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135

Kamala Harris Claims She’s Tougher Than Donald Trump on Border Policies (www.democracynow.org)

submitted 4 months ago by return2ozma to c/politics

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[–] [email protected] 98 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (8 children)

Hello! Okay so, one, she didn't say that. The quote was:

“Our administration worked on the most significant border security bill in decades. Some of the most conservative Republicans in Washington, D.C., supported the bill. Even the Border Patrol endorsed it. It was all set to pass, but at the last minute, Trump directed his allies in the Senate to vote it down.”

There's also a quote that's a little closer, from this pretty good article about the rally where this all happened:

"Donald Trump does not care about border security — he only cares about himself," Harris said. “As president, I will bring back the border security bill that Donald Trump killed, and I will sign it into law, and show Donald Trump what real leadership looks like," she said.

So, she's not claiming she's tougher on border policy than Trump is, but it is fair to say she is pivoting to a "border security" narrative. In order to explain why she wants to pass a border bill, it is necessary to explain what is actually going on at the border. Because our media is shit, almost no one knows; I suspect she's pivoting to "border security" as a narrative because she's being attacked from the right on it, and because something genuinely does need to be done, and she wants to lay the groundwork for making the attempt. But anyway. What is happening is that there are two big problems in immigration in this country:

There's a huge backlog of asylum / deportation cases which means people stay in custody in racist and oppressive overcrowded prisons
We're rate limiting the people coming into the country (see point #1), which means a lot of asylum seekers who are trying to do it legally wind up waiting for months (maybe years now, IDK) on the other side of the Mexican border, basically just living in a big, dangerous, squalid, crime-ridden open-air field with no facilities for life, and no job, no medical care for anyone no matter how young or old, it's fuckin dangerous

There's also a problem that the whole agency in charge of the border police is for the most part made of racist people, but that one is unfixable unless Harris can fire the whole agency en masse and then find 40,000 people who want to be immigration police who are not racist. So, unfixable. The other two problems do have legislative solutions, but the Republicans blocked anything Biden did, even when he tried promising to do some cruel or racist things as a compromise in order to get them to also agree to some badly needed things (mostly, increasing ICE funding so they can at least house the people they have in better conditions, and increasing the number of judges to process cases so people don't wait for a year before their case is heard).

And, any time a Democrat tries to do anything about any of this, e.g. reducing the rate of people allowed to come across the border, or increasing the number of judges to reduce the backlog, or increasing funding for ICE, everyone on the left as far as I can tell thinks they're just being cruel on purpose for no reason and gets really mad.

So, OP: What should the Democrats do? You are (edit ~~angry~~) attacking them because they are talking about border security and trying to fix this mess. What should their messaging be instead (since you seem angry about this particular messaging, which again, you kind of have a point about "tough on the border" being a callous message in addition to feeding into the false media narrative)? And, what their legislative action?

[–] very_well_lost 19 points 4 months ago (1 children)

No, no, you're wrong! The media bias fact checker bot gave it a credibility rating of "high", so the headline must be right!

[–] ripcord 10 points 4 months ago (1 children)

And Left-Center!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Amazing how anything left of stormfront is "left" something

[–] ripcord 6 points 4 months ago (1 children)

At first I was thinking it was a perception issue on my part and I was realizing something. Then it said the AP, Reuters, and the damn Internet Archive were "Center-left". It's definitely confused about where "center" is.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Literally Reagan, that pinko commie with his government cheese and immigration amnesty.

[–] ripcord 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 months ago

You wanted to know where they think the center is.

It's well known centrist, Ronald Reagan.

[–] kevindqc 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Can anyone remember the bill that Trump tanked? I tried to look it up but I guess journalists didn't want to give the name of or number of the bill?

I found HR 815 on one, but that's a bill that became law, so probably a mistake?

[–] dhork 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

The bill started in the Senate and got killed there, so look for a Senate number. I don't think it ever made it to the House.

