WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris will visit the U.S.-Mexico border in Arizona on Friday as her campaign increasingly tries to make the issue of immigration more of a strength, countering a line of political attack from former President Donald Trump.
Two people familiar with the matter confirmed the trip but insisted on anonymity on Wednesday to confirm details that had not been announced publicly.
Trump has built his campaign partly around calling for cracking down on immigration and the southern border, even endorsing using police and the military to carry out mass deportations should he be elected in November. At nearly all of his campaign rallies, the Republican former president scoffs at Democrat Harris as a former Biden administration “border czar,” arguing that she oversaw softer federal policies that allowed millions of people into the country illegally.
President Joe Biden tasked Harris with working to address the root causes of immigration patterns that have caused many people fleeing violence and drug gangs in Central America to head to the U.S. border and seek asylum, though she was not called border czar.