American Opinion: It’s too late for Kamala Harris to crack down on immigration – Grand Forks Herald

Vice President Kamala Harris checked off her presidential campaign checklist last week with a visit to the southern border. She spoke to members of the Border Patrol and made standard promises to crack down on immigration.

Sorry, Kamala, you don’t get any points if you promise to close the stable door after the horses escape.

As a presidential candidate, Harris raised her hand during a 2019 primary debate when asked if she supported “decriminalizing” border crossings to make unlawful border crossings just a civil crime. She no longer supports that view, she told CNN.

But now: “I was attorney general of a border state for two terms. I saw the violence and chaos that transnational criminal organizations cause and the grief and loss resulting from the spread of their illegal drugs,” Harris said, adding that pursuing such gangs would be a priority if she is elected president . NBC News reported on her limit. speech.

Why isn’t going after these gangs a priority of the Biden administration now?

Harris doesn’t need to look back to her time as California AG for examples of criminal illegal immigrants and their effect on communities. She just needs to expand her campaign stops from rallies and auditoriums to some of the communities damaged by the Biden administration’s lax immigration policies, of which she is a part.

Harris could stop by New York City’s infamous “Market of Sweethearts” in Queens, where New York police raided a migrant-run brothel last week, the New York Post reported.

“This brothel was the worst of the worst,” said Democratic district leader Hiram Monserrate. The former state lawmaker added that the sex workers are forced into prostitution to pay off debts of up to $50,000 to human traffickers.

“The migrant crisis has contributed to the crime – the sheer numbers coming here in a short period of time. Some of them are part of organized crime,” Monserrate said.

Or Harris could stop by the office of Deputy Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Patrick J. Lechleitner. He recently provided some sobering data: As of July, there were 662,566 noncitizens with criminal histories on ICE’s national docket. More than 100,000 illegal immigrants – convicted criminals and people facing criminal charges – accused of abuse are not being held.

Harris was a fan of “sanctuary laws,” at least he used to be. In 2015, as AG, she sent a letter to U.S. senators opposing the Stop Sanctuary Policies and Protect Americans Act.

“The policy of ‘reserves’ can serve to protect dangerous criminals, who often victimize the same communities,” Lechleitner said in a letter to U.S. Rep. Tony Gonzales of Texas.

If Harris wants to see the results of the administration’s shelter and lax immigration policies, she should go to Nantucket. That’s where ICE Boston agents arrested five illegal immigrants earlier this month, including the arrest of an MS-13 gang member. That arrest came a day after a noncitizen was charged with a sex crime against a Nantucket resident and two days after ICE apprehended three other illegal immigrants on the island.

These are far from isolated cases. These are the consequences of the Biden administration’s immigration policies. Harris can do her best to flip the script on the campaign, but the communities living with these consequences are far from cheerful.

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