Tipsheet

'Her Campaign Declined to Say'

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  September 24, 2024 10:05 AM

According to the Kamala Harris campaign and its surrogates, their candidate is too busy to answer questions.  A top supporter argued that her schedule is just too packed to accommodate interviews.  For context, Harris has been a major party's presidential standard-bearer for more than two months, and has done one solo televised interview, one (joint) nationally-televised interview, and zero press conferences. A spokesman tells us not to read too deeply into her refusal to answer basic questions.  Hillary Clinton says Harris simply doesn't have to field such questions, suggesting such demands are evidence of a sexist double-standard, or something.  Her campaign has informed reporters of numerous claimed flip-flops on multiple issues -- I say 'supposed' because she hasn't offered an explanation for any of them, and hasn't even addressed nearly any of them herself at all.  As more of her previous stances come to light, a handful of curious journalists have attempted to glean insight into what she's at least pretending are her current beliefs.  They are often met with some version of this:


She promised a massive amnesty-by-executive-fiat when she ran for president just a few years ago.  Does she now ostensibly oppose her proposal?  "Her campaign declined to say either way."  Of course they did.  We'd likely get a similar stonewall if someone decided to ask the Harris camp if their candidate still endorses her 'down with deportation' chant:


She is, after all, the Border Czar who has permitted more than ten million illegal crossings on her watch.  She's explicitly in favor of decriminalizing illegal border crossings, and favors taxpayer-funded healthcare plans for illegal immigrants, including sex change operations for those in temporary detention (she also wants to close detention centers and abolish ICE, whom she compared to the KKK).  Of course she shouted "down, down with deportation."  But because she needs to feign border seriousness for a few months, she'll feature Trump's border wall (which she has vociferously opposed as antithetical to everything she believes in) in her ads, while no-commenting questions about her many public positions and statements.  The only way a candidate or campaign gets away with such things, of course, is with media complicity.  And the Harris campaign has got that, in spades.  Unfortunately, this assessment is accurate:


They view their desired political outcomes as more important than the core credibility and basic functions of their industry.  Harris and her running mate are outspoken supporters of 'sanctuary' policies, like these:

Local authorities in Massachusetts allowed an illegal migrant accused of raping a pre-teen child to walk free on bail — and never called immigration authorities, according to a shocking report from ICE.  Bryan Daniel Aldana-Arevalo, 28, was charged on July 26 on the wealthy island of Nantucket with one count of rape of a child with a 10-year age difference and two counts of indecent assault and battery on a child under 14, authorities said.  Three days later, he was released on bail by Nantucket District Court. ICE officers ultimately arrested Aldana-Arevalo on Sept. 10 after tracking him down.. this is not the first time migrants accused have been released into the community after facing charges of sexual violence. It happened earlier this month in the upmarket liberal enclave of Martha’s Vineyard.  

ICE was able to arrest Brazilian national Warley Neto, 24, but it wasn’t until after he was later indicted on five counts of raping a Massachusetts minor and five counts of enticing a minor under 16 earlier this year, according to agency officials...In early September, ICE officers arrested migrant “gotaway” Jorge Luis Castro-Alvarado, 28, who was charged with rape in Lynn, Massachusetts, just a month earlier. ICE had lodged a detainer for the Guatemalan national’s arrest on Feb. 9 under a separate charge of assault and battery on a family or household member. Castro-Alvarado was convicted by the Lynn District Court and sentenced to 18 months in prison, which was shortened to six months. He was then arraigned in April for two counts of rape, and indecent assault and battery on a person over 14 years old — but he was let go on bail without ICE knowing. ICE hunted him down and caught him in September.

Imagine if ICE were abolished, as Harris suggested they should be.  This is what sanctuary polices and 'down down with deportation' look like in practice.  Any comment, Madame Vice President?  Don't hold your breath.  I doubt we'll get any response to these incidents either:

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If on the off chance someone commits a random act of journalism and asks Harris about any of this, her answer is pre-determined.  She'll say she's a prosecutor who has gone after traffickers, she'll alert that she understands the seriousness of this issue, then she'll blame Donald Trump for opposing a fatally flawed bill that she had nothing to do with, having done nothing for years as millions of illegal immigrants poured into the country.  A follow-up question might knock her off her rehearsed lines, but journos seem to have forgotten that such things exist.  I'll leave you with one additional example of a related incident about which the incumbent and Border Czar will have nothing to say: