The Vice President Kamala Harris will visit the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona on Friday as his campaign increasingly tries to make immigration a strong point, countering a political line of attack by the former president. Donald Trump .
Two people familiar with the matter confirmed the trip but insisted on anonymity Wednesday to confirm details that had not been announced publicly.
Trump has based his campaign in part on calling for a crackdown on immigration and the southern border, and has even backed using the police and military to carry out mass deportations if elected in November. At nearly every rally, the Republican former president mocks Democrat Harris, whom he calls the Biden administration’s “border czar,” arguing that she oversaw lax federal policies that allowed millions of people to enter the country illegally.
President Joe Biden tasked Harris with working to address the root causes of immigration patterns which has caused many people fleeing violence and drug gangs in Central America to head to the US border and seek asylum, although she was not called a border czar.
Since taking over as Democratic vice president from Biden, Harris has drawn on her experience as a former California attorney general, saying she frequently visited the border and went after drug and human trafficking gangs in that role. While campaigning across the country, the vice president has also frequently criticized top Republicans for rejecting a sweeping bipartisan immigration package in Congress earlier this year after Trump opposed it.
Harris has worked to make immigration an issue that can help her win supporters, saying Trump would rather play politics on the issue than seek solutions, while promising more humane treatment of immigrants if she wins the White House.
Meanwhile, arrests for illegal border crossings have dropped dramatically in recent months, after the Biden administration suspend asylum processing in an effort to calm the situation at the border.
