Harris’ immigration role
Trump claimed of Harris: “She was the border czar, but she never went to the border.”
Facts First:
Trump made two false claims here. First, Harris did go to the border as vice president, in Texas in mid-2021; many Republicans had criticized Harris prior to the visit for not having gone, and some later argued that she didn’t go frequently enough, but the claim that she “never” went has not been true for more than three years. Second, Harris was never made Biden’s “border czar,” a label the White House has always emphasized is inaccurate. In reality, Biden gave Harris a more limited immigration-related assignment in 2021, asking her to lead diplomacy with El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras in an attempt to address the conditions that prompted their citizens to try to migrate to the United States.
Some Republicans have scoffed this week at assertions that Harris was never the “border czar,” noting on social media that news articles sometimes
described Harris as such. But those articles were wrong.
Various news outlets,
including CNN, reported as early as the first half of 2021 that the White House emphasized that Harris had not been put in charge of border security as a whole, as “border czar” strongly suggests, and had instead been handed a diplomatic task related to Central American countries.
A White House “fact sheet” in July 2021
said: “On February 2, 2021, President Biden signed an Executive Order that called for the development of a Root Causes Strategy. Since March, Vice President Kamala Harris has been leading the Administration’s diplomatic efforts to address the root causes of migration from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.”
Biden’s own comments at a March 2021 event announcing the assignment were slightly
more muddled, but he said he had asked Harris to lead “our diplomatic effort” to address factors causing migration in the three “Northern Triangle” countries (he also mentioned Mexico that day). Biden listed factors in these countries he thought had led to migration and said that “if you deal with the problems in-country, it benefits everyone.” And Harris’ comments that day were focused squarely on “root causes.”
Republicans can fairly say that even “root causes” work is a border-related task. But calling her “border czar” goes too far.
An article from 2021 refuting the title
But administration officials, from the president down, have stressed that she is not responsible for dealing with the surge of migrants at the border, including
the record number of unaccompanied minors.
That distinction might be lost on voters, however. And that may be what Republicans are counting on.
On Wednesday, after a meeting with immigration experts, Harris was asked whether she would visit the southern border. She twice explained that Biden has asked Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas to address border issues and said that “he has been working very hard at that, and it’s showing some progress because of his hard work.”
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