South Texas Congressman Henry Cuellar recently had choice words for Vice President Kamala Harris. He said he’s “moved on” from working with the Vice President on the issue of immigration.
Cuellar wishes the country has a border czar who can tackle the issue of immigration: “I’ve moved on from the vice president to say, ‘OK, let’s work with the ambassadors and let’s work with the State Department. Let’s work with the homeland secretary’,” Cuellar stated during a conference call with reporters on November 17.
“I wish we had a border czar. We’ve had border czars under different administrations,” Cuellar added.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas conceded that Vice President Harris had not been “directly” involved in the department’s critical policy decisions since she assumed the informal position of border czar.
Cuellar said the mainstream media has branded Harris as the border czar, which he believes is unfair.
The Democrat Congressman said the press “put a lot of focus on the Vice President, but with all due respect, she was given that title. I don’t think she’s, with all due respect, put the effort in there… We’ve got to look at other folks that have the expertise on that.”
Cuellar represents Texas’s 28th congressional district, which spans 215 miles of the border and includes Rio Grande City, Laredo, and eastern San Antonio.
The representative of Texas’ 28th congressional district has been in Congress since 2004 and has built a reputation as a moderate Democrat. Cuellar’s concerns about the Biden administration’s immigration policy reveal growing factional tension within the Democrat Party.
Representatives in traditionally Democratic areas in South Texas are alarmed by the inroads Republicans have made along the border.
For instance, Donald Trump won Zapata County and other border counties in the 2020 Presidential election. That was the first time Zapata County went to the Republican win column for the first time in a century.
After the victory of Republican candidate Javier Villalobos in the McAllen mayoral race earlier this year, some Republican pundits speculate that South Texas Hispanics’ drift towards Republicans could be a durable trend.
Wedge issues like immigration could potentially be driving the pro-Republican shift. In a Quinnipiac poll published in late September, 66% of Hispanic voters in the U.S. disapproved of the Biden administration’s handling of immigration.
When Quinnipiac surveyed South Texas voters, 76% voiced their disapproval with the Biden administration’s immigration policies.
