It seems like a long-shot play, but Democrats may have no choice.
For years, former President Donald Trump and Republicans have run roughshod over Democrats on border security, particularly during the record migration and resulting chaos during the Biden administration. That pummeling will continue.
Simply trying to deflect the attacks hasn’t sat well with many Democrats.
As the election approaches, Democrats are ramping up an offensive posture that began emerging months ago, airing ads blaming Trump and GOP members of Congress for making the border situation worse by blocking a border enforcement bill.
The bipartisan measure, endorsed by the Border Patrol union, would have limited asylum and poured in millions of dollars to pay for equipment, surveillance technology and thousands of border agents and asylum officers.
Meanwhile, Democrats such as Rep. Mike Levin, who represents coastal north San Diego County, are highlighting President Joe Biden’s executive action strengthening border security and limiting asylum requests that has settled things down along the border and limited migration into the United States.
In her acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention Thursday night, Vice President Kamala Harris spoke of pursuing strong border enforcement while addressing immigrants who already reside in the United States.
“We can create an earned path to citizenship and secure our border,” Harris said.
Not surprisingly, Republicans show no signs of ceding anything here, with polls suggesting they still have the clear advantage. On Thursday, Trump visited the border in Arizona and again slammed Harris about security.
“The choice is simple,” Trump said. “Kamala’s mass amnesty of criminals, or President Trump’s mass deportation of criminals.”
Seemingly attempting to counter such attacks, the Harris campaign released an ad earlier this month that says the former California attorney general “took on drug cartels and jailed gang members for smuggling weapons and drugs across the border. As vice president, she backed the toughest border control bill in decades.”
At the Democratic National Convention in Chicago, border security was a notable theme.
“Let’s be clear, the border is broken,” Rep. Tom Suozzi, D-N.Y., told the crowd on Wednesday, adding that Harris “joyfully accepts the challenge to work across party lines, to secure our border, to treat people like human beings.”
Suozzi flipped a Republican-held district this year while calling for stronger border and asylum laws. Still, it’s not clear how much, or if, the tougher talk on the border will change the equation for Democrats in the presidential race and congressional battlegrounds.
A recent Fox News poll suggests Harris has a lot of ground to make up. The survey, conducted Aug. 9-12, showed Harris and Trump in a virtual dead heat in a nationwide matchup, with the former president ahead by 1 percentage point.
But Trump had a 19-point advantage on border security. On immigration, Trump had a 14-point lead. That’s bigger than the 11-point lead he had over Biden on immigration in a July Fox poll.
Trump and Republicans have branded Harris as Biden’s “border czar” — as have some media outlets — and insist she shares considerable responsibility for how the past increase in border crossings was managed.
Harris defenders said that’s inaccurate and she was never given responsibility for policing the border. Instead, she was tasked with dealing with the “root causes” of Central American immigration.
Nevertheless, Democrats see some daylight here. Media reports have chronicled Democratic ads in battleground districts raising the issue, contending the House Republican majority lacks solutions while Democrats have backed safety improvements at the border — namely, the bipartisan bill.
Some ads blame longtime members for not getting the job done.
“Ken Calvert has had 32 years to secure the border,” Democrat Will Rollins says in an ad criticizing the incumbent Republican he’s challenging in California’s 41st Congressional District.
Levin was among Democrats who urged Biden in a letter in May to take stronger action on the border. On Aug. 13, Levin said the Border Patrol in the San Diego sector had six consecutive weeks of zero migrant street releases, and credited the president’s executive order. Previously, such releases caused confusion among migrants and advocates trying to help them, while triggering public consternation.
“Although this is a positive step forward, there is much more work to do to ensure our immigration system is efficient and effective,” Levin said in a statement. “Executive actions are not permanent. Congress must work together to pass a bipartisan border security and immigration bill.
“Unfortunately, the bipartisan Senate border security bill negotiated earlier this year, the toughest border bill in years, was killed by former President Trump and his congressional allies. They opposed the legislation in order to score political points and play politics with border security.”
Levin’s Republican challenger, businessman Matt Gunderson, said it’s the Democrats who are playing politics.
He said the Biden administration dismantled Trump’s border policies just to “inch their way back” as the election nears, according to the Los Angeles Times.
“No recent ‘come to Jesus’ perspective is going to change what they’ve done over the last three and a half years,” he said.
“Right now, the border is the No. 1 issue impacting this district,” Gunderson said in June. “The San Diego County line has become the epicenter of border crossings. Until we secure the border, all our other issues, in terms of public safety and public health and inflation, kind of fall to the wayside.”
Since then, the sudden rise of Harris has given Democrats momentum. Whatever the political impact of going on offense on border security may have, it seems to have further energized Democrats, and that never hurts.
What they said
Ron Nehring (@RonNehring), former head of the California and San Diego Republican parties, on Wednesday about Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who on Friday dropped his independent presidential bid and endorsed Trump.
“No Republican should come within a thousand miles of this weirdo.”
Originally Published: