WASHINGTON (AP) — Immigration is one of the key issues in the November election. Many voters are concerned about the number of migrants who have entered the U.S. during the Biden administration.
Republicans have repeatedly criticized President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris on the issue, painting a picture of an out-of-control immigration system where migrants are straining services while potential terrorists and criminals take advantage of the chaos to infiltrate the country.
After promising a friendlier approach to immigration when they took office, Biden administration officials have struggled to control the southern border. They have cracked down on asylum access, but also created modern opportunities for migrants to come to America and for some of those already here to gain citizenship.
The government has pointed out that the falling number of migrants coming to the border this summer is evidence that its policies are working.
Here’s a look at Harris and Trump’s stance on immigration:
Harris is focused on border security
In her first trip to the border as the Democratic presidential candidate on Friday, Harris is expected to lay out a plan to further curb asylum applications and expand restrictions on asylum access put in place by the Biden administration earlier this summer, according to a campaign official who spoke on condition of anonymity spoke as Harris had not yet made the announcement.
Ahead of this trip, Harris has largely shied away from the topic of immigration, offering few details about what she would do if elected. That reflects how the issue has become such a controversial issue for the Biden administration.
While Biden’s 2020 campaign promised to restore America’s place as a haven for people fleeing persecution, the government quickly found itself confronted with ever-growing numbers of migrants at the southern border. Democratic-run cities rebelled against the strain migrants faced in their cities.
The government has moved to a more carrot-and-stick approach, making it harder for people coming to the border to get asylum while creating modern ways to make the process more arranged.
In public comments and on her website, Harris has focused on how she might enforce border security and crack down on drug smuggling.
The vice president has spoken about her experiences as California’s attorney general, saying she walked through drug smuggling tunnels and successfully pursued gangs transporting drugs and people across the border.
At the beginning of his term, Biden made Harris his administration’s point person on the causes of migration. Republicans have described her as a “border czar” position responsible for all border security, but her job was specific — finding long-term ways to stem migration from three countries in Central America. During a trip to Guatemala, she warned migrants not to think about coming to America: “Don’t come.”
Harris said Trump made the situation at the border worse by scuttling a bipartisan Senate compromise earlier this year that would have included tightening asylum standards and hiring more border agents, immigration judges and asylum officers. She said she would bring the bill back and sign it into law.
After reaching a record high in December 2023, the number of migrants crossing the border has fallen sharply since then. Harris and the administration credit their tough anti-asylum measures with stemming the flow of refugees, although increased enforcement on the Mexican side has also played a key role.
The vice president has endorsed comprehensive immigration reform that seeks pathways to citizenship for immigrants in the U.S. without legal status and provides a faster path for people living in the country illegally who arrived as children.
She has not commented on whether she would continue key Biden administration programs that have allowed more than a million migrants to enter the country – the carrot of the carrot-and-stick approach.
Migrants can apply an app called CBP One to make an appointment to report to an official border crossing for entry while in Mexico. Additionally, 30,000 migrants a month from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela can come to America for two years and receive work permits provided they have a financial sponsor, pass screening and fly into an American airport.
Harris has also spoken out against Trump’s zero-tolerance policy, which separated families at the border to deter immigration.
Trump promises mass deportations
Immigration was the issue that brought Trump to the White House for the first time and that he hopes will win him another term.
In almost every campaign speech or appearance, he portrayed immigration as out of control.
One of Trump’s most vital promises if re-elected is to carry out the largest domestic deportations in US history. He made similar promises when he first ran for office, but no more than 350,000 people were ever deported during his time in office.
For comparison, then-President Barack Obama carried out 432,000 deportations in 2013, the highest annual deportation on record.
This time Trump explained his promises in more detail. He said he would deploy the National Guard to round up migrants. And he said he would invoke the Alien Enemies Act, a 1798 law that allows the president to deport any non-citizen from a country with which the United States is at war.
He has also vowed to kick out hundreds of thousands of immigrants who entered the country under two key Biden administration programs if he is reelected.
Any plans for mass deportation would certainly be challenged in court and would be enormously costly to implement. And it would depend on countries being willing to take back their citizens.
Trump says he would also bring back policies he implemented during his first term, such as the Remain in Mexico program and Title 42. Remain in Mexico made migrants wait in Mexico while their asylum claims were heard, while Title 42 reasons restricting immigration on public health grounds.
He said he would revive and expand a travel ban from his time in office that originally targeted citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries and pledge a modern “ideological vetting” for immigrants to exclude “dangerous lunatics, haters, fanatics and lunatics.” .
Trump also wants to abolish birthright citizenship for people born in the United States whose parents are both in the country illegally.
