This is what Biden didn’t see at the border during three-hour visit: Migrants assembling to cross

President Joe Biden became closer than he ever thought to the hundreds of illegal immigrants who had just set foot on American soil during their trek across the border on Sunday.

As his presidential motorcade sped down closed roads from a visit to yet another carefully staged facility, he came within dozens of feet of immigrants lining the wrong side of the border fence.

They cheered as Biden’s convoy ran past them even though he almost certainly would not have noticed their presence.

It marked an ironic twist to a quick tour of border facilities in El Paso, where the president stayed off the streets where he might see migrants at large in the city.

The episode echoes Republican criticism that the visit was little more than a border photo op.

And it comes amid claims that El Paso, the epicenter of a surge of immigrants last month, had cleaned up ahead of Biden’s visit.

In all, the president spent three hours on the ground near the border, meeting with officials and charities that help migrants.

However, he was not seen meeting any migrants.

After visiting the busy port of entry at the Bridge of the Americas, which connects El Paso with the Mexican city of Ciudad Juárez, Biden was driven to his next stop at the El Paso County Migrant Services Center.

The convoy of police vehicles, vans and buses carrying personnel, Secret Service agents and journalists was traveling at high speed on roads that were closed to regular traffic.

The 21-minute drive took them past the heavily fortified border, where Texas National Guard troops have been deployed to stem the flow of immigrants.

But the vehicles were clearly visible to the migrants on the other side of the border fence.

Some 200 people had just crossed from Mexican territory, through the murky waters of the Rio Grande, and had gathered on US soil at a gate in the fence as they waited for Border Patrol to let them through.

This is how the complicated business of processing at the border works.

Arrivals are herded inside the fence by border agents, who then have to process their asylum claims and decide who will be immediately deported and who can present their case before a judge.

The poorly dressed newcomers, mostly male and mostly without possessions, were not part of Biden’s tour.

Instead, he met local officials at the airport and was then taken to the Bridge of the Americas for an up-close look at the border and a bustling port of entry.

He watched border agents demonstrate how they search vehicles for drugs, money and other contraband.

A yellow lab was shown sniffing fruit and meat in a vehicle, before a chocolate lab retrieved what appeared to be a package of drugs from another car.

As he made his way through the port of entry, a sign reading ‘Welcome to Mexico’ could be seen on the other side of the border.

From there, he passed the fence and headed to the El Paso County Migrant Services Center to learn about services offered to new arrivals.

He asked how many people passed through the center and was told between 300 and 500 a day, although sometimes it reached 1,000.

POTUS asked how many people do you have?

He said it varies. One of the people said that the average per day was about 300-500 migrants per day, but that sometimes they have peaks of about 1000 per day.

Republicans denounced the visit as a carefully managed photo op and pointed to reports that the city of El Paso had been cleaned up in advance.

Biden was met at the airport by Greg Abbott, the state’s Republican governor, who handed him a letter denouncing his border policies.

“Your visit to our southern border with Mexico today is $20 billion too little and two years too late,” he said.

“In addition, your visit avoids the sites of mass illegal immigration and dodges the thousands of angry Texas property owners whose lives have been destroyed by your border policies.”

Representatives of the border agents said it was impossible for the president to see the real image during such a brief visit, which lasted just over three hours.

Brandon Judd, president of the National Border Patrol Council, which represents 18,000 agents, said, “You’re hardly going to understand the scope of what’s going on.”