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[–] TropicalDingdong 28 points 4 months ago

I'm not voting for a Democrat because they are "tougher" on the border. I want better border policy, not shitty draconian Republican or Biden border policy.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago (3 children)

We don’t actually want this. This is bad. Stop it.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

I have good news! She's not actually doing what the headline says. IDK why the media is so shit when covering this issue but the picture that's being created (where the choices are "nothing" which is fine or "border security" which means cruelty), is wrong in both respects. See my longer top level comment.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Biden’s current border strategy is killing migrants by forcing them into remote areas of the border. They’ve continued trumps bullshit but no one gives a shit because it isn’t Trump.

As an example for a long time, they were keeping migrants in open air detention camps while not feeding or giving water to these migrants. Volunteers were keeping them alive. This is evil and I do not want it.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago

Good news, Biden tried to fix that, by giving enough funding to ICE so they would have places to put those people, increasing the number of judges so there wouldn't be this massive backlog of 3 million asylum cases to be heard (THREE FUCKING MILLION PEOPLE). Bad news, the Republicans killed it, and none of the left supported him on it either because the media doesn't give a fuck about any of those people in any of those open air detention camps, and so they represented it all wrong, so people thought he was doing cruelty to migrants and opposed his attempt to do anything to fix it. So, nothing happened. They're still in the camps. And ICE is still racist. Biden can't fix that either.

It's a fucking disaster. And now, the left is preemptively shitting on Harris for getting tangentially involved in it, before she's even had a chance to fuck anything up. Sounds like those people better have their supplies of sunscreen and bottled water in place.

😢😢😢

[–] [email protected] 7 points 4 months ago

If "tough" means "focused", I'm fairly indifferent. Indiscriminately breaking up families and harrassing people because you're bigoted is not "tough", it's just hateful. It serves no real world functional purpose. And that's the policies of the right. They aren't tough, because they aren't results orientated, beyond punishing "them". I have to assume (hope) Harris is motivated more by real world cost benefit calculations and less by knee jerk stereotypes. Tough could mean fair, if she intends to apply the rules more justly, and less punativatively. If tough means more scrutiny with less prejudice, it sounds more like a better return on investment for border infrastructure.

[–] SGG 3 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Words are inaccurate.

It is perfectly possible to be tough on border security without treating people like sub human trash.

You can make a border more difficult to illegally bypass, while also opening the gates to more to ensure that people are documented. Turning potential "illegals" into legal immigrants. This reduces the need to try and get through the border illegally. This is obviously a very basic over view, lacking any kind of thought into policy for supporting them.

Of course, if someone's definition of tougher on border security is "fuck off, we're full", with the border having razor wire and armed guards shooting on sight, then they would disagree with the above.

[–] jordanlund 15 points 4 months ago

Considering Trump killed a bi-partisan border deal because it might make the other side look good, that's not a surprise.

https://youtu.be/0gsR001be-U#t=14s

[–] Lasherz12 14 points 4 months ago (1 children)

To be fair, coupled in with this more draconian set of rules was an attempt to actually make the border function normally if you actually read some of the finer details. We have a massive need for more immigration judges which is causing migrants to be in camps longer and leading to more abuse as they and their families wait for rulings. Republicans have made the disfunction part of the process to keep them tortured longer and the new policy would be the first real push in over a decade to fix that. I'd also rather have a hiring wave under a Democrat than a republican. Bush created a nightmare with border patrol by advertising the positions to the public and structuring it as defending America rather than taking care of desperate people and getting them processed.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Yeah, exactly. There was some genuine cruelty in the bill, put in as an attempted compromise with the Republicans so they could get it passed (incl. making it harder to get asylum and easier to kick people out), although nothing even close to the child-stealing horror movie stuff that Trump was getting his kicks out of putting into place. But the majority of the legislation was trying to help -- increasing the number of judges so people aren't waiting in custody for over a year in a terrifyingly racist and overcrowded prison when they didn't even do anything wrong being a big one.

[–] Crismus 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Why do the democrat leadership always push for right-wing causes, when they aren't in the Republican Party for a reason?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 months ago (2 children)

"Democrat leadership"

Fascinating

[–] Crismus 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

The person being nominated is considered the leader of the party. At least it has for as long asbI can remember. Number 2, while I understand she may not have said those exact words, Biden's border bill is basically a Republican bill that only was killed to make Democrats look bad.

