Biden team’s diplomatic efforts aimed at giving people some sense of hope.
Describing immigration as a complex issue that can’t be solved overnight, Vice President Kamala Harris has said the ultimate goal of Biden administration’s diplomatic efforts is to “give people some sense of hope.”
“We have to give people some sense of hope, that if they stay, that help is on the way,” she told CNN on the “State of the Union” Sunday.“It’s not going to be solved overnight, it’s a complex issue. If it were easy, it would’ve been solved years ago.”
The Indian American official said President Joe Biden had asked her to take the lead on immigration “to carry on the work that he did” as vice president under former President Barack Obama.
Harris told CNN that the Commerce and Agriculture departments will be rolling out policies to help stem the spikes in migration at the US-Mexico border in recent months.
She also plans to work with community-based organizations in countries such as Mexico and Guatemala to make conditions better and give citizens a reason to stay in their countries.
Harris also said the hardest part of the work is rebuilding relations with the nations of Central America after the Trump administration.
“We’re making progress, but it’s not going to evidence itself overnight,” she said. “Part of the problem is that under the previous administration, they pulled out, essentially, a lot of what had been the continuum of work.
“It essentially came to a standstill. We have to rebuild it, and I’ve made it very clear to our team that this has to be a function of a priority that is an American priority, and not just a function of whoever is just sitting in this chair.”
Harris also confirmed that she was the last person in the room before Biden made the decision to pull all US troops out of Afghanistan by Sept. 11.
“This is a president who has an extraordinary amount of courage,” she said, regarding the decision. “He is someone, who I have seen over and over again, make decisions based on what he truly believes … is the right thing to do.”
Harris said that Biden “is acutely aware that it may not be politically popular, or advantageous for him personally; it’s really something to see.”
“I have seen him over and over again make decisions based exactly on what he believes is right,” she noted.
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