California sheriff used in Kamala campaign ad says he doesn’t support Harris, who ‘did nothing’ to stop border crossings, cartels: report

A California sheriff criticized Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign Tuesday for using his image in a new ad without his permission, a new report shows. He also said he doesn’t support the Democratic presidential nominee because she “has done nothing to stop people from crossing the border illegally.”

“In light of a recent political ad by Kamala Harris featuring Sheriff Boudreaux, and other local law enforcement officials, the Sheriff wants to make it clear that his likeness is being used without his permission and that he is NOT endorsing Harris for president or any other political office,” Tulare County Sheriff Mike Boudreaux told Fox News in a statement.

“The truth is Harris never cared about the cartels and did nothing to stop people from crossing the border illegally,” Boudreaux shot back.

The Tulare County sheriff appears briefly in the TV ad, as a narrator reads: “Kamala Harris spent decades fighting violent crime as a prosecutor in a border state. She took on drug cartels and jailed gang members for smuggling guns and drugs across the border.”

Boudreaux, who worked for the county police for nearly 40 years, said that claim was “misleading” and that Harris’ actions alongside him and other law enforcement officials when she was California’s attorney general were “smoke and mirrors.”

The ad shows her brief trip to the (Central) Valley in 2014, promoting a years-long investigation into a multinational drug trafficking ring with ties to Mexican drug cartels and prison gangs, he noted.

Later, the narrator also promises that Harris will “hire thousands of additional border agents and crack down on fentanyl and human trafficking,” which Boudreaux says “drove us completely crazy.”

“How can you go in and claim you were a strict border guard when all the troops are coming across the border and you are literally eliminating all these task forces?” he asked.

Tulare County District Attorney Tim Ward, who also appears in the footage, also slammed Harris, telling Fox News that her “hypocrisy knows no bounds.”

Boudreaux further recalled that Harris didn’t even say “hello” to any of us as she smiled for the cameras and claimed responsibility for the drug bust.

“We were in the green room. She never came in and said hello to any of us. She walked up, gave her press conference, literally walked away and never said hello to any of us,” he said. “I’m disgusted because, you know, she didn’t shake hands. She didn’t say hello. And she took credit for all the work that the locals did.”

ABC 30 in Dinuba reported at the time that 11 people had been arrested, including “suspected drug lord” Jose Magana, and that authorities had seized nearly 950 marijuana plants, 4 kilos of cocaine and 56 pounds of methamphetamine.

Harris took the opportunity to demand from then-California Governor Jerry Brown a $7.5 million increase in funding to her law enforcement budget to tackle drug trafficking across the state.

As vice president, however, she has said that “no one should go to jail for smoking weed” and has endorsed President Biden’s approval of dozens of pardons for people sentenced to federal prison for drug-related crimes.

In April, Harris was at the White House with Kim Kardashian to celebrate several of the pardons, including those for several ex-convicts convicted of cocaine and crack possession, and others convicted of methamphetamine distribution and heroin possession.

“We have pardoned all the people convicted of marijuana possession,” Harris boasted at the event.

None of these pardons were for people still incarcerated. A recent Congressional estimate showed that some 2,700 people are still in prison for marijuana-related offenses.

Harris’s TV spot debuted on Aug. 9. Campaign officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Boudreaux ran as a Republican in the May midterm elections to replace retiring Rep. Kevin McCarthy in California’s 20th Congressional District, just seven months after McCarthy was ousted as Speaker of the House.