Harris’s failed, weak, and dangerously liberal immigration record

 Vice President Kamala Harris, whom her campaign says should never be referred to as President Joe Biden’s Border Czar, now says she “will proudly” put her record up against President Donald Trump’s on any issue, “including, for example, on the issue of immigration.”

Let’s do that.

Before we turn to the numbers, it should first be noted that as lax and extreme on border security as President Joe Biden and his administration have been, Harris was even more radical as a presidential candidate and as a senator.

As a senator, she fought against Trump’s efforts to increase funding for new Border Patrol agents and migrant detention beds. She also tried to defund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and funnel that money to non-profit organizations that encourage illegal immigration. 

As a presidential candidate, Harris said she wanted to decriminalize illegal border crossings, which even Biden was not prepared to do. Harris also said she would extend free healthcare to illegal immigrants, a policy her radical home state of California has since implemented.

While Biden is not as radical as Kamala, he still let millions of illegal immigrants into the country. Immediately upon entering office with Harris, he ended Trump’s Remain in Mexico program, which required asylum-seekers to wait until their cases were adjudicated before crossing into our nation. Instead, he and Harris let illegal migrants in to go wherever they wanted. Biden and Harris ended all deportations from the interior of the country for 100 days, and curtailed the number of interior deportations since. In the final year before COVID-19, Trump deported 267,258 illegal immigrants from the country’s interior. In Biden’s first full year in office, he deported just 72,177.

The results of the Biden-Harris immigration policies were swift. Southwest border apprehensions soared from fewer than 75,000 in the month before Harris took office to over 100,000 the month after she took office. It further soared to more than 300,000 in December 2023. All told, there have been more than 8 million Southwest border apprehensions since Harris became vice president and was given special responsibility for tackling the issue, compared to less than 2.5 million during Trump’s full four-year term.

The total number of illegal immigrants in the country fell during Trump’s term, but the number under Harris has surged by almost 4 million. These have been a strain on communities, including Democrat-controlled communities, across the country. Cities, including Denver, Chicago, New York, and Washington, D.C., have pleaded for federal bailouts to pay to feed, house, and educate migrants and provide them with healthcare.

Not only has Harris failed even to speak to the last two Border Patrol Chiefs, she actually mocked the suggestion she should visit the southern border. “I don’t understand the point you are making,” she laughed when NBC News’ Lester Holt corrected her and pointed out that she had never been to the border.

Harris’s campaign claims she is better on border security because she supported legislation authored by Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), but it would have made the crisis worse. It codifies catch-and-release policies by creating a new “Alternatives to Detention” pathway for illegal migrants to be released into the country and set on a path to work permits and amnesty. The bill would have done nothing to prevent the murder of Laken Riley or the other violent crimes perpetrated by illegal immigrants the Biden-Harris administration welcomed into the country. 

Harris can flip-flop and abandon her past border positions, but she can’t run away from the Biden-Harris record of border failure.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/3106230/kamalas-harris-failed-weak-and-dangerously-liberal-immigration-record/