Washington, DC — Attacks against the candidacy of Vice President Kamala Harris include the false assertion she was in charge of border policy in recent years. This message is flat-out wrong (as multiple fact checks such as this good article from Isabela Dias in Mother Jones make clear).
Yet in addition to fact checking, it’s also important to recognize the broader importance of why her actual role focused on the root causes of migration. Reducing the pressures that force people to migrate from their home countries, particularly in nearby Latin American countries, is an important component in addressing the unprecedented hemispheric migration that needs to be part of a smart strategy of reform for 21st century America. The reasons that opponents of immigration consistently oppose efforts to make immigration a more orderly, safe, and legal process are also revealing.
According to Vanessa Cárdenas, Executive Director of America’s Voice, reacting:
“If Republican Members of Congress would actually be interested in solutions, they would come to the table with common-sense ideas on how to best manage migration in a way that serves our national and economic interests. Instead, they spend their time fearmongering about immigrants, blocking legislative reforms and fixes and opposing and dismantling approaches that actually help encourage orderly and safe migration.
If you prefer to have immigration as a campaign issue and the border in perpetual crisis, then working together to solve problems and fix our immigration system is the last thing you want and explains why some Members of Congress have blocked any progress on this issue. They prefer non-binding politically driven resolutions to play ‘gotcha’ than working on and supporting legislation to make progress on behalf of the American people. For political reasons, they prefer the chaos of the broken status quo.”
Additional Resources
- Read the new fact sheet from America’s Voice, “5 Things To Know about Vice President Kamala Harris’ Immigration Record”
- Read the America’s Voice’s reaction to this weekend’s Biden-Harris announcements and read our blog on the immigration record of Kamala Harris
- Read our 2023 memo and analysis: “Republicans Are Against Solutions and Policies that Alleviate Border Pressures; In Favor of Chaos and Politicized Misinformation.” The memo highlights Republican opposition to policies and legal pathways that alleviate pressures on the border and highlights how the first Trump term’s immigration chaos included dismantling programs and policies that helped migrants and asylum seekers avoid the dangerous trek to U.S. border, including:
- Cutting aid to Central America; ending the Central American Minors (CAM) program that allows minors to apply for protection from the region; forcing asylum seekers into squalid settlements and dangerous conditions in northern Mexico; and decimating other regional processing programs and funding as part of the larger assault on orderly refugee resettlement process and programs.
- At the same time, Republicans were voting to slash legal immigration, trying to end TPS and make millions deportable, were suing to end DACA (and still are) and seeking to close off the options available to the President in setting immigration policies and priorities through the conservative judiciary.