Tightening the amnesty and refugee quotas won't make it better. Acknowledging that this whole border crisis is manufactured would do more.

Fox and the rest love to lie about how much asylum seekers get paid, bur will never give that money to the people that they promote are missing out.

Finally, moving to the right is normal campaign strategy, but there was no push to the left during the Primary stage. This is just going from center right to more right. Because Biden never was on the left.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

Acknowledging that this whole border crisis is manufactured would do more.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/migrants-desperate-live-us-endure-inhumane-conditions-mexican/story?id=99108515

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1745-9133.12580

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/12/27/immigration-court-backlog-grows/72030952007/

There is absolutely a crisis at the border, just not the one that conservative media has manufactured.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

The bill in question gave billions to ICE, CPB, US martials, and others to hire more officers and increase detention capacity.

If the purpose of the bill was to process immigrants so they could legally stay in the country and get jobs with papers and all, they wouldn't spend billions building cages for the immigrants in the country or shut the border down, making things worse for the ones already stuck outside the border.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago (1 children)

The bill in question gave billions to ICE, CPB,

True

US martials

I feel like this part isn’t true. Is this true? Idk, maybe it is.

hire more officers

True

and increase detention capacity

Interesting that you don’t like this

I talked way up at the top of the thread about more details of what’s going on at the border and why the bill is the way that it is. I would ask you the same thing I asked before: What should Biden/Harris do?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

I feel like this part isn’t true. Is this true? Idk, maybe it is.

I linked the bill, page 64

64 SEN. APPRO.

1UNITED STATES MARSHALS SERVICE

2FEDERAL PRISONER DETENTION For an additional amount for ‘‘United States Mar-

3shals Service—Federal Prisoner Detention’’,

4$210,000,000, to remain available until expended, for de-

5tention costs due to enforcement activities along the south-

6ern and northern borders

What should Biden/Harris do?

If you find yourself in control of the machine that crushes orphans, your primary concern shouldn't be making sure it has all the resources it needs to function.

Appoint a head of ICE who will fire every single officer and sell off or destroy every asset. Any remaining budget can be used to process claims and arrange housing/job placement for immigrants.

End all economic warfare and other hostile actions against Caribbean/Central/South American countries. You can't torpedo Mexico's economy via NAFTA, and ask why you're getting a flood of Mexicans, then torpedo Venezuela's economy via sanctions and ask why you're getting a flood of Venezuelans, torpedo Nicaragua's economy via coup, etc.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

4$210,000,000, to remain available until expended,

Ah, got it. Fair play.

Appoint a head of ICE who will fire every single officer and sell off or destroy every asset.

He tries, congress and the courts say no because that’s not how that works. (Just as they did for way more reasonable things than this that he tried to order to have happen. That’s the whole thing with Project 2025 is to undo the guard rails that prevent presidents from simply making massive changes to the system on a whim.)

What should he try next?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

He can tell the courts to fuck off, and as far as congress goes, he only needs 50%+1 in the senate to approve an appointment, and he's more than capable of whipping that vote given that the organization that sends migrants to camps is unpopular among dem constituents.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (1 children)

He can tell the courts to fuck off

Ah yes! I mean, you’re right; he can tell whoever he wants, whatever he wants, as Trump demonstrated. The issue is, what would happen with his orders to ICE to start doing things that were illegal as far as existing statutes about what ICE is supposed to do. And then that in the face of an order by the courts to do definitely obey the statutes.

Biden would probably be fine. He might lose some support in the election but whatever. Whoever implemented those orders would probably join the handful of Trump administration members who did the same and wound up in federal prison for it. Eventually, people would notice the pattern of their coworkers going to prison for obeying Biden’s instructions and stop listening to him. Nixon and Trump tested the boundaries of this system with varying levels of success, and a bunch of people in their orbits went to prison and a bunch more than that stopped listening to them.

