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U.S. Rep. Colin Allred wants to talk about the boundary, unlike some Texas Democrats who have come before him.
In particular, he wants to talk about how U. S. Sen. Ted Cruz, who he’s challenging this November, helped rise big bipartisan border legislation earlier this year — piece of Allred’s broader effort to color Cruz as an obstructionist whose hardline stances have hindered long-overdue immigration reform.
Allred is attempting to define his own, largely unknown, immigration views before Cruz can adopt them, running ads that label him as” tough” on the border and supporting a number of proposals to improve border security and enlarging the way to legal status.
But the idea that Allred is hard on the frontier is laughable to Cruz, who says his Democratic rival is trying to have it both techniques and showing a renewed interest in the topic just now that he’s running for statewide office. Cruz, who is also making immigration the statement of his plan, claimed Allred is tarnishing a voter history and previous remarks that show the Dallas Democrat more in tune with President Joe Biden’s controversial border policies than he would have expected voters to consider.
With three and half months left until Election Day, both candidates are campaigning on border and immigration issues: Allred is running battle ads that boast headlines about him breaking with his party to denounce Biden, while Cruz laced into the president’s policies in a colorful speech at the Republican National Convention Tuesday, blaming Biden for some new high-profile murders allegedly committed by immigrants who entered the country illegally. The border-centric campaigns are a nod to polls that have repeatedly shown Texas voters to prioritize immigration and the border and express disapproval of Biden’s strategy given that the majority of immigrants have attempted to enter Texas from Mexico for the majority of his term.
Cruz, asked about the attacks on his alleged intransigence on the bipartisan immigration package, said he opposed the bill because it was “terrible policy” that failed to “actually secure the border”. He claimed that Democrats have rejected his own” commonsense” bills and that he has also helped pass less visible but crucial border measures like allowing real-time data sharing between the Coast Guard and the Border Patrol. One example, Cruz said, is his proposal to require mandatory minimum prison sentences for those with an aggravated felony conviction who re-enter the country illegally.
” Over the past decade I’ve repeatedly authored and introduced strong border legislation, and Democrats like Allred have repeatedly refused to agree to anything that would actually secure the border”, Cruz said in an email to The Texas Tribune.
Allred disputed the claim that he has only recently made the border a priority, citing his ancestry to Brownsville, where his mother is from and his grandfather worked as a U.S. Customs officer. He acknowledged that” too often, Democrats have failed to be serious” about responding to border crises, though he also pointed the finger at Cruz and other Republicans for Congress ‘ long-running failure to pass a major immigration overhaul.
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” One of my biggest frustrations with Sen. Cruz is that he’s had 12 years to try and enact any kind of reform— whether it’s comprehensive or even just targeted — to try and help us do something about what’s been happening at the border. And he has consistently rejected,” Allred said in an interview.
Even with his more proactive approach, though, Allred faces an uphill climb shaking his party’s brand among Texas voters, who have routinely said they trust Republicans over Democrats on border and immigration matters. Allred is walking a tightrope, according to Andrew Smith, a professor of political science at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.
” If he does n’t go tough enough, if you will, on securing the border, he’s not going to get those centrist and moderate voters that are willing to vote against Cruz”, Smith said. However, if he gets too tough at quote-unquote, he runs the risk of alienating the Democratic Party’s younger, more progressive wing.
Allred’s border record
Allred’s border-policy was criticized by the left for his support for a GOP resolution that denounced Biden’s “open-borders policies” in the Democratic primary earlier this year. Allred’s rival in the race, state Sen. Roland Gutierrez of San Antonio, blasted Allred for throwing Biden” under the bus … just for political expediency”.
Allred claimed at the time that it was a difficult vote as a way to demonstrate that he did not support the” status quo.” A spokesperson for Cruz’s campaign called the vote” cowardly flip-flopping” after Allred had” consistently voted with his party for reckless border policies that benefit the undocumented, while weakening our country and its borders”.
Allred said he has made it clear when he supports Biden’s border policies, such as the executive order that temporarily stops asylum applications for those who cross the border, and that he has spoken out when he disagrees. He said his vote for the Republican border resolution was a prime example, showing” I disagreed with what I thought was a much-delayed response to what had been an obvious crisis for some time”.
Cruz claimed that if Allred really believed that, he should have gotten behind House Republicans ‘ extensive border crackdown last year.
The GOP border package passed the House without any Democratic votes. Cruz called it” the most comprehensive border security legislation in decades” and introduced a version in the Senate despite the fact that Democrats in the upper chamber had already declared it to be dead on arrival.
The proposal would have restarted construction on a border wall, restricted asylum eligibility, required migrants to wait out asylum claims in Mexico and stiffened penalties for overstaying visas. Democrats criticized the bill, saying it was too draconian, and that it only focused on stricter enforcement.
Allred said while he might support some aspects of the measure, the overall package was an “unserious partisan messaging bill” that never had any chance to become law.
” It was only meant to be used by people in an election like this to say ,’well, you did n’t support this,” he said.
Instead, Allred supports a bill penned by U. S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, D-El Paso, and Florida Republican Rep. Maria Salazar that includes a mix of security-minded features and policies addressing legal immigration and the status of undocumented people in the U. S.
That package, which was unsuccessful in the GOP-controlled House, would provide for more border patrol and surveillance equipment and require employers to eventually use E-Verify, an electronic service that monitors employees ‘ immigration status. It also proposes expanding visa programs for temporary and skilled workers, granting some undocumented immigrants legal status if they pay a fee and pass a criminal background check, and establishing “humanitarian campuses” at busy areas of the U. S. Mexico border where asylum seekers would temporarily stay while their claims are processed.
