After months of dodging or laughing off questions about her reluctance to visit the U.S.-Mexico border amid an immigration crisis, Vice President Kamala Harris confirmed this week that she plans to do so in the near future.
In response, former President Donald Trump took credit for the development, noting that Harris announced her plans shortly after he released details of an upcoming border trip of his own.
“Tremendous destruction and death”
According to the Washington Examiner, Harris is set to travel to the border along with Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on Friday. The move comes roughly three months after President Joe Biden tasked her with addressing the root causes of a massive spike in illegal immigration from Central America.
Despite her leading role in tackling the border crisis, however, the vice president has brushed off criticism over her decision not to witness the situation firsthand.
For his part, Trump released a statement shortly after the upcoming Harris trip was confirmed and referenced his own border visit to meet with GOP leaders including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.
“After months of ignoring the crisis at the Southern Border, it is great that we got Kamala Harris to finally go and see the tremendous destruction and death that they’ve created — a direct result of Biden ending my very tough but fair Border policies,” the former president wrote.
According to his assessment, the Biden administration inherited “the strongest Border in American history” and turned it into “by far the worst in American history.”
“Harris has not yet shown adequate interest”
Furthermore, Trump asserted that if he and Abbott were not planning their own border visit, Harris “would have never gone!”
He is not alone among Republicans in denouncing the job Harris has done as Biden’s border czar.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) shared his own skepticism about the motivation for Harris’ border visit, asserting: “Suddenly President Trump is going to the border and they realized, ‘Oh crap, we got to do something.'”
Dozens of GOP lawmakers signed a letter last week calling for someone else to take over the role.
“Despite being in the midst of a border crisis this country has not seen in two decades, Vice President Harris has not yet shown adequate interest in observing this crisis first-hand,” the letter read.
The post Trump claims credit for upcoming border visit by VP Harris first appeared on Conservative Institute.
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