So. Biden tells the courts to fuck off, people go to prison, the remaining staff do not obey his instructions as far as what ICE should do, because they don’t want to also go to prison. The border conditions remain a bone chilling nightmare. What should he try next?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

start doing things that were illegal as far as existing statutes about what ICE is supposed to do

There's nothing illegal about firing ICE officers and selling off assets, they do that all the time.

The border conditions remain a bone chilling nightmare

Decreasing ICE and CPB's capacity to make things worse is better than nothing.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

There's nothing illegal about firing ICE officers and selling off assets, they do that all the time.

There is absolutely something illegal about ignoring a judge who is telling you that what you are doing doesn’t match the statutes that describe how ICE is supposed to operate.

Decreasing ICE and CPB's capacity to make things worse is better than nothing.

What? No it isn’t (or, not automatically). Like I say, I already explained this in my longer message. There are 3 million people waiting for their cases to be heard, in a system that wasn’t designed for that many. Decreasing the funding will make things worse for those people (when they were already pretty pretty fuckin bad); increasing the funding so the prisons are not overcrowded will make it better.

The problems of racism and horror in the immigration apparatus of this country are very real. The magical-thinking solutions you are proposing will either accomplish nothing or make things worse. People who are similarly confused on the issue, and thinking that they need to oppose the Democrats’ attempts at legislation, because if it isn’t waving a magic wand to make things instantly better then it must represent making things worse on purpose, have created quite a lot of real human misery that is ongoing including up to the present day.

I’m gonna take it from this that you have no answer to what Biden / Harris should do to make things better. There are realistic answers that are better than what they are doing, but nothing you’ve said comes anywhere close to that.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Decreasing the funding will make things worse

Increasing funding for rounding those people up and putting them in more cages will make things worse.

This isn't funding for judges, it's funding for the whole system. You can fund judges without funding the expansion of the camps.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yes yes, let's underfund the prisons, instead of anything to directly reduce the amount of people going into them

What could go wrong, what's the worst that could happen

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

This is not reducing the number of people going into the prisons, it is funding the guys who round them up.

I would have a very different take if this funded judges instead of US marshals and ICE agents.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

I have chosen to exit this conversation

[–] return2ozma -1 points 4 months ago (2 children)

Do they not tend to move towards the right during election years Mozz?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 4 months ago (3 children)

He's pointing out that using "Democrat" as an adjective is a weirdly Republican thing to do.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Specifically, when I did some real analysis on the question, less than 10% of lemmy posters who talk about Democrats do it by saying "Democrat" as an adjective, and there's significant overlap between those posters and the posters that are saying that people shouldn't support the Democrats (claiming that the Democrats aren't far left enough to deserve support from the left).

Why is that? IDK, man, it's a mystery. I can draw a up a little diagram for you; maybe we can figure out the mystery together.

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[–] Blackbeard 0 points 4 months ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Addressing the causes of the influxes (supporting terrorists/coups any time a south American country elects someone left of hitler) in the long term, and the actual migrants in a humane way by letting asylum seekers into the country until their claims can be addressed as international law requires, and providing job placement and housing all migrants need, instead of throwing them in cages.

[–] Blackbeard 2 points 4 months ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago

Except that's not at all what the bill does, it's spending billions increasing detention capacity, hiring more ICE agents, border surveillance, and allows the president to close the border entirely.

This is everything the republicans wanted.

[–] Ensign_Crab 1 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

No, you don't get it. Any apparent move to the right is ackshually a move to the left because not Trump. If you disagree, it's because [veiled accusation that you're a scary foreigner or a Republican].

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Yeah this isn't an arms race you want to get involved with. You're not gonna win over any Trump voters with this when he can make them swoon by talking about total border shutdowns or hell maybe reviving the old build-a-wall rhetoric.

On the flip side, this might well alienate independent/Dem-leaning people who don't want this but whose votes you desperately need and have a chance to win over.

Not a good play imo.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago)

Democrats can promise a river of foreign blood, and still lose the "moderate republicans", because the republicans will promise to double it.

Fascists will always vote for the real thing over diet-fascism.

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