- Kamala Harris toughened her stance on the Mexican border, claiming to have the necessary experience to fight Mexican cartels.
JOSE DIAZ BRISENO / REFORMA AGENCY
ARIZONA, USA.- The Democratic Party candidate for the Presidency of the United States, current Vice President Kamala Harris, toughened her stance on the border with Mexico, claiming to have the necessary experience to fight against Mexican cartels in the area and not only against irregular migration.
In front of some 15,000 people gathered in the Phoenix area of the crucial state of Arizona, the 59-year-old candidate recalled her time as attorney general of California between 2011 and 2017, saying that this experience allows her to know how to deal with Mexican drug trafficking and human traffickers.
“I was the attorney general of a border state (with Mexico). I went after transnational gangs, drug cartels and human traffickers. I prosecuted them case after case, and I won. So I know what I’m talking about!” Harris told a packed crowd at the Diamond Desert Arena.
Since her emergence as the virtual Democratic candidate, Republican Party candidate Donald Trump has focused much of his attacks against Harris on what he considers her inability as vice president to reduce the high flows of irregular migration across the border.
Now, at her rally, Harris attempted to make a substantial shift in the narrative, highlighting above all her image as a tough prosecutor in California against drug trafficking on the border with Mexico; all this at the same time that her campaign published advertisements reinforcing the anti-crime message.
“Kamala Harris spent decades fighting violent crime. As a prosecutor in a border state (with Mexico), she attacked drug cartels and jailed gang members for trafficking guns and drugs across the border,” says a television ad that seeks to reinforce the vice president’s image.
According to a poll by the Ipsos firm, the high flow of irregular migration at the border is the second most worrying issue among Americans: 44 percent of voters believe that Trump has a better border security plan, compared to 27 percent for Harris.
During Fiscal Year 2023, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Office (CBP) reported a record of nearly 2.5 million irregular migrant crossings at the border, something that has served Trump to attack Harris; but the Democrat insisted that the Republican is not looking for solutions.
“We know our immigration system is broken, and we know what it will take to fix it – comprehensive reform that includes strong border security and an earned path to citizenship.
“But Donald Trump doesn’t want to fix this problem,” Harris said at the rally in Phoenix, Arizona.
Although he has promoted the deportation of the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the United States if he reaches the White House for the second time, Trump openly suggested to Republicans on Capitol Hill not to approve a tough border security law at the beginning of the year so as not to help the Biden administration.
Despite complaints from pro-immigrant groups and organizations that defend asylum as a right, President Joe Biden signed an executive order in April closing the Mexican border to irregular migrants in weeks of high crossings, something the vice president has openly defended.
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