Psaki walks back Biden's border 'crisis' comments, acknowledges 'crisis in Central America'

When President Biden referred to an immigration-related "crisis" over the weekend, he was not referring to migrants crossing the southern border, White House press secretary Jen Psaki insisted to reporters Monday.

"The president does not feel that children coming to our border seeking refuge from violence, economic hardships, and other dire circumstances is a crisis," Psaki said during a press briefing on Monday. "He does feel that the crisis in Central America, the dire circumstances that many are fleeing from, that that is a situation we need to spend our time, our effort on, and we need to address it if we’re going to prevent more of an influx of migrants from coming in years to come." The president's discussion of a crisis was meant to explain why he had not yet raised the cap on refugees that had been put in place by former President Donald Trump.