The White House on Monday batted away questions about controversial plans to pay compensation to families separated at the border - just days after President Biden said he was in favor of payments to people who suffered under the Trump administration's zero tolerance policy.
Last week Biden said reports he was planning to pay as much as $450,000 to separated families were 'garbage' before apparently backtracking.
The result has been an administration under pressure from both left and right to explain its plans.
But White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre offered no further clarity when asked about the issue during the daily briefing on Monday.
'I will direct you to the Department of Justice for any specifics on that,' she said.
'You've asked us this question.
'We have answered it and I will refer you to the Department of Justice on any specifics.'
White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre referred questions about compensation for separated families to the Department of Justice. It comes after a series of reversals about whether the administration was planning to pay compensation to families separated at the border under Trump and how much the payments would be
Biden initially dismissed the reports as 'garbage' but later delivered a passionate defense, saying 'the outrageous behavior of the last administration' meant it was right to compensate parents who had their children taken away from them at the border
Her reticence is a new departure for a White House that has been keen to respond to the reports.
Details surfaced first in the Wall Street Journal last week. It reported that the Biden administration was in talks to offer immigrant families separated at the border up to $450,000 a person in compensation.
Biden was asked about it last week and dismissed the claim as 'garbage.'
'But it's not true,' he said without getting into further details.
That attracted the anger of the American Civil Liberties Union, which said the president either had not been briefed properly or was abandoning a promise to undo Trump's strictest immigration laws.
'President Biden may not have been fully briefed about the actions of his very own Justice Department as it carefully deliberated and considered the crimes committed against thousands of families separated from their children as an intentional governmental policy,' ACLU Executive Director Anthony Romero told Fox News.
But Jean-Pierre took a different line when she was asked about it in the briefing room a day later.
'If it saves taxpayer dollars and puts the disastrous history of the previous administration's use of "zero tolerance" and family separation behind us, the president is perfectly comfortable with the Department of Justice settling with the individuals and families who are currently in litigation with the US government,' she said.
A U.S. Border Patrol agent gives instructions to immigrant families as they prepare to board transport to a processing center after crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in La Joya, Texas
Biden tried to clear things up on Saturday after speaking about the passage of the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill.
He said he had been referring only to the figure of $450,000 rather than the idea of compensating families that were split up when Fox News's David Spunt asked him about his 'garbage comments.
'No I didn't say that,' he said. 'Let's get it straight, you said everybody coming across the border gets $450,000.'
Instead, he offered a passionate defense of the principle.
'If in fact, because of the outrageous behavior of the last administration, you were coming across the border, whether it was legal or illegal, and you lost your child,' he said raising his voice, 'you lost your child - it's gone - you deserve some kind of compensation, no matter what the circumstance.
'What that will be, I have no idea. I have no idea.'
The idea brought a quick backlash from critics.
Republican Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is a possible 2024 presidential candidate, described the proposal as a 'slap in the face' to hardworking Americans.
'I mean, you think about it, Americans are getting more in their gas bills,' he said.
'They're getting more in their grocery bills.
'You've had all kinds of really bad policies throughout our country that have limited freedom.
'And you're going to turn around for that and you're going to do $475,000 for an individual that came illegally to this country?'
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