Trump persuades Harris on border policy as she prepares acceptance speech

Former President Donald Trump took his counter-Democratic National Convention message on illegal immigration to the battleground in Arizona on Thursday, as his new Democratic opponent prepared to take the stage in Chicago.

Vice President Kamala Harris will deliver her acceptance speech on Thursday night, capping a week of events in which speakers warned voters about the dangers of a second Trump term. Harris has tightened the race against Trump since she topped the ticket after President Joe Biden withdrew from the race — and races in several key states such as Arizona, a border state, will determine the presidency.

“The choice is simple: Kamala’s mass amnesty of criminals, or President Trump’s mass deportation of criminals,” Trump said in Cochise County, Arizona, as he stood next to a stretch of border wall.

Trump has been taunting Harris all Thursday, leading up to her appearance in Chicago, starting with a Fox News interview in the morning, the visit to the southern border in mid-day, and he plans to release his play-by-play of the DNC speakers in prime time.

The Trump campaign and Republicans have tried for weeks to portray Harris as responsible for the surge in illegal immigration in the first three years of Biden’s presidency, since the president put her in charge of tackling the root causes of migration in Central America. Trump and Republicans have used the title “border czar” to describe her role, though she and the Biden administration reject it. The term has also previously been used as shorthand by numerous news organizations.

“She loved the title, but she didn’t want to do the work, or she’s lazy,” Trump said. “And probably more important than being lazy, she wants an open border.”

Harris leads Trump 59 percent to 34 percent among likely Hispanic voters in Arizona, according to a new poll from TelevisaUnivision’s Strategy & Insights and Media in partnership with Media Predict, though more than a third of them said they aren’t yet sure who they’ll vote for. The voting bloc will be crucial in the battleground state, where Hispanics make up about 20 percent of the electorate there.

Trump has promised that if re-elected, he will carry out mass deportations, finish building a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, end birthright citizenship and reinstate his ban on people entering the U.S. from certain Muslim-majority countries. During his speech, he graphically detailed about a dozen cases of violent murder and rape allegedly committed by people who entered the U.S. illegally.

“As Kamala gives her speech tonight at the convention, she will not name the victims, she will not even talk about them — although she may now that she sees us,” Trump said. “She will not name them or express remorse to their families. Kamala says she wants to talk about the future. No, these people want to go back to the safe past. We do not have a future with open borders and all these other problems.”

Trump also praised the Supreme Court’s ruling from earlier in the day that allows Arizona to require new voters to provide proof of citizenship when they register to vote using a state form, but it’s unlikely to have a broad impact because voters can use a federal form instead. It’s illegal in the U.S. for non-citizens to vote and studies show it’s rare, but the Supreme Court was responding to an emergency appeal from the Republican National Committee.

“I give the Supreme Court a lot of credit for this,” Trump said of the decision. “They have a lot of courage to do what they do.”

Trump earlier this year discouraged Republicans from agreeing to a bipartisan border deal that Biden supported. In turn, the president issued an executive order in June suspending asylum applications when the border averaged 2,500 daily crossings over a seven-day period. Illegal border crossings fell as a result.

Undocumented immigration was not a dominant theme at the DNC, compared with the Republican National Convention, which featured speeches from people whose loved ones had been victims of violent crimes and drug overdoses. Three people affected by violent crimes allegedly committed by undocumented immigrants appeared alongside Trump during his visit to Arizona.

Alexis Nungaray took the podium to recount the stranglehold of her 12-year-old daughter, Jocelyn. “Please remember how important border control is,” she said, “because we are losing very innocent people to horrific crimes that should not have happened in the first place.”

Harris has not given interviews about her stance on immigration law since becoming the Democratic nominee. She previously supported decriminalizing border crossings and expanding Medicare to all U.S. residents, regardless of immigration status.

Since then, Harris’ campaign has emphasized her support for the bipartisan border bill and her work combating transnational gangs. She also toured a Customs and Border Protection processing center in the border city of El Paso, Texas, in June 2021 after facing criticism from Republicans.

Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who was on Harris’ running mate shortlist, criticized Trump’s border visit as a “photo opportunity” during a call with reporters arranged by the presidential campaign. “He said he wanted this for a campaign issue,” Kelly said of Trump urging Republicans to reject the legislation. “Trump and Vance, they just want to campaign on this issue,” he added. “Donald Trump didn’t solve this last time he was in office, and he doesn’t really want to solve it now.”

Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, the former president’s running mate, argued at a press conference before Trump’s remarks that the bill had “nothing to do with border security” and instead codified existing executive orders.

He accused Harris of “finding Jesus in her tough-on-crime approach” when Biden dropped out of the race, as she had embraced her law-and-order image as a former prosecutor.

Republicans have also called attention to a new report from the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General, which found that at least 32,000 unaccompanied minors have failed to show up for their immigration court hearings over the past five years, making it difficult to track their whereabouts and leaving them vulnerable to exploitation.