NBC News: VP Harris’ Record on Immigration

AINSLEY: “Since rising to the top of the ticket, Vice President Kamala Harris’s handling of the border under renewed scrutiny and attack.”

Trump: “She was a border czar, she’s done a horrible job.”

AINSLEY: “But the White House and Harris campaign say ‘border czar’ is an unfair label. The job Biden assigned her in March 2021 was to address the root causes of immigration in Central America.”

Harris: “Because we can chew gum and walk at the same time. We must address the root causes that — that cause people to make the trek.”

AINSLEY: “After that announcement, Harris visited Mexico and Guatemala. While in Mexico, Harris forged an agreement that has led the U.S. to commit $4 billion in direct assistance to Central America and over $5.2 billion in private investment in the region from U.S. companies. the White House says those investments are creating jobs and have connected more than 4.5 million people to the internet and brought more than 2.5 million people into the formal financial system. But in Guatemala, she garnered pushback from immigration advocates for telling migrants don’t come to the U.S.”

Harris: “Do not come.”

LESTER: “You had a message for would-be migrants, ‘don’t come.’ Why should they believe you when they — when they know that people are getting in?”

Harris: “The people who are here for generations, if we know the history of Guatemala for centuries, they want to stay, they don’t want to leave, but they need opportunity, they need assistance.”

AINSLEY: “Also pressed by NBC’s Lester Holt about why she hadn’t visited the border, a criticism from Republicans.”

Harris: “So, this whole thing about the border, we’ve been to the border. We’ve been to the border.”

LESTER: “You haven’t been to the border.”

Harris: “And I haven’t been to Europe.”

AINSLEY: “Two weeks later, Harris made a trip to El Paso, where she toured border facilities. After that trip, Harris’s public-facing work on immigration largely fell off. She made one more Central American trip for the inauguration of Honduras’s new president in 2022 and held two in-person meetings with the presidents of Mexico and Guatemala in D.C. Since Harris’s work began, immigration from Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras has fallen dramatically, from over 86,000 in March 2021 to just over 25,000 in June 2024. But some experts say Harris shouldn’t get much credit for that. How much credit can Harris take for that decline from Central America?”

SELEE: “I don’t think that immigration has been one of her top priorities.”

AINSLEY: “Andrew Selee is the president of the nonpartisan think tank Migration Policy Institute.”

SELEE: “I’m not sure how much Vice President Harris has been engaged in those discussions outside of the private sector part and some of the diplomatic work.”

AINSLEY: “In the meantime, migration from other parts of the world, including Venezuela, China, Central Asia and sub-Saharan Africa are all on the rise. Harris’s immigration record traces back to before she became VP. As California Attorney General, she regularly met with Latin American officials to fight organized crime, and as a senator in 2017, she led a group of Democratic lawmakers who threatened to withhold votes on a federal spending bill that did not include protections for DACA recipients. The nation’s top Border Patrol union says some agents are unconvinced by Harris’s record so far. What reaction does the name Kamala Harris evoke among Border Patrol agents?”

ANFINSEN: “It’s not a good one. A lot of people roll their eyes. Nobody’s seen any results from her, her efforts.”

AINSLEY: “Meanwhile, on the campaign trail, Harris is defending her immigration record, pointing to her work combating transnational crime as California AG and the Biden Administration’s border security bill.”

Harris: “The border security bill that Donald Trump killed and I will sign it into law.”

AINSLEY: “Julia Ainsley, NBC News, Washington.”