Trump talks security at Arizona’s southern border to counter Harris momentum in the state
Donald Trump, suddenly in a close race against new Democratic nominee Kamala Harris, came to Arizona and leaned on one of his earliest campaign messages to counter her rise: immigration.
The former president painted a grisly, violent picture of illegal immigration during a tour of the U.S.-Mexico border on Thursday, using Cochise County as the backdrop for his counterprogramming on the day the vice president accepts her party’s presidential nomination.
“When we win this November, we will end the Kamala Harris border nightmare,” Trump said, standing beside an unfinished portion of the border wall.
Trump was joined by the families of victims who were reportedly killed by undocumented immigrants, and said that the people crossing the border into the United States and committing such crimes “make our criminals look like babies.”
The mother of Jocelyn Nungaray, a 12-year-old who was killed in Texas, stood beside Trump and gave an emotional appeal for more border control. She said that she hoped listeners would “hear my pain.”
“I just really, really, really want everybody to please take into consideration how important border control is, because we’re losing very innocent people to very heinous crimes that shouldn’t be happening in the first place,” Alexis Nungaray said.
Live coverage: Donald Trump visits border, holds rally in Arizona
Trump spoke for nearly 90 minutes, attacking President Joe Biden and deriding Harris as a “Marxist.” He was joined by top campaign advisers, including Corey Lewandowski, Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles. Republican National Committee Chair Michael Whatley also attended the tour.
The former president praised the U.S. Supreme Court during his remarks after the high court granted an emergency stay on Thursday that limits Arizonans' ability to sign up to cast ballots without providing proof of citizenship.
Border officials welcomed Trump to the region on Thursday.
“It sends a real strong message,” said Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels, who hosted the former president. “You look at his report card when he was president, this was a priority for him.”
While at the border stop, Trump addressed a Cochise County manhunt for a person suspected of making threats against him.
Responding to a question from the media, Trump said he was unaware of the situation.
"I've heard it's dangerous, but I also have a job to do. I heard it's very dangerous. I haven't heard about that," Trump said. "They probably want to keep it from me. Thank you for telling me."
Trump added that he has "great respect" for the Secret Service, which came under bipartisan fire last month after Trump was wounded in a July 13 assassination attempt.
"Mistakes were made, and they're going to learn from the mistakes," he said.
The Cochise County Sheriff's Office confirmed to The Arizona Republic on Thursday that they were searching for Ronald Syvrud, a 66-year-old Benson resident, after it "was made aware of threatening statements made via social media."
“But no, I haven’t heard that, but I’m not that surprised," Trump said. "And the reason is I want to do things that are very bad for the bad guys. I have heard that it's very unsafe to make this trip. There were some people who really didn't want me to make it."
Trump’s decision to fly to Arizona during the Democratic National Convention and visit the southern border underscores how quickly the presidential race has changed. Trump had a comfortable lead over Biden in Arizona polls at the beginning of the summer. But new surveys show Harris and Trump locked in a tight contest in the battleground, with Harris slightly ahead.
Trump arrived on his plane at Sierra Vista Municipal Airport on Thursday morning and was greeted by a crowd of elected officials and supporters. From there, he went to Montezuma Pass with a smaller group, including Democrat-turned-independent Sierra Vista Mayor Clea McCaa, for a border tour and news conference.
Trump will continue his Arizona campaign swing with a rally in Glendale on Friday. He addressed rumors that independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. may drop out of the race during a Phoenix speech on Friday morning. Trump said he hasn’t spoken recently with Kennedy but would consider his endorsement an honor. He noted the pair will both be in the state on Friday but cautioned that there are no set plans for Kennedy to appear at the Trump rally.
Kennedy is “smart” and “a little different, but that’s OK,” Trump said.
Since Harris took over the top of the ticket, Trump has put a renewed focus on immigration. The former Republican president sent his running mate JD Vance to the border in Cochise County at the beginning of August. Trump also teamed up with Brandon Judd, the former president of the National Border Patrol Council who has worked in Arizona, to take Harris to task on immigration in a news conference.
Now, some officials near the southern border are asking Harris to come see the region for herself. Dannels recently asked U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., to pass along an invitation to Harris to visit Cochise County. The mayor of Sierra Vista, a city near the border, also extended an invite to Harris, according to Dannels. McCaa’s office declined to comment on the invitation.
“It’s very important that she comes here. Because for three-and-a-half years, we haven't seen prioritization, acknowledgement or engagement with Vice President Harris or President Biden,” Dannels said. “For her not to come in the next 78 days … sends a very strong message.”
Biden has toured the southern border twice during his time in the White House, most recently going to Brownsville, Texas, to promote a bipartisan border bill. That legislation stalled in Congress after Trump urged Republicans to vote against it in order to deny Democrats an election-year victory.
“Trump and Vance, they only want to campaign on this issue. Donald Trump did not fix this the last time he was in office, and he doesn’t really want to fix it now. He made that very clear,” Kelly said Wednesday during a video news conference. “I'm confident that Vice President Harris is going to be the problem solver that we need. … This is an issue that she cares about, she’s worked on and has helped us with.”
Kelly confirmed that he spoke with Dannels and said that he, too, welcomes anyone to come and tour the border. The senator sidestepped a question about whether he passed along Dannels' invitation to the vice president and knocked Trump’s visit as a “photo op” instead.
Bisbee Mayor Ken Budge, a Harris ally in Cochise County, joined Kelly at the conference and said that “coming down and standing next to a big metal fence doesn't really do much.”
“Coming to the communities and talking with the leaders down here and hearing from them and the public, that's what really matters, and that's what she's hearing through surrogates,” Budge said. “Just to have your picture taken with a big rusty wall behind you, I don’t think accomplishes anything. But I know Vice President Harris does listen to us as we send our messages up and I think that’s the important part.”
The GOP has been spending millions to keep immigration top of mind for Arizona voters: Republicans spent five times as much money on immigration-focused TV ads in the state compared with Democrats last month. But new data that show border crossings are down could complicate the party’s campaign message.
Federal officials saw a 40% decrease in migrant encounters in the month after Biden signed an executive order limiting access to asylum along the U.S.-Mexico border. In the Tucson sector, which encompasses much of Arizona’s border with Mexico and has the highest number of encounters along the entire southern border, migrant encounters dropped by nearly half from June to July.
Cochise County, a rural county located on Arizona’s border with Mexico in the Tucson sector, is often at the center of immigration issues in the state. Vance slammed Harris during his trip there for her role in handling parts of the Biden administration’s immigration portfolio.
“It's hard to believe until you see it with your own eyes, just how bad the policies of the Kamala Harris administration have been when it comes to the southern border,” Vance said while standing beside an unfinished portion of the border wall.
Arizona has the most fortified stretch of the southern border in the country with more barriers built under Trump in Arizona than in any other state. The barriers did not stop smugglers from cutting holes in the wall in broad daylight last year at the peak of border crossings.
Paul Perez, the president of the Border Patrol union, described a wild scene at the border. He referred to the wall as the "Trump wall" and the unused metal beams beside it as the "Kamala wall."
"I've never seen a border as chaotic," Perez said. "It's completely out of control."
10 months after violence shook Sasabe: What is life like in the Mexican border town now?
Republic reporter Perry Vandell contributed to this article.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Trump in Arizona: He turns to border to counter Harris momentum
