To the Editor:
There is much misinformation in the atmosphere concerning this year’s candidates in the presidential election. I’d like to comment on one persistent lie that keeps appearing in TV ads.
To be clear, Kamala Harris is not, nor was she ever, our “border czar.” The U.S. doesn’t have a border czar. The border is under control of the Department of Homeland Security. President Biden tasked Vice President Harris to look into the reasons that illegal immigrants were coming primarily from certain countries, and to see if, working with the State Department, those reasons could be addressed so that fewer people in those countries would feel compelled to leave. She was not in charge of anything directly related to the border itself.
I’d also like to remind readers that last year, three senators, one a very conservative Republican, one a pragmatic Democrat and one an independent senator from a border state, put together the toughest immigration bill in over 10 years. It provided for the hiring of an additional 1,000 border patrol agents, for upgraded technology to help them patrol the border, toughened the criteria for applying for asylum, provided for the hiring of additional immigration judges so asylum cases could be heard more quickly than the current average of three years, and allowed immigrants seeking asylum to work so they wouldn’t have to be supported with public funds while waiting for their hearing.
The bill had bipartisan support and looked like it was sure to pass both houses of Congress. President Biden indicated that he would sign the bill as soon as it arrived on his desk. Then former President Trump intervened and told Republicans not to vote for the bill because it would remove immigration problems as a topic he could campaign on. Republicans did as they were told and tanked the bill.
If you want to know who to blame for the border mess, there is plenty of blame to pass around. Neither party is innocent, but one party seems to have acted in their own best interest instead of the best interest of the country.
PARY TELL
Erma