According to Allred,” we cannot secure the border without fixing our legal immigration system,” the crisis is brought on by” the fact that people feel like they have no legal way to enter the country” and” the system does n’t work.”
Sharon Navarro, a political science professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio, said Allred is on the right track strategically trying to convey support for a bipartisan approach, though she noted that voters often tune out policy specifics in campaigns dominated by sound bites.
” It’s a wise political strategy, but it’s very challenging because the only thing voters want to hear is,” Can we stop the border” right now. Can you stop the flow of immigrants”? Navarro stated. ” And so, short of that, I do n’t think they’re convinced or want to hear the details”.
Allred backed the idea of physical barriers along the border in his first year in Congress, which the Escobar-Salazar bill also includes funding for. But he also previously called former President Donald Trump’s wall proposal “racist” and “ineffective”, comments that have drawn flak from Cruz.
Physical barriers should be considered “one component” of the nation’s border security system, according to Allred, who claimed that they “make all the sense in the world” in some situations. He contrasted that with Trump’s idea of building a wall “from sea to shining sea”.
Regarding a full-fledged border wall, Allred said,” I’ve never supported, and will never support, this idea that we need some kind of symbol that people are not welcome.”
Recently, Cruz has been calling on Allred to talk about the recent killing of a 12-year-old Houston girl, Jocelyn Nungaray, who authorities say was murdered by two Venezuelan migrants who entered the country illegally. According to federal authorities, the suspects were apprehended by Border Patrol earlier this year and released into the country to await immigration court proceedings. Cruz also recently introduced legislation to keep migrants in custody if detention beds are available.
In his emailed response, Cruz pointed to Nungaray’s death as an example of how border policies favored by Allred “allow monsters into our country who have assaulted and murdered Americans”. Cruz’s campaign has argued that illegal aliens have committed a “dradramatic increase in crimes,” which the senator’s campaign claimed in his Tuesday convention speech. However, a recent study by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, found that illegal immigrants have lower rates of homicide convictions than native-born residents. There do not appear to be any data showing a recent uptick in the rate of violent crime among undocumented immigrants.
When asked about Nungaray’s death and Cruz’s claim that his preferred policies were to blame, Allred responded,” I just think Jocely n’s murder was a tragedy, and I ca n’t think of anything more shameful than someone like Ted Cruz trying to use that as a political attack.”
Cruz’s border record
At the same time, Allred has sought to refocus attention on Cruz’s border record, questioning whether the GOP senator’s hawkish stances have actually produced results. He has particularly emphasized Cruz’s objection to a bipartisan border package in February that included an array of border restrictions, but died after most Senate Republicans voted to block it on the grounds that it was too lax. A number of GOP senators came out against the bill after Trump called it an “open borders betrayal” that would benefit Democrats politically.
Cruz was one of the first Republicans out of the gate blasting the proposal, which aimed to clamp down on asylum, limit the president’s authority to admit people using parole in certain cases and send aid to help organizations and local governments pay for migrant services.
Cruz argued that the bill would have” codified” the catch-and-release policy, which he called” the main cause” of the rise in crossings seen under Biden. He also said the bill would have “normalized” allowing 5, 000 migrants to enter illegally every day— referring to a provision requiring the shutdown of all border crossings between ports of entry if unlawful crossings exceeded a daily average of 5, 000 over a week, or reached 8, 500 in a single day. Supporters had argued that it would help to reduce the number of unauthorized crossings that exceeded 5, 000 per day, but Cruz and others, including Cruz, claimed the bar was too high.
At the time, Cruz panned Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell for initially signaling support for the bill. He claimed on Fox News that McConnell had made sure “every Democrat running for office” would declare,” Gosh, I wanted to secure the border, but the mean old Republicans would n’t let us.” He also predicted, though, that voters” will not be fooled” by the attempt to provide “political cover” for Democrats.
Allred has capitalized on the “political cover” characterization and used it to show that Republicans were against the bill, which would have prevented Democrats from winning. A TV ad recently launched by Allred’s campaign attacks Cruz for opposing what was “actually a good plan backed by sheriffs and border officers”.
Cruz added that he also disagreed with a provision of the bill that would have required asylum seekers to obtain work permits while they waited for the decision to file their asylum cases as long as they had first passed an initial screening. Cruz said the change would have “incentivized greater illegal entry”.
Cruz stated that he continues to adhere to the “legal—good, illegal—bad” philosophy he has long advocated. It is the same slogan Cruz has used while establishing his brand as an aggressive fighter for tough border restrictions, from his opposition to the bipartisan so-called Gang of Eight bill early in his Senate term to his immigration-fueled 2016 presidential bid, where he sought to match Trump’s hardline stances.
” I support legal immigration, and I want a way for hardworking, freedom-loving people to enter this land of opportunity legally,” Cruz said. ” But right now, cartels are exploiting our open border to make billions of dollars trafficking drugs and people across the border”.
Cruz outlined a number of bills and amendments that he has introduced into law with Democratic support, including one that would give the Coast Guard a long-range radar system at its South Padre Island station. He also authored a bill, signed into law by Biden, that directs the federal government to find better ways to detect and combat an emerging street drug called xylazine, a type of animal tranquilizer that officials have found mixed in fentanyl smuggled across the border.
” I’ll say this: I’ve done everything I can to secure it and stop the drug epidemic in our country, despite the border issue being politically divisive,” Cruz said.
Disclosure: University of Texas at San Antonio has been a financial supporter of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters are not involved in the Tribune’s reporting. Find a complete list of them here.
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