Harris vows to do more on immigration at southern border
Harris visits border, Trump touts data showing undocumented immigrant crimes
Vice President Kamala Harris is in San Francisco Saturday, fresh off a visit to the U.S. Mexico border, where she vowed to do more to secure it. At the same time, Republicans released new data that shows how many undocumented immigrants have committed crimes.
Vice President Kamala Harris is in San Francisco Saturday, fresh off a visit to the U.S. Mexico border, where she vowed to do more to secure it.
At the same time, Republicans released new data that shows how many undocumented immigrants have committed crimes.
In her first trip to the southern border since becoming the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris walked along it with border agents. She vowed to do more to secure the border, including bringing in more personnel and inspection systems with technology to detect fentanyl.
She also called for a better way to welcome immigrants legally.
"I reject the false choice that suggests we must either choose between securing our border or creating a system of immigration that is safe, orderly, and humane. We can, and we must do both. We must do both," said Harris in Douglas, Arizona.
KTVU political analyst Brian Sobel said it was important for Harris to visit the border because she's behind Trump when it comes to immigration.
"Frankly, Kamala Harris is going to be weak on that because of three and a half years of folks coming into the United States, committing crimes and other things without an apparent administration plan to block it," said Sobel.
While Harris was in Arizona Friday, former President Donald Trump was in Michigan, continuing to blame her for the country's immigration issues.
He pointed to new numbers released by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
"According to this brand-new data, never seen before, over 13,000 and 99 convicted murderers have crossed the border and they're free to roam and kill in our country. These are convicted murderers. They are people that were in jail. And I've been talking about this for three years," said Trump.
The numbers Trump is referring to were in a letter from the Deputy Director of ICE to Republican lawmaker Tony Gonzalez of Texas, who released the letter publicly.
The letter lists the number of undocumented immigrants who have been detained or not detained, and who have committed crimes either in the U.S. or abroad, from low-level traffic offenses to fraud and assault.
It shows nearly 15,000 undocumented immigrants who have not been detained have been convicted or charged with homicide, and more than 20,000 have been convicted or charged with sexual assault.
Sobel isn't confident about the accuracy of the data.
"The numbers will be wrestled with for a while to decide whether they’re legitimate and the sources of the numbers, and all of it has to be vetted. But setting all of that aside, Americans feel it. They intuitively understand that there’s an issue that needs to be dealt with and solved," said Sobel.
Sobel said Trump will take these numbers and run with them, while for the Harris campaign, it might be too little too late to flip this narrative - at least on this one issue.