Harris accuses Trump of playing ‘political games’ during US border visit | US elections 2024

Kamala Harris accused Donald Trump of “playing politics” on immigration – his signature issue – as the vice president tried to turn one of its biggest vulnerabilities into a political strength.

Speaking in the border town of Douglas, Arizona, Harris declared the US both a “sovereign nation” and a “country of immigrants” and said that as president she would strengthen controls at the southern border while working “to fix of our broken immigration system’. ”.

“I reject the false choice that suggests we must choose between securing our border or creating a system that is orderly, safe and humane,” Harris said. “We can and must do both.”

She hammered Trump for derailing a sweeping bipartisan package that would have overhauled the federal immigration system while providing additional resources to hire more Border Patrol agents.

“It should be in effect today and delivering results, in real time,” Harris said, speaking from a podium surrounded by American flags and large blue posters that read “border security and stability.” “He prefers to tackle a problem rather than solve a problem.”

After that bill collapsed, the Biden administration announced new rules to temporarily halt the asylum process at the U.S. southern border. Since then, the number of border crossing arrests between ports of entry has fallen sharply. In July, arrests fell below levels not seen since Trump’s final months as president in 2020, although they rose slightly in August.

As president, Harris said she would “take further action to keep the border closed,” including increasing penalties for those who cross. She emphasized her support for “humane” and “orderly” policies, and reminded Arizonans of the actions Trump took during his first term to curb illegal immigration.

“He separated families, ripped toddlers from their mothers’ arms, put children in cages and tried to end the protection of Dreamers,” she said in Douglas, a blue dot in the overwhelmingly red Cochise province.

Before her remarks, Harris walked across a section of barrier built during the Obama administration. In the sweltering three-degree heat, she received a briefing from Customs and Border Protection officials on efforts to stem the flow of fentanyl across the border.

She also stopped at the Raul H Castro Port of Entry in Douglas, across from Agua Prieta, Mexico, which is expected to be expanded and modernized with grants from the bipartisan infrastructure bill signed into law by Joe Biden.

“They have a tough job and, rightly so, need support to do their job,” Harris said afterwards.

Speaking to supporters at a factory in Walker, Michigan, Trump boasted that Harris was “killed at the border” and blamed the Biden administration’s border policies for fueling high levels of migration during the first three years of his presidency .

“What she did is a crime,” he said. “There is no greater act of disloyalty than destroying the sovereignty of your own nation.”

In her remarks, Harris said she understood the unique challenges and needs facing border communities like those in Douglas after serving as attorney general of neighboring California. She recalled traveling through human smuggling tunnels used by smugglers, and praised her work prosecuting international gangs and criminal organizations that smuggle weapons, drugs and people across the border.

Republicans would rather discuss her more recent assignment, as vice president during a period of record migration, when she was officially tasked with addressing the root causes of people moving north from Central America. On Friday, Republicans misleadingly accused her of being an absentee “border czar” whose policies led to the situation at the border.

Arizona voters consistently rank immigration — Trump’s signature issue — as one of the top concerns this election cycle, often second only to the economy. A significant share of voters trust Trump more on immigration and border security, but Harris’ campaign believes it has made progress in easing Democrats’ deficit in an area seen as one of their biggest electoral vulnerabilities is seen.

The campaign has blanketed the airwaves with ads aimed at blunting Trump’s attacks on her immigration record. On Friday, it launched a new ad in Arizona and other battleground states highlighting its pledge to hire thousands more border agents and stop fentanyl trafficking and human smuggling. “We need a leader with a real plan to fix the border,” a voiceover says.

Less than six weeks before Election Day, polls show a close race in Arizona, one of seven battleground states likely to decide the election and the only one touching the southern border.

A Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll of swing states showed Harris with a narrow lead in Arizona, while a New York Times/Siena College poll released Monday showed Trump opening a five-percentage-point lead over Harris. which marks a significant improvement from August, when he trailed the vice president by the same margin.

Biden won Arizona in 2020 by just over 10,400 votes, becoming the first Democrat to win the southwestern state since Bill Clinton in 1996.

Kris Mayes, the attorney general, who accompanied Harris on her visit Friday, urged Arizonans not to delay the election.

“The races in Arizona could be close, take it from me,” Mayes said. In 2022, the Democrat won her race by 280 votes.