By Joe Chatham
FAIR
On Wednesday, CNN hosted a town hall meeting in Pennsylvania that featured Vice President Kamala Harris. CNN anchor Anderson Cooper pressed the Vice President on the issue of immigration. And while she did not answer all of his questions, Harris continued to voice strong support for a Senate bill that would codify open-borders policies and said she would push for amnesty for the millions of illegal aliens already in the country.
The first immigration question raised was about the country’s skyrocketing illegal alien population and the benefits and subsidies that they may receive. But instead of addressing the more than $150 billion annual cost of illegal immigration, the Vice President attempted to pivot: “Let’s start with this. America’s immigration system is broken and it needs to be fixed, and it’s been broken for a long time.” She voiced support for the Senate border bill negotiated earlier this year, which failed twice on the Senate floor. Vice President Harris applauded the increase in taxpayer funding in that bill, but failed to mention that it would codify catch-and-release of asylum seekers and provide hundreds of millions in funding for NGOs facilitating illegal immigration.
Then, referencing the record border crossings in 2022 and 2023, Cooper asked the Vice President why the Biden-Harris administration did not take action to stop the flood of illegal immigration earlier. CNN’s Cooper noted that her administration took hundreds of executive actions but that the numbers continued to rise. He referenced new asylum rules put in place in June of 2024, and asked if she regretted not taking action sooner. Harris said, “I think we did the right thing.”
Mr. Cooper focused next on the border wall. “Under Donald Trump,” Cooper said, “you criticized the wall more than 50 times. You called it stupid, useless, and a medieval vanity project. Is a border wall stupid?” In response, Vice President Harris again pivoted, describing former President Trump’s efforts to build the wall as ineffective. However, Harris refused to say whether she thinks the border wall is stupid, instead talking about needing a path to citizenship for people in the country illegally.
Finally, Mr. Cooper touched on a 2019 presidential debate when the Vice President raised her hand in support of “decriminalizing” illegal border crossings. Vice President Harris failed to explain that comment, but argued that, “I never intended, nor will I ever allow, America to have a border that is not secure.”
After the interview, Anderson Cooper said he was criticized for his direct questioning of Harris. But, Cooper defended himself, even taking a jab at rival news network MSNBC. “I believe in asking questions and probing people’s arguments and trying to reveal people’s arguments, what’s true and what’s not. And I like — I’m not on MSNBC for a reason.” Unfortunately, his town hall did not result in direct answers or the revelation of new policy positions from the Vice President, who claims a Harris-Walz administration will be different from the Biden-Harris administration. Like CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Americans are still trying to learn how.
