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“If she's elected president, Kamala Harris pledges to spend hundreds of millions of dollars on the wall along the southern border — a project she once opposed and called ‘un-American’ during the Trump administration…
“In her speech to the Democratic National Convention last week, Harris said she would sign the recent bipartisan border security bill — which Trump had ordered his allies to kill, fearing it would help Democrats in the November elections. That bill, negotiated by senators such as James Lankford (R-Okla.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), requires hundreds of millions of dollars of unspent funds to be used to continue building a wall on the border.” Axios
The left generally supports Harris’s approach, and criticizes Trump’s proposal for mass deportations.
“Vice President Kamala Harris is running ads touting toughness on the border, with a more muted campaign emphasis on the legalization policies that for decades have been their immigration lodestar. Yet even as Democrats make their rightward turn, the party’s left flank is not putting up a fight. The lack of major backlash from progressives has been striking as activists swallow their concerns and dutifully line up behind the vice president.”
Melanie Mason, Politico
“There are some 11 million unauthorized immigrants in the United States… The most immigrants ‘removed’ in a single year by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the authority in charge of weeding out unauthorized immigrants inside the United States rather than at the border, was 432,334 in 2013. At that pace, Trump’s plan [for mass deportations] would take decades…
“It would take almost five cities the size and density of Houston to house 11 million people. If, instead, they are quickly expelled as Trump prefers, the government would need a lot of planes. ICE flew 1,651 removal flights in the year leading up to July. Flying 11 million people out would require 58,201 flights…
“Trump and his friends at Project 2025 share a fantasy in which they are freed from the constraints of law… Mass expulsions would be illegal even under a nationwide rollout of ‘expedited removal,’ a process expanded during the Trump administration that limits immigrants’ right to see a judge before being kicked out. It cannot be applied to immigrants who have been in the United States longer than two years. But some 9 million of the 11 million have been in this country since before 2010.”
Eduardo Porter, Washington Post
“While illegal immigration absorbs most of the political discussion, legal immigration is a critical component of economic growth and solvency for our entitlement programs… With an aging population, the necessity for legal immigration to prevent economic contraction has become more urgent…
“There is no shortage of good ideas, ranging from dropping outdated country caps to granting foreign STEM graduates green cards to clearing the green-card backlog to increased visas for seasonal workers… Harris need not come up with a full-blown statute to address this highly technical and complex problem. She could, however, commit to bringing in members of labor, business, state and local government and advocacy groups to make a comprehensive proposal.”
Jennifer Rubin, Washington Post
The right is critical of Harris, arguing that her newfound hawkishness is insincere.
The right is critical of Harris, arguing that her newfound hawkishness is insincere.
“In her [convention] speech, Harris blamed the border crisis on Trump's opposition to a bipartisan immigration-reform proposal that Harris herself never endorsed… Harris didn't talk about building a border wall until a hot second ago, despite having been assigned the leadership role about the border crisis for over three years. Scratch that -- Harris still hasn't talked about building a border wall. Her aides are leaking the idea as a campaign trial [balloon] to reporters…
“Now suddenly we are to believe that Harris has gone full MAGA because she'll sign a bill authorizing spending on barriers across 2% of the border. That isn't a flip-flop as much as it is a fugazi. It's a dodge, a deke, a way to try to signal a centrist position while making no real commitment at all. Harris will never build the wall, not even the 2% of it her campaign now suggests.”
Ed Morrissey, Hot Air
“It's election time. That is why they waited for 3.5 years to try and address the border. It's about votes. It has never been about border security…
“Even though under this administration the border has over 10 million encounters, over 6 million released into this country, more than 2 million known gotaways, a historic number of illegal aliens dying on our border, a historic number of Americans dying from fentanyl coming across the open border and a historic number of people on the terror watch list coming across the border, it isn't and never has been about border security under this administration.”
Thomas Homan, Fox News
“How can the next administration fix the mess Biden and Harris have created? We must immediately enforce the Remain in Mexico policies we negotiated in the first Trump administration and make clear that the only way to enter our country is by following the law. Accordingly, we should deploy military resources under NORTHCOM’s command to finish the border wall efficiently, and we should keep those resources there until the flow of migrants has been meaningfully reduced…
“Next, we should focus our energy on degrading and destroying the primary cause of illegal immigration: transnational drug cartels that help terrorists cross into our country undetected, manufacture and distribute poisonous drugs that kill our citizens, and drive an immigration crisis that has destabilized our nation…
“Biden and Harris have neglected this duty; only President Trump will deliver the national security Americans deserve.”
Mike Pompeo, New York Post
