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The 2019 ACLU questionnaire highlights Harris’ past support for progressive causes
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The 2019 ACLU questionnaire highlights Harris’ past support for progressive causes

A 2019 questionnaire filled out by then-Senator Kamala Harris highlights her past support for more progressive causes, contrasting with the more moderate approach she is now taking to appeal to broader Americans in the final days of the 2024 presidential election.

Harris’ answers on the American Civil Liberties Union form show that she once supported cutting funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and favored using taxes to fund gender reassignment surgeries for federal prisoners and detained immigrants. The current vice president also supported federal decriminalization of drug possession for personal use and promised to “end” immigrant detention.

At the time she filled out the form, Harris