Vice President Harris will strike a hawkish tone on illegal immigration from a port of entry in Douglas, Ariz., on Friday as she seeks to cut into former President Trump’s advantage on border security.
The Hill’s Alex Gangitano got a peek into what to expect from Harris’s first trip to the Southern border as the Democratic presidential nominee:
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Harris will call for more resources for border patrol agents. She’s previously pledged to hire 1,500 addition border agents.
- Harris will say she has a plan to curb the flow of fentanyl into the U.S. by installing new detection machines at ports of entry.
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A campaign official said Harris plans to make the case that “American sovereignty requires setting rules at the border and enforcing them.” She will argue that a safe and secure border can also be “humane” in the way it deals with immigrants.
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Harris will meet with border agents, although there is some tension here. President Biden claimed during his debate against Trump that the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) endorsed him. The border patrol union quickly slapped down the suggestion as false, saying they “never have and never will.”
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Art Del Cueto, the vice president of the NBPC, told Fox News on Friday: “After years of not just ignoring the problem, but helping create it, Vice President Kamala Harris is finally headed down to the border. This is nothing more than for her to check the box, but what it is in reality is a slap in the face towards the men and women that put their lives on the line every day, and also a slap in the face to the American public. Where has she been?”
- Harris will reiterate her support for the bipartisan border deal that failed twice in Congress this year after Trump came out against it. The NBPC supported that bill. “The American people deserve a president who cares more about border security than playing political games,” Harris will say.
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In addition to the border visit, the Harris campaign will release a new ad in Arizona casting her as a border hawk. “She will secure our border. Here’s her plan — hire thousands of more border agents, enforce the law and step up technology and stop fentanyl smuggling and human trafficking. We need a leader with a real plan to fix the border and that’s Kamala Harris,” the narrator says in the ad.
Watch the event live here at 7:45 p.m. ET Border encounters have dropped dramatically since Biden’s executive order earlier this year limiting asylum claims at the Southern border. However, critics accuse Biden and Harris of failing to address the issue for their first three years in office, as a massive influx of illegal immigrants created a strain on resources in cities across the country. Trump called a press conference Thursday at Trump Tower in New York to act as a prebuttal to Harris’s border visit.
“For nearly four years, we have been living through the worst border crisis in the history of the world,” he said. “There’s never been anything like it, which has brought untold suffering, misery, and death upon our land. The architect of this destruction is Kamala Harris.” However, new polls show Trump’s advantage on border security has narrowed since Harris replaced Biden as the Democratic nominee. -
The final CNN poll while Biden was in the race found Trump with a 22-point advantage on immigration. The most recent survey finds him leading Harris by only 8 points on the issue.
Harris’s border visit to Arizona comes as polls find Trump opening up a lead in the Sun Belt swing state. -
A poll from USA Today/Suffolk University released Friday found Trump with a 6-point lead in Arizona. He leads by 1.4 points in Nate Silver’s average of surveys, which have moved in Trump’s direction by nearly by 2.7 points in Arizona over the past month. Trump lost Arizona to Biden in 2020 by only roughly 10,000 votes.
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Welcome to Evening Report! I’m Jonathan Easley, catching you up from the afternoon and what’s coming tomorrow. Not on the list? Subscribe here. |
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Trump, Zelensky meet amid tensions
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Former President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met at Trump Tower on Friday to discuss bringing an end to the war with Russia, even as some Republicans grow frustrated with U.S. involvement and Zelensky’s coziness with Democrats. Trump and Zelensky had a friendly encounter in front of the cameras, where Trump pledged to bring a “rapid” end to the war if he’s elected president in November. “It has to end,” Trump said. “His country has gone through hell and he’s gone through hell.” There was one small sign of strain when Trump boasted he’d negotiate a quick end to the war because he has “a very good relationship” with Russian President Vladimir Putin. “I hope we have more good relations between us,” Zelensky interjected. “Oh, I see,” Trump responded. “But it takes two to tango, you know. And we’re going to have a good meeting today. And I think the fact that we’re even together today is a very good sign.” It was a roller coaster week for Zelensky in Washington: -
President Biden pledged billions more in aid to Ukraine, but Zelensky ran crosswise with Republicans for touring an artillery factory with Democrats in the swing state of Pennsylvania.
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Zelensky gave an interview to the New Yorker in which he doubted Trump could negotiate a quick end to the war. He also called Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), “too radical.”
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House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) called for Ukraine’s ambassador to the U.S. to be fired for scheduling the trip to Pennsylvania. Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) opened an investigation into the matter, which Republicans described as election meddling.
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Zelensky urged the U.S. to allow him to strike deeper into Russia. Putin has said any action like that would provoke a nuclear response against the West.
However, Trump and Zelensky appeared friendly and united on Friday. Trump praised Zelensky for supporting him through his first impeachment trial. The House impeached Trump for improperly pressuring Zelensky to investigate President Biden. Trump was acquitted at the time by the GOP-controlled Senate. “He could have grandstanded and played cute but he didn’t do that. He said President Trump did absolutely nothing wrong, he said it loud and clear and the impeachment hoax died right there…He was a piece of steel.” Zelensky said he hopes to maintain strong relations with both candidates ahead of the election “Only Americans decide who will be the president, but until November we can’t stop Putin … after November, we have to decide and we hope the strength of the U.S. will be very strong … that’s why I decided to meet with both candidates.”
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Harris ticks up in the polls
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Vice President Harris has risen in recent national polls and surveys of the battleground states with less than six weeks to go before Election Day.
Harris is near her high mark in Nate Silver’s election model, where she has a 58 percent chance of victory. That lead wouldn’t survive either a 2016 or a 2020-sized polling error, but Silver said on social platform X: “Forecast still in toss-up range, but we’re at a point where you’d probably rather have Harris’s hand to play.” -
Harris has recently had a strong string of polls in Georgia and North Carolina, both of which are must-win states for former President Trump.
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The latest Fox News poll found Harris leading Trump by 3 points in Georgia, while three recent surveys of North Carolina have found Harris leading by between 1 and 3 points.
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A new CNN poll found Harris leading by 11 points in Nebraska’s second congressional district, which is worth one Electoral College vote. Republicans recently tried and failed to turn Nebraska into a winner-take-all state. Trump should win the remaining four Electoral College votes in Nebraska.
Still, every swing state is within the margin of error and could go either way.
Here’s the state of play, according to the latest polling averages from The Hill and Decision Desk HQ:
National: Harris +4.0 AZ: Trump +0.8 GA: Trump +0.2 MI: Harris +1.2 NC: Harris +2.5
NV: Trump +0.6 PA: Harris +1.3 WI: Harris +2.0 Bottom line: If the chips fell exactly like this — which is unlikely — Harris would win 283 Electoral College votes, compared to 255 for Trump. But if Trump won North Carolina and everything else remained the same, he’d notch a 271-267 victory. Perspectives: -
Politico: Harris’s Pennsylvania problem.
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Vox: The Republican Party is less white than ever thanks to Donald Trump.
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The Hill: Why Harris is likely to be the first woman president.
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Steve Bannon: Victory is at hand.
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The Nation: Is Harris’s media strategy working?
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The Washington Monthly: Time for Democrats to spend in Florida and Texas.
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Here’s who’s coming up on the Sunday shows: NewsNation “The Hill Sunday”: Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont (D); Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.).
FOX “Fox News Sunday”: Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.).
CBS “Sunday Morning”: President Biden will talk about former President Carter’s 100th birthday.
NBC “Meet the Press”: Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.).
ABC “This Week”: House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-Minn.).
MSNBC “Inside with Jen Psaki”: Second gentleman Doug Emhoff.
CBS “Face the Nation”: Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.); Rep. Madeleine Dean (D-Pa.)
CNN “State of the Union”: Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). |
–Compiled by The Hill’s Elizabeth Crisp. |
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“The looming industrial downturn,” by Justin Vassallo for Compact.
“Legalizing sports gambling was a huge mistake,” by Charles Fain Lehman for The Atlantic.
“Why has Melania Trump returned to public life now?,” by Kara Kennedy for The New Statesman. |
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4 days until the vice-presidential debate.
39 days until the 2024 general election.
115 days until Inauguration Day 2025. |
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Friday - Harris travels to San Francisco.
- Trump holds a town hall in Warren, Mich., at 6 p.m.
Saturday - Trump holds a campaign event in Prairie du Chien, Wis. He’ll then travel to Tuscaloosa for the Alabama-Georgia college football game.
- Harris holds campaign events in San Francisco and Los Angeles.
Sunday - Harris campaigns in Nevada.
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