trump has pledged should he be victorious in the fall.
'When he was president he separated families and children at the border,' Biden recalled. 'And now he's proposing to rip spouses and children from their families and homes and communities and put them in detention camps.'
The miffed Democrat continued: 'He's actually saying these things. It's hard to believe it's being said. He's actually saying these things out loud.'
President Joe Biden said he wasn't 'playing politics' with the border, though ripped former President Donald Trump for his plans to put illegal immigrants into detention camps should he be the victor in November
President Joe Biden (left) hugs Javier Quiroz Castro (right) at the White House Tuesday. As the president marked 15 years of DACA, which gave Castro citizenship, he rolled out a plan to help spouses of U.S. citizens who entered the U.S. illegally a way to become citizens
'It's outrageous,' Biden uttered.
'Folks, I'm not interested in playing politics with the border or immigration I'm interested in fixing it,' the Democrat added.
Tuesday's announcement came after earlier this month Biden made a move to shut down U.S.-Mexico border crossings - by barring most migrants from being able to claim asylum if they came into the U.S. that way.
That policy was more in-line with what Trump has pitched.
Since then, Trump has called it 'bulls***,' as much of the Republican's campaign has been based on claiming that Biden has does nothing to secure the U.S.-Mexico border.
At the same time, liberal groups weren't pleased with Biden's executive action since it mirrored a Trump-endorsed policy.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre denied that Tuesday's move to help spouses - which coincided with the 15-year annivesary of the DACA program - was to provide a counter-balance to the controversial asylum plan.
Former President Donald Trump, seen at a campaign event Saturday in Detroit, has called Biden's executive order on asylum 'bulls***,' while also pledging to put illegal immigrants in detention camps ahead of a mass deportation
'I wouldn't look at it that way, I really wouldn't,' she said.
'We're seeing immigration policy that has not been revamped in some time and the president wants to address that,' she continued. 'And we can do the EO and deal with border security ... and also make sure that American families are not broken up.'
During the East Room event, Biden pushed that he could do two things at once - secure the border and provide a pathway to citizenship for some illegal residents.
'I refuse to believe that to secure our border we have to walk away from being America,' Biden said.
'But I also refuse to believe that for us to continue to be America, that embraces immigration, we have to give up securing our border,' he continued.
'They're false choices,' the president added. 'We can both secure the border and provide legal pathways to citizenship.'
