Vice President Kamala Harris gave a sharp, and unusual interview on CBS News’ “60 Minutes” where the correspondent Bill Whitaker took issue with the Biden administration’s handling of US immigration policy especially on the southern border. That conversation, recorded during a special election special, pointed to the change of administration on border security and the dramatic spike in undocumented immigrants during the early months of the Biden presidency.
But the conversation soon became heated as Whitaker challenged Harris on whether it was a “mistake” to enact looser border laws in 2021, which many say caused the southern border to become overflowing with migrants.
“You recently visited the southern border and embraced President Biden’s recent crackdown on asylum seekers, and that crackdown produced an almost immediate and dramatic decrease in the number of border crossings,” Whitaker noted. “If that’s the right answer now, why didn’t your administration take those steps in 2021?”
Harris Supports Administration’s Policy
Harris countered by justifying the administration’s original plan and cited Congress as a major roadblock to comprehensive immigration reform. She pointed out that the first bill the Biden administration put forward would fix the “broken” immigration system.
“The first bill we proposed to Congress was to fix our broken immigration system, knowing that if you want to actually fix it, we need Congress to act. It was not taken up,” Harris explained. She further elaborated that a bipartisan effort in the U.S. Senate had come close to passing a border security bill, but was derailed by former President Donald Trump.
“Fast forward to a moment when a bipartisan group of members of the United States Senate, including one of the most conservative members of the United States Senate, got together, came up with a border security bill,” Harris said. “Well, guess what happened? Donald Trump got word that this bill was afoot and could be passed, and he wants to run on a problem instead of fixing a problem. So he told his buddies in Congress, ‘Kill the bill, don’t let it move forward.’”
Extinct High of Border Crossings.
Not giving up, Whitaker accepted that the border problem predates the Biden administration but mentioned the historic wave of undocumented immigrants during its early stages. “There was an historic flood of undocumented immigrants coming across the border the first three years of your administration. As a matter of fact, arrivals quadrupled from the last year of President Trump,” Whitaker said, asking if it was a mistake to open up immigration so much as the administration did in the beginning.
Harris supported the government’s policies and made it clear that the immigration issue is a deeply held one that needs permanent answers. “It’s a long-standing problem, and solutions are at hand, and from day one, literally, we have been offering solutions,” She defiantly challenged the idea that the administration’s policy changes were what drove the increased number of border crossings.
Biden’s Fence Restrictions
The recent (hush) war on asylum seekers by the Biden administration that Harris has embraced has also seen an almost immediate and massive decrease in border crossings. Observers wondered why such steps hadn’t been taken earlier in the administration’s reign.
While Harris said that legislation is needed to combat the crisis, opponents argue that the administration’s weak early immigration record led to migrants descending on the southern border. When in 2021 some of Trump’s border-wall hardliners canceled most of those, many interpreted it as a sign the border was open, welcoming thousands.
A Left-Hand Political War Zone.
But that southern border has continued to be a focus of US politics, and both parties have been concentrating on it during campaigns. The Biden administration’s policy on immigration has always been condemned by Republicans as causing a border crisis. Harris, supposedly named Biden’s “border czar”, has been criticized for not being very proactive or clear on the subject.
The 60 Minutes interview is also set during a time when immigration remains at the center of political attention ahead of the 2024 presidential election. While the Biden-Harris administration defends its standing, the border issue remains a weakness that Republicans are always eager to take advantage of.
To read the interview and political commentary, visit CBS News.
