Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris visited the U.S.-Mexico border for the first time in her 2024 presidential campaign on Friday, calling for tighter asylum restrictions and vowing to make stopping fentanyl from entering the U.S. a "top priority."
Harris spoke in Douglas, Arizona, a border town of less than 17,000 people, on Friday, where she accused her Republican rival Donald Trump of "fanning the flames of fear and division," over the impact of immigrants on American life.
Harris called for more punitive measures for people crossing the border illegally, following an asylum ban for those entering the U.S. illegally established by President Joe Biden this year.
"I will take further action to keep the border closed between ports of entry. Those who cross our borders unlawfully will be apprehended and removed and barred from re-entering for five years," Harris said.
"We will pursue more severe criminal charges against repeat violators, and if someone does not make an asylum request at a legal point of entry and instead crosses our border unlawfully, they will be barred from receiving asylum," she said.
But Harris also said that her policy would forge a path for a humane immigration program.
"I reject the false choice that suggests we must either choose between securing our border or creating a system of immigration that is safe, orderly and humane," Harris said. "We can and we must do both."
Some 7 million migrants have been arrested illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border during the Biden administration, according to government data, a record high number that has fueled criticism from Trump.
But illegal border crossings have dropped sharply since Biden announced the asylum ban earlier this year.
In Douglas, Harris spoke to Customs and Border Protection officials and viewed part of a border barrier constructed between 2011 and 2012, during the Obama administration, the White House said.
Harris also received a briefing on the CBP’s drug enforcement operations and viewed inspection technology used to seize illegal drugs, including fentanyl, the campaign said, noting that border officials stopped more fentanyl at ports of entry in 2022 and 2023 than in the previous five fiscal years combined.
Harris was introduced by Theresa Guerrero, whose 31-year-old son Jacob Guerrero died from fentanyl poisoning. She accused Trump of blocking a comprehensive border security bill that would have stemmed the flow of fentanyl.
Harris said she would target the "entire global fentanyl supply chain" to materially and sustainably disrupt the flow of illicit fentanyl, calling on China to do more to crack down on fentanyl precursor chemicals.
Fentanyl overdoses have surged to become the leading cause of death for Americans between the ages of 18 and 45. Over 107,000 Americans died from drug overdoses in 2023.
Trump and his running mate JD Vance have increased their criticism of immigrants in recent weeks, repeating falsehoods about legal Haitian immigrants in Vance's home state of Ohio and suggesting that immigrants were committing crimes and stealing jobs from U.S. citizens.
Immigration is a top issue for voters. Arizona is a closely contested election state, with a high population of Latino voters sought by both parties. And the nation's porous southern border remains a source of fentanyl, a leading cause of drug overdoses in the United States.
On Friday, Trump blamed Harris for the rising trend of irregular migration.
"The architect of this destruction is Kamala Harris," Trump said at Trump Tower in Manhattan. "She keeps talking about how she supposedly wants to fix the border. We would merely ask, Why didn't she do it four years ago? It's a very simple question."
He also accused Harris of turning small towns in the U.S. into "blighted refugee camps."
A wide-ranging border security bill that took months to negotiate was blocked by the U.S. Senate in February, after Trump pressed Republicans to reject any compromise.
A Reuters/Ipsos poll last month found that 43% of voters favored Trump on the issue of immigration and 33% favored Harris, while 24% either didn't know, chose someone else or refused to answer.
Harris was California's attorney general before being elected to the U.S. Senate and then vice president. Her California remit included targeting gangs that operate on both sides of the border and traffic in drugs, guns and people.
Biden also tasked Harris with dealing with the root causes of migration from Central America, a diplomatic issue on which her record is mixed.
Emigration from Latin America, the Caribbean and Asia to the United States has created unease among voters concerned about what the trend means for the U.S. economy, crime rates and culture. The share of American residents born abroad rose by nearly a fifth to 47.8 million from 2010 to 2023, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
© Thomson Reuters 2024.
31 Comments
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Wick's pencil
Over 3 years too late. What is her excuse for ignoring the problem during years as border czar?
Zaphod
Now she is channeling Trump again. What a show...
Blacklabel
Kamala:
illegal immigrants “are American, in every way”
bass4funk
That was so painful to watch my God….
Forgotten
Why is this even in the news? It's so obvious that these are just campaign talks.
Bob Fosse
“Why won’t she address immigration”
Addresses immigration
”Boo hoo”
dagon
Talking about architecture and Trump Tower and illegal immigration, how about all the undocumented workers Trump employs there?
https://time.com/4465744/donald-trump-undocumented-workers/
Blacklabel
Would? had 4 years to do this already, why hasn’t she?
Peter Neil
deported more than trump.
why didn't he?
Dango bong
funny. she has been in charge of the border for 4 years
Underworld
Blacklabel
Harris said she would target the "entire global fentanyl supply chain" to materially and sustainably disrupt the flow of illicit fentanyl,
Because she isn't president.
Most voters see Harris as the candidate of change.
Eastmann
question
as VP what did you do abt it until now?
reply is NOTHING.
