Republican Campaign Strategies Targeting Kamala Harris on Immigration Issues

Republican Strategies Targeting Vice President Kamala Harris

As Republicans strategize their campaign against Vice President Kamala Harris, they are honing in on her involvement in the Biden administration’s border and immigration policies. They aim to hold her accountable for the significant increase in migrants entering the United States over the past few years. However, an analysis of her contributions reveals a more complex picture.

It’s important to note that President Biden did not officially designate her as the “border czar” or assign her the specific duty of managing enforcement policies at the U.S.-Mexico border, contrary to claims made by the Trump campaign in its initial advertisement against her. Nevertheless, she has played a key role in addressing the record surge of global migration, striving to prevent further escalation.

During the first three years of the administration, the number of migrants crossing the southern border reached unprecedented levels. Recently, however, those crossings have decreased to their lowest figures since Biden and Harris took office.

Despite these gains, her initial attempts to manage her responsibilities and the administration’s policies faced widespread criticism, even from within her own party. Many viewed her approach as awkward and counterproductive, particularly regarding her defensiveness over the fact that she had not yet visited the border. Some of her supporters felt she was being positioned to fail from the outset.

At the outset of the administration, Ms. Harris was assigned a role that essentially combined duties as a chief fundraiser with serving as a liaison between business leaders and the economies of Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. Her efforts to persuade international companies to invest in Central America and create job opportunities for potential migrants had some success, according to insights from immigration experts as well as current and former government officials.

However, these successes highlighted the stark disparity in economic opportunities between the United States and Central America, illustrating that any policies aimed at bridging this divide could require years, if not generations, to yield tangible results.