GLENDALE, Ariz. (AP) — Vice President Kamala Harris drew on her prosecutorial background to make her first expansive pitch on immigration to border-state voters as she and her new running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, attracted thousands to a campaign rally in Arizona during their tour of battleground states.
Harris, the former attorney general of California, reminded the crowd that she, as a law enforcement official, targeted transnational gangs, drug cartels and smugglers. “I prosecuted them in case after case, and I won,” Harris said in front of a crowd of more than 15,000 in Glendale, a suburb of Phoenix. “So I know what I'm talking about.
” Harris promoted a border security bill that a bipartisan group of senators negotiated earlier this year, which Republican lawmakers ultimately opposed en masse at Republican nominee Donald Trump's behest. “Donald Trump does not want to fix this problem," Harris said. "Be clear about that: He has no interest or desire to actually fix the problem.
He talks a big game about border security, but he does not walk the walk.” Her effort to address immigration — a political liability that has dogged Harris for most of her vice presidency — head-on in the critical battleground state is part of a broader push from her campaign to make gains in Sun Belt states that had become increasingly out of reach with Joe Biden at the top of the ticket. Trump and his allies, who had long hammered Biden over the influx of migrants during hi.