Republicans have lit on what they think will be their most effective policy issue against Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign and—surprise, surprise—it’s immigration. Specifically, Republicans are falsely saying that the vice president has been in charge of President Joe Biden’s immigration policy, that she’s his “border czar.” And it’s a lie designed to benefit Donald Trump’s favorite topic: fear-mongering about immigration.
The lie is coming from the top, of course. On Tuesday, Trump told reporters, "Harris was appointed 'border czar' in March of 2021, and since that time, millions and millions of illegal aliens have invaded our country and countless Americans have been killed by migrant crime because of her willful demolition of American borders and laws.”
It was a regular theme of last week’s Republican National Convention, even before Biden ended his reelection campaign on Sunday and endorsed Harris. At least seven speakers at the convention, including failed GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley, Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, and Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida attacked Harris as being in charge of Biden’s border policy.
And on Tuesday, the odious Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York introduced a resolution “condemning Kamala Harris’ role as Joe Biden’s ‘Border czar’ which has led to the most catastrophic open border crisis in history.” In the real world, however, border crossings today are at their lowest point since Biden’s first full month in office.
The House GOP is so committed to this lie about Harris, they scrapped passing a government funding bill and are spending Thursday—their last day in session until after Labor Day—voting on this nonbinding ridiculousness.
Let’s set the record straight: In a meeting with Harris in March 2021, Biden tapped her to lead U.S. diplomatic efforts with officials in Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras to stem migration to the U.S. In that meeting, Biden said that when he was vice president, he "got a similar assignment" and that the Obama administration secured $700 million to help countries in Central America.
"One of the ways we learned is that if you deal with the problems in country, it benefits everyone. It benefits us, it benefits the people, and it grows the economies there," Biden said in that meeting.
Harris was tasked with working diplomatically with Central America leaders to work on the region’s root causes of mass migration—corruption, crime, hunger, poverty—all the stuff the GOP, and in particular Trump, is incapable of understanding, much less addressing. If there were such a thing as a border czar under Biden—and there isn’t—it would be Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. ( House Republicans have also attacked him over the border, but that’s a different story.)
In fact, Harris has had successes engaging in the region. As America’s Voice’s Gabe Ortiz points out, Harris “led the ‘In Her Hands’ economic empowerment initiative in collaboration with Partnership for Central America, which aims to support and provide opportunities for millions of women across Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras by 2030.”
She also led the Root Causes Strategy, which has mobilized more than $5 billion in private-sector investments in Central America, investments that have helped to create over 250,000 jobs in the region and “provided funding for small businesses, and supported the economic inclusion of women,” according to Immigration Hub, an organization that pushes for immigration reform.
Answering the larger and tougher challenges of migration is what Harris and the Democrats have been trying to accomplish. The job is going to get only more complicated as climate change drives more migration.
The GOP’s reductive response to the entire issue is solely about the politics of fear and never about policy. They don’t want to solve the crisis; they want to keep running on it.
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