The House condemned Vice President Kamala Harris for her role in helping to oversee the migrant crisis as Republicans work to tie the vice president to some of the Biden administration’s most unpopular policies as she seeks the presidency.
Lawmakers voted 220-196 in favor of a resolution condemning the Biden administration and specifically Harris as its “border czar” over their “failure to secure the southern border” during record-high illegal immigration. The measure is largely a messaging bill as it does not hold any legislative authority or action, but it is likely to be used as fodder against Harris as she is poised to become the Democratic nominee — especially as six Democrats joined all Republicans in backing the bill.
Those Democrats include Reps. Jared Golden (D-ME), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (D-WA), Yadira Caraveo (D-CO), Don Davis (D-NC), Henry Cuellar (D-TX), and Mary Peltola (D-AK).
“Biden’s open border czar Kamala Harris and every elected Democrat is responsible for this border crisis and they must all be held accountable for their role in jeopardizing our national security and turning every community into a border community,” House GOP Chairwoman Elise Stefanik (R-NY), who introduced the resolution, said in a statement . “Kamala Harris failed as border czar leading to violent crimes, rapes, and murders of innocent Americans. We will hold her and Far Left Democrats accountable.”
The resolution comes as Republicans seek to shift their attacks from President Joe Biden, who dropped out of the presidential race on Sunday, to Harris, who is expected to replace the president at the top of the ticket.
Harris is already facing an impeachment effort from Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN), who is seeking to charge the vice president with high crimes and misdemeanors due to "extraordinary incompetence in the execution of her duties and responsibilities" related to immigration. Ogles filed his impeachment articles on Tuesday, although it's unclear when or if they will be brought to the floor for a vote.
The border has emerged as the top issue for Republicans to target Harris, especially after she was tapped by Biden early on in his term to oversee coordination with Central American countries that were considered key sources of migrants to the U.S. southern border. At the time, Harris was unofficially coined the “border czar” by Republicans and several news outlets — a moniker now being rejected by the White House as an official title.
Additionally, White House officials have argued that Harris was never tasked with overseeing operations at the southern border, instead focusing her efforts on Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. However, when pressed on questions about whether Harris's lack of coordination with border patrol chiefs at the southern border is indicative of a problematic leadership style, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre brushed off the concerns.
"She was supposed to be doing root causes dealing with diplomacy. Diplomacy. That's what her job was supposed to be," Jean-Pierre told reporters on Wednesday.
Instead, Jean-Pierre sought to place blame on Senate Republicans who backed out of a bipartisan border deal with Democrats last year shortly after former President Donald Trump came out in opposition.
"We should also look at congressional Republicans who got in the way. Literally got in the way of everything that this president was trying to do to deal with the border," she said. "They would say, 'We want border patrol, we want a deal on what’s happening at the border,' and then they would walk away from it. And they did it because of what the former president said."
Democrats have also pushed back on recent GOP attacks, calling it a “complete fabrication” to shift the blame from Biden to Harris ahead of the election.
“It's semantics,” Rep. Glenn Ivey (D-MD) told the Washington Examiner. “I think the big point, though, is really: When we had a chance to move bipartisan legislation, the Senate bill, Trump killed it. And he basically directed the speaker not to move it forward. So they sat on it instead of actually doing something that could have helped to address the problem.”
Beyond the border crisis, Republicans are also hoping to link Harris to other Biden policies on the economy and crime — seeking to sell the case to voters that the pair are one and the same.
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“She is the co-owner, co-author, co-conspirator in all the policies that got us into the mess,” Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) said on Tuesday. “Crises owned by Kamala Harris: The border crisis, the inflation crisis, the crime crisis, everything happening with the economy, our national security, weakness on the world stage. She [is] an equal partner on all of that. She can't run from that, she has to run on it. And we will ensure that the American people know the facts.”
Harris has not yet formally replaced Biden on the Democratic ticket, although the vice president is presumed to be the likely nominee to receive all his delegates during the party’s nominating convention next month.
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