It's fair to say that Donald Trump is to blame for this one. See https://edition.cnn.com/2024/01/25/politics/gop-senators-ang...:
"Senior Senate Republicans are furious that Donald Trump may have killed an emerging bipartisan deal over the southern border, depriving them of a key legislative achievement on a pressing national priority and offering a preview of what’s to come with Trump as their likely presidential nominee.
In recent weeks, Trump has been lobbying Republicans both in private conversations and in public statements on social media to oppose the border compromise being delicately hashed out in the Senate, according to GOP sources familiar with the conversations – in part because he wants to campaign on the issue this November and doesn’t want President Joe Biden to score a victory in an area where he is politically vulnerable."
I consider a DEI hire because Biden made his intentions clear. He specifically said he was going to pick a woman, and I thought he specifically said a black woman but may I'm misremembering that. Saying you are reducing the pool of candidates specifically for a diversity factor makes that person a DEI hire, I'm not really sure how else to see it.
Its also worth noting that being a DEI hire doesn't say anything about the person's ability to do the role. Though I don't view her as being effective in her role, that is because of her experience and what she has accomplished and isn't because she was a DEI hire.