What Are We Learning About Kamala Harris?

The field of 2020 presidential candidates is growing by the week, but no one has declared their intention to take on President Trump with more gusto than Sen. Kamala Harris (D-CA). The former prosecutor held a rousing kickoff event in front of 20,000 supporters in her native Oakland on Sunday. A day later, she gave a master class on how to conduct a town hall, fielding questions with aplomb and empathy at Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa.

But there’s going to be more to landing the Democratic nomination — and ultimately, defeating Trump — than appearing presidential. On Monday night, Harris staked out positions on several key issues that figure to shape the debate around which candidate Democratic voters should choose to represent the party two years from now and, possibly, for four-to-eight years after that.

Immigration

Link to tweet

There was a point last year when Democrats agreed to provide funding for a wall along the southern border in exchange for protection to recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program introduced by President Obama. Harris doesn’t see this as a fair exchange. “Let me be clear, I’m not going to vote for a wall under any circumstances,” she said.

“We promised [DACA recipients], and it is in writing, that if you give us this information about who you are we will not share it will ICE and we will not use it as a basis for deporting you,” Harris explained. “We promised you that. Then this administration came in and broke that promise.” She added that the lives of DACA recipients shouldn’t be traded “for the sake of the political games that this president is playing in trying to vilify young people like you who are doing nothing except being productive and believing in and living the American dream.”

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https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/kamala-harris-criminal-justice-785874/