Vice President Kamala Harris criticized former President Donald Trump for lobbying GOP lawmakers against passing a bipartisan border bill at Tuesday night’s debate, as the debate over the bill that Trump opposed earlier this year has been revived ahead of the election, with Harris calling for the legislation to be resurrected.
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump speak during a presidential debate at ... [+]
Harris touted the bipartisan border bill that lawmakers introduced earlier this year at Tuesday night’s debate and criticized Trump for killing it to boost his own campaign, claiming, “He preferred to run on a problem instead of fixing a problem.”
Harris has frequently said ahead of the debate that her main priority on immigration if elected would be to pass the bipartisan border bill that failed to pass earlier this year—after a surge in border crossings in recent years became a political vulnerability for Democrats.
The Border Act of 2024 was originally introduced in February by Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., following months of negotiations with Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., and Murphy said the bill was also authored with the help of the White House and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
The bill quickly fell apart, however, as Trump vocally denounced the bill and urged Republicans not to pass it, calling it a “gift” to Democrats and writing on Truth Social, “A BAD BORDER DEAL IS FAR WORSE THAN NO BORDER DEAL.”
While Murphy told Politico lawmakers behind the bill initially believed they could get support from 20 to 25 Republicans, the legislation ultimately failed to advance in the Senate in a 49-50 vote.
Murphy then reintroduced the bill in May, but it failed again in a 43-50 vote—with even Lankford now voting against it, as Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, was the only GOP senator to support the legislation.
The $118 billion bipartisan bill was sweeping legislation that Greg Chen, senior director of government relations for the American Immigration Lawyers Association, told CNN was “probably the most extensive border funding and security package that we’ve seen in decades.”
The bill includes a number of provisions, such as imposing new restrictions on border crossings that would authorize the government to temporarily enact emergency measures and stop unauthorized crossings between official ports of entry if border crossings pass an average of 5,000 per day in a given week or 8,500 in a single day. The asylum process would also get an overhaul if the bill passed, including new restrictions, such as raising the legal standard to pass the initial assessment and giving asylum seekers fewer chances to have their case appealed before they’re forced to leave the country. The legislation would increase the use of alternatives to immigration detention facilities—like having immigrants wear ankle monitors—until their cases are heard. Those restrictions are balanced out by other measures that are more permissive toward immigration, however, like increasing funding for legal representation for minors under age 13, giving a pathway to citizenship for some immigrants from Afghanistan and increasing the number of job and family visas given each year for three years. The initial bill also earmarked approximately $60 billion in aid to Ukraine—after some Republicans opposed any aid being sent to Ukraine without being tied to border restrictions—on top of other funding that included $20.2 billion for border security improvements and $2.3 billion in assistance to refugees in the U.S.
While Harris is now pushing the bipartisan bill as a key part of her platform, even some Democrats did not get behind the legislation at the time. Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., said it “contains some of the same tried and failed policies that would actually make the situation worse at the southern border” and criticized the bill for not doing more for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients, for instance, while Rep. Priya Jayapal, D-Wash., expressed “alarm” over the legislation. “There is no question that we need significant changes to our immigration system,” Jayapal said in a statement. “However, this proposal includes none of the thoughtful reforms to do that or to actually address the situation at the border in a humane way that recognizes the contributions immigrants make to our economy and our communities.”
Harris and Trump faced off Tuesday in their first debate since the vice president entered the race. The debate came after weeks of Republican attacks on Harris’ immigration record since she became the nominee, with Republicans decrying her as the “border czar” and linking her to broader criticism of how the Biden administration has handled immigration. Harris has not yet revealed proposals for immigration beyond wanting to resurrect the bipartisan deal, though she has backtracked on further-left policy positions she supported during her 2019 presidential primary campaign, such as cutting funding to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and decriminalizing border crossings so they’re only a civil offense. Harris told CNN in August she no longer wanted to decriminalize unlawful immigration, saying, “We have laws that have to be followed and enforced that address and deal with people who cross our border illegally. And there should be consequences.”