The United States has a broken immigration system that needs to be repaired, Vice President Kamala Harris said on Wednesday in a rare interview with the Republican-leaning news channel during which she sparred with its popular host.
“The point is that we have a broken immigration system that needs to be repaired,'” Ms Harris told Fox News anchor Bret Baier in a rare sit-down with the news channel.
“So, your Homeland Security Secretary said that 85 per cent of apprehensions,” Mr Baier interjected.
“I'm not finished. We have an immigration system,” Ms Harris tried to continue with her answer.
“It's a rough estimate that 6 million people have been released into the country,” the Fox News anchor interrupted again.
“And let me just finish. I'll get to the question. I promise you. I was beginning to answer,” the vice president pleaded.
“When you came into office, your administration immediately reversed a number of Trump border policies. Most significantly, the policy that required illegal immigrants to be detained through deportation, either in the U.S. or in Mexico. And you switched that policy. They were... released from custody awaiting trial. So instead, included in those were a large number of single men, adult men, who went on to commit heinous crimes. So looking back, do you regret the decision to terminate Remain in Mexico at the beginning of your administration?” Mr Baier asked again.
“At the beginning of our administration, within practically hours of taking the oath, the first bill, practically within hours of taking the oath, was a bill to fix our immigration system,” Ms Harris said as Mr Baier kept on interjecting in between.
“We recognized from day one that to the point of this being your first question, It is a priority for us as a nation and for the American people. Our focus has been on fixing a problem. From day one, then, we have done a number of things, including to address our asylum system and put more resources, getting more judges, what we needed to do to tighten up penalties and increase penalties for illegal crossings, what we needed to do to deal with points of entry between border, entry points,” she said.
“We worked on supporting what was a bipartisan effort, including some of the most conservative members of the United States Congress, to actually strengthen the border. That border bill would have put 1,500 more border agents at the border, which is why I believe the Border Patrol agents supported the bill. It would have allowed us to stem the flow of fentanyl coming into the United States, which is a scourge affecting people of every background, every geographic location in our country, killing people,” she said.
“Donald Trump learned about that bill and told them to kill it because he preferred to instead of fixing a problem,” Harris alleged.
“This election in 20 days will determine whether we have a president of the United States who actually cares more about fixing a problem, even if it is not to their political advantage in an election, because there was a solution,” she said.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
