Kamala Harris Goes To Border, Tries To Blame Trump For Crisis: “We inherited a tough situation”
Kamala Harris finally went to the border and promptly snapped at a Fox News reporter who asked what took her so long before trying to blame Trump for the border crisis. “We inherited a tough situation…In five months we’ve made progress,” Harris said.
“I said back in March I was going to come to the border, so this is not a new plan,” Harris told reporters after landing in Texas. “Coming to the border is about looking at the effects of what we have seen happening in Central America,” she said. “They believe that is something that can win them seats in 2022, so of course they’re going to play it up,” she said of the GOP who have relentlessly criticized her. “They’re going to try to make it an issue.”
Harris was accompanied in El Paso by Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee Dick Durbin, and Democrat Rep. Veronica Escobar of Texas who called the El Paso area the new “Ellis Island,” during the visit.
“The vice president’s trip to Guatemala and Mexico earlier this year was about the root causes, and this border visit is about the effects,” her spokesperson Symone Sanders, told reporters on Thursday. “Both trips will inform the administration’s root causes strategy.”
Anna Giaritelli, a reporter for the Washington Examiner, shut down Kamala’s claim writing:
FACT CHECK: In terms of unlawful crossings at the southwest border, this is false. 78,000 were encountered illegally trying to enter the US from Mexico in January when Biden took office.
By March, 173,000.
April: 178,000.
May: 180,000.
Highest monthly numbers in 21 years
“While it’s certainly positive that she is taking this step, I am disappointed that she is not going to the Rio Grande Valley (RGV) – the very epicenter of this crisis,” acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf under Trump said in a statement.
From CNN:
Harris said the Biden administration has “made progress” on “inhumane conditions” at the border, but admitted “there’s still much more work to be done.”
“Our administration, it is important to be clear, is working to build a fair and a functional, humane immigration system,” the vice president said. “We feel very strongly about that.”
FACT CHECK: In terms of unlawful crossings at the southwest border, this is false.
— Anna Giaritelli (@Anna_Giaritelli) June 25, 2021
78,000 were encountered illegally trying to enter the US from Mexico in January when Biden took office.
By March, 173,000.
April: 178,000.
May: 180,000.
Highest monthly numbers in 21 years https://t.co/I23ol2MRTx
Harris was speaking at a round table with faith-based non-governmental organizations, which she said would be a “candid conversation.”
She said the Biden administration “inherited a tough situation,” but that in five months, “we’ve made progress.”
While in West Texas, Harris will not visit nearby Fort Bliss, where migrant children who crossed the US-Mexico border alone are still spending prolonged time in temporary government facilities, raising concerns among attorneys, who say the conditions are inadequate for kids.
Shaw Drake, a staff attorney and policy counsel for border and immigrants’ rights with the ACLU of Texas, told CNN’s Ed Lavandera that although the Biden White House has taken some very important steps to address immigration, “the administration, to this point, is not doing enough.”
Drake specifically cited the administration’s continued reliance on Title 42 and complaints of inhumane conditions at Fort Bliss. Title 42 is a policy enacted during the early days of the coronavirus pandemic that allows the US to expel migrants encountered at the US-Mexico border.