WASHINGTON – Just over fourteen months into President Joe Biden’s term, he appointed Vice President Kamala Harris to lead efforts with Mexico and Central America’s Northern Triangle —Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador—to address the root causes of the southern border crisis.
In his March 24, 2021 remarks, the President said that while it was “not her full responsibility and job,” Harris was qualified to lead the charge due to her experience as California attorney general, where she did “a great deal upholding human rights, but also fighting organized crime in the process.”
He highlighted the importance of reversing some of the Trump administration’s immigration policies, like reinstating the $700 million bipartisan deal established under Obama to fund Northern Triangle countries and address issues driving migration.
“The best way to keep people from coming is to keep them from wanting to leave,” he said.
Now, as Biden’s term winds down, both his administration and the Harris-Walz campaign have pivoted to stricter border policies, responding to polls showing border security as a key issue for voters in this election cycle.
“The public has shifted,” said Colleen Putzel-Kavanaugh, an Associate Policy Analyst with the nonpartisan Migration Policy Institute’s U.S. Immigration Policy Program.
“It’s really this sense of orderliness that people are looking for,” Putzel-Kavanaugh said. People want to feel as if “the government is handling it and there’s been this general perception that the government isn’t handling it.”
According to a recent report by Pew Research Center, improving border security is supported by nearly all registered voters who support Trump, at 96%, and 80% of Harris supporters.
Sahana Mukherjee, Associate Director of Race and Ethnicity Research at Pew Research Center, co-authored the report and said that despite the traditional partisan divides surrounding immigration issues, it’s significant that both parties widely support improving border security.
“Border security is something that both candidates have been talking about, so I think that’s why you see a similar general sentiment amongst their supporters,” Mukherjee said.
Nicknamed a “border czar” by her Republican opponents, Harris has visited the southern border twice during her vice presidency—once in 2021 and again in September 2024. She has also made two trips to Latin America, traveling to Guatemala and Mexico in 2021 and Honduras in 2022.
Harris has proposed few concrete immigration policies ahead of the election, focusing primarily on reviving a bipartisan border bill that failed in Congress. The bill would overhaul the asylum process, tighten detention policies, and increase green card availability. Harris has blamed Trump for blocking the bill and vows to push it through if elected.
Her current stance on immigration marks a shift from her earlier, more progressive policy positions. During the 2020 primary, Harris supported cutting Immigration and Customs Enforcement funding and more lenient asylum policies. Now, she emphasizes enforcing immigration laws and imposing consequences for unlawful entry.
“The United States is a sovereign nation,” Harris said during her speech at the border crossing in Douglas, Arizona on Sept. 27. “And I believe that we have a duty to set rules at our border and enforce them.”
Arizona is poised to play a pivotal role in the presidential election, with Trump holding a narrow lead in recent polls. Harris’ visit to Douglas, one of the busiest ports of entry at the southwest border, followed a $400 million grant from the Biden administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill.
In her speech, Harris commended Biden’s executive order from June 2024, which restricted asylum seekers to official border crossings and has caused a 77% decline in migrant border encounters since December 2023, according to recent Customs and Border Patrol statistics. However, she emphasized the ongoing need for a bipartisan solution. Without congressional support, immigration centers receive the same funding under the executive order.
“So whether that’s at the border or in the interior, at the courts, they’re still getting the same amount of resources, but working with a much higher and more complicated caseload,” Putzel-Kavanaugh said.
While Biden’s executive order has contributed to the ongoing decline in illegal border crossings in 2024, Mukherjee noted that those figures were already decreasing due to shifts in the Mexican government.
She also said that, based on Pew’s data, it remains uncertain whether voters are aware of the drop in border apprehensions, especially as both campaigns highlight border security as a critical issue leading up to the election.
“Both Trump and Harris supporters agree that the immigration system in general needs major changes or needs to be completely overhauled,” Mukherjee said.