Blacklabel
Because Trump blocked them from entering and also stopped them from showing up by telling them they are unwelcome.
Don’t have to deport people who don’t enter.
biden and Harris encourage them to come and let them in where they get free stuff.
bass4funk
More lib deflection. That has nothing to do with the 10 million this administration and Myorkas allowed in.
How about the growing crime wave that the lib media talks about? Keep it current, we care about the here and now and not just past allegations
https://nypost.com/2024/09/22/us-news/chicago-gangbangers-face-off-against-venezuelans/
Which no one cares or is even talking about
Well, since the Dems have no answers to the destruction they brought onto the nation, when in doubt, blame Trump. Tired and old as their arguments.
Alarming data from ICE
- 13,099 Murders
- 15,811 Rapists
- 425,431 Convicted Criminals and that’s just the convicted ones and this is the exact reason why Trump is slamming Harris on this issue and leads her by almost 12 points, in 4 years she never visited the border and 5 weeks shy of the election she now goes and gives a pathetic speech to a friendly picked audience and won’t even take any hardline questions or not even given. The woman is just a pathetic train wreck.
kohakuebisu
1 in 3000 every year, with no doubt many more battling addiction. Grim
Bad Haircut
Yep. A change for the even worse.
blue in green
Why NOW?
She's an INCUBENT vice president!
She was the border Czar, and this is the first time she's spent any time at the Border
at all.
And there she is, smiling for the cameras.
The press, who enable this woman, do nothing anywhere close to investigative journalism.
TaiwanIsNotChina
Weak on border MAGAs can start by getting behind the bipartisan border bill.
Blacklabel
she is the current Vice President. Only liberals could be that stupid to think this.
Bad Haircut
Harris's entire campaign is an unintended self-parody, and this episode is further proof. She's behaving as if Trump has been in charge of the border for the last 4 years and she had absolutely nothing to do with the disaster. In a way she's right - completely asleep at the wheel and doing nothing until this last-minute panic attack.
I get that there are some people who can't grasp her incompetence and dishonesty, but fact that there are some who can but wilfully ignore and will vote for her beggars belief.
TokyoLiving
As long as US do not seriously prevent drug consumption, the problem will continue, as long as there is demand there will be consumption..
If US continue to blame the rest of the world for their own mistakes, US will continue in the same downward vortex..
By the way, nothing can stop immigrants..
Peter Neil
most of those criminals came to the u.s. when trump was president.
current administration has arrested almost 5 times more than during trump’s failed presidency.
ya gotta stop using fox news spin on everything.
Bob Fosse
There was a bill that would have addressed many of these issues ready to go.
But a guy who literally isn’t the President pressured weak spined republicans to oppose it for purely political reasons and to deny Biden a win on immigration.
bass4funk
Sorry, Mexico could help and stop the Cartels and flow of drugs coming in if they really wanted to, that’s just a lame excuse
Yes, if you have strong border policies, a completed wall, border patrol agents that are allowed to do their jobs, if you can, however, you cannot stop people from applying for asylum, that is their human right, but what is not the human right is just walk into a country whenever they want to, your favorite country China wouldn’t allow it, North Korea doesn’t allow it, no country allows it, even Mexico won’t allow it.
If they are legal, fine.
That won’t happen so…
LOL
Jimizo
One thing with Trump is those outside the idiot alternative media/podcast bubble can see he has a track record of spouting off garbage that can’t implement.
The senile old conman was dribbling about going after Google.
Not to be taken seriously.
Blacklabel
In 2024, that had a bunch of unrelated bad things also added on to it.
2021-before 2024 bill proposed? nothing.
absolutely nothing.
bass4funk
That is factually not even close to the truth.
and let go over 445K and that’s just what we know. This administration did nothing to stop the flow, the former head of BP just testified about that.
Has nothing to do with FOX
https://youtu.be/m2md8f9-ySA?si=G5lzu0RP7lKF08pO
bass4funk
Nope! It would’ve made the problem worse, and it was a good thing that the Republicans did not fall for that trap, the Democrats can tell that lie all day long, when you read it, there was nothing good about that bill, it was a poison pill!
Thank God for that.
-allows 5,000 illegals per day
-allows 1,825,000 illegals per year
- $1 billion to NGOs to enable the mass migration
-grant asylum claims (and thus American citizenship) to illegal aliens at the border without civil review by the immigration courts
-government-funded lawyers for illegals
- catch-and-release for any alien who says they intend to apply for asylum
-does very little to ensure the deportation of undesirable illegals
Again, the Republicans dodged the bullet with that, because it wouldn’t have done anything to secure the border.
wallace
People caught supplying Fentanyl should receive a minimum of 30 years in prison.
JJE
Why didn't she say this over 3 years ago and tens of millions of illegals earlier?
Hadn't been to Europe either.
Pathetic.
bass4funk
Senile? Hardly and Going after Google, I would as well given the fact how they injected themselves into politics.
Google, no one does.
I will go one step further, it should be a federal crime, they should do no less than 50 years or receive the death penalty