Vice President Kamala Harris will visit the US-Mexico border next week for her first time as vice president.
Politico first reported the news on Wednesday, June 23, 2021, citing sources familiar with the vice president’s plans. She is set to be accompanied by Alejandro Mayorkas, head of the Department of Homeland Security, on the trip.
The vice president had come under increasing criticism from Republicans over the past few months after she was appointed by President Joe Biden to oversee his administration’s handling of the situation at the border and the ongoing surge of northbound migration, due to her lack of physical visits to the border and facilities where migrants, particularly children, are being held.
Her visit to the border follows a multi-day trip to Guatemala and Mexico, where the vice president met with the countries’ respective leaders and vowed US support for anticorruption efforts and other work seen as necessary by the administration to address the underlying causes of US-bound Central American migration.
