3:17
- ABC News
- June 8, 2021
VP pushes back on criticism of 1st foreign trip
"I'm not discounting the importance of the border," Harris said in an interview.
3:17
Also presented with Ocasio-Cortez's criticism on Tuesday, Psaki reiterated the White House message that immigration reform is one of the administration's top priorities.
\"What the vice president was simply conveying is that there’s more work to be done,\" she said. \"As we've said many times from here and from many forums before, we need more time to get the work done to ensure that asylum processing is where it should be.\"
But it's not only staunch conservatives like Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and progressives like Ocasio-Cortez who have expressed disapproval with the Biden administration's handling of immigration -- albeit, for different reasons.
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/Politics/harris-gty-ml-210607_1623071412865_hpMain_4x3t_384.jpg\")
Democrat Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, who represents a border district and describes himself as a \"moderate-centrist,\" has also encouraged Biden and Harris to visit the southern border.
\"I think it's important, but I guess he'll do it on their own time and terms,\" he said in an interview with Fox News last week.
Harris arrived in Central America on Sunday and returns to the U.S. Tuesday evening.
Immigration authorities arrested or detained more than 172,000 migrants at the southwest border in April, according to administration officials, the largest in a month since the early 2000s.
The vice president's trip also comes as a report from the Biden administration family reunification task force out Tuesday identifies 3,913 children who were separated from their families between July 2017 and Jan. 2021 under former President Donald Trump's \"zero tolerance\" policy.
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/Politics/kamala-harris-ceremonial-office-02-gty-iwb-210605_1622907000482_hpEmbed_3x2_384.jpg\")
Biden has told migrants not to come to the U.S. on several occasions since taking office.
\"I can say quite clearly don't come over,\" Biden told ABC News Anchor George Stephanopolous in an interview in March. \"Don't leave your town or city or community. We're gonna make sure we have facilities in those cities and towns run by department of -- by DHS and also access with HHS, the Health and Human Services, to say you can apply for asylum from where you are right now.\"
Staff for Harris on the ground in Guatemala told ABC News they are hopeful the first \"migrant center\" would open in Guatemala in \"the next few months.\"
The Department of Homeland Security last week formally terminated the Migrant Protection Policy (MPP), also known as the \"remain in Mexico\" policy, first enacted in 2019 by the Trump administration, which Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said caused a strain on resources.
The policy forced asylum seekers transiting through Mexico to return to dangerous border towns rife with violent crime while their claims were decided in American courts.
ABC News' MaryAlice Parks, Quinn Owen, Justin Gomez and Molly Nagle contributed to this report.
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