WASHINGTON — Suddenly, Kamala Harris is talking about the border and enjoying it.
As he and his soon-to-be-announced running mate prepare to capture battleground states this week, the Harris campaign is tackling an issue that until recently has been ceded by Democrats to Republicans and Donald Trump: immigration.
“The vice president has a compelling story to tell about prosecuting transnational gangs and drug traffickers as the attorney general of a border state,” a campaign official said. “This record will make it difficult for the Trump camp to attack him.”
It’s a remarkable turnaround for a party that has largely shied away from the issue so far this year — and as Republicans try to make it a point of weakness for Harris, they allege that he is responsible for the ongoing flow of migrants at the southern border.
In front of a cheering crowd in Atlanta last week, Harris smiled as he enjoyed promoting the dignity of his frontier as California’s attorney general.
“In this job, I walked underground tunnels between the United States and Mexico,” he said. “I went after transnational gangs, drug cartels and human traffickers who entered our country illegally. I sued them and I won.”
Turning point
The shift in messaging for Democrats began earlier this year when Trump urged House Republicans to kill a bipartisan border funding bill that was being debated in the Senate. At the time, House Speaker Mike Johnson said he preferred different legislation introduced in the House and argued the Senate bill did not go far enough.
One of those talks, Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., was furious. It wasn’t just Republicans derailing the Senate bill; they were very open about it.
“We didn’t go into these negotiations thinking it was about politics,” Murphy said in an interview. “But we’d be fools not to take advantage of the gift-wrapped political advantage once the Republicans tear it apart.”
Murphy said Democrats immediately polled the issue and made it the focus of a special congressional election in New York a few days later. Democrat Tom Suozzi made immigration one of his main arguments in the final days of the campaign and won.
“They were rejecting a very good border compromise because Trump told them to,” Murphy said in an interview. “It was Republican transparency that made it political.”
This victory in New York signaled to Democrats that they could change the script on immigration. Still, even as President Joe Biden tries to step up his attacks on Trump on immigration — and issued an executive act tightened border restrictions in July – polls have consistently shown him to be unattractive.
Now Democrats are hoping that Harris — a former prosecutor — can make a more convincing case.
“Donald Trump doesn’t care about border security,” Harris said to loud applause at the Atlanta rally. “He only thinks of himself.”
‘Root Causes’
Shortly after taking office, Biden tasked Harris with overseeing diplomatic efforts with the Northern Triangle—Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. At that time, there was a flow of unaccompanied migrant children from that region.
Harris has repeatedly said the Biden administration will examine the “root causes” of that migration, which he says is partly due to typical immigration cycles, as well as major hurricanes and the coronavirus pandemic. Republicans called Harris a “border czar.” The White House rejected the name. Instead, Harris’ team emphasized that efforts to address the root causes of migration have generated billions of dollars in private-sector commitments, but they argue that it is not responsible for daily fluctuations in illegal border crossings.
As NBC News reported last year, a former aide of the Biden administration said that it is no secret that Harris, who is not focused on foreign policy as a president, was reluctant to take on migration issues when Biden gave him this task. Instead, she chose to be an aggressive reporter on the issue of reproductive rights.
Some immigration advocates have argued that the Biden administration is ignoring more of the border.
“I think the two go hand in hand,” said Jodi Goodwin, an immigration attorney in Harlingen, Texas, referring to the difference between long-term and short-term solutions. “Because if there is an effective plan or policy to deal with the ‘root causes,’ that should alleviate the problems we see at the border.”
At the New York Times Dealbook Summit in November 2023, Harris reiterated the administration’s position that the immigration system is broken — but that it’s up to Congress to fix the legislation.
“It needs fixing, and we’re working on it to build a safe, humane and orderly immigration system at the border,” Harris said. “Political games are being played with this because on November 24th, some people decided that this might be the best weapon against the incumbent Democrat.”
However, his allies were frustrated when trying to distinguish between his official mandate and how his political opponents defined it. Earlier in the Biden administration, Harris’ press secretary — after fielding several questions from his boss on immigration issues — responded bluntly during an informal briefing with reporters.
“The vice president doesn’t cross the line,” said Symone Sanders. “The President asked the Vice President to make diplomatic efforts with Mexico and the Northern Triangle to address the root causes of migration.”
(Sanders has since left the vice president’s office and is now an MSNBC host.)
Questions about Harris’ role, or lack thereof, in shaping immigration policy continued throughout his tenure. Recall that in June 2021, Harris came under fire after insisting in an interview with NBC News’ Lester Holt, “We’ve been to the border,” despite having never visited it as vice president. He visited El Paso, Texas a few weeks later.
As illegal border crossings increased, Harris’ critics blamed the Biden administration and Harris himself.
“I think everybody would agree that he was missing in action,” said Chris Cabrera, a spokesman for the National Border Patrol.
At a rally in Atlanta on Saturday, Trump harshly criticized the vice president.
“For three and a half years, ‘border czar’ Harris has allowed terrorists and criminals to cross our wide open border,” he said. “And now he’s denying it.”
‘Active error’
Again, there are migrant crossings dropped dramatically Over the past few months since Biden tightened asylum rules. Now that the numbers are down, Harris’ allies say Republicans are making an “active mistake” by trying to link Harris to them.
“If you’re going to say he’s the ‘border czar,'” one of Harris’ aides said, “he also knows border crossings are at record levels.”
Clearly, Harris campaign officials are reluctant to directly compare Biden’s messaging success on the issue. But at the same time, they seem more optimistic and eager to talk about immigration.
For Sen. Chris Murphy, it’s a clear opportunity to woo voters in November. He is convinced that swing voters will not like Trump’s promised immigration policies, including mass deportations, and will turn to the Democrats.
“We have to prove to people that we are not just compassionate, but tough,” he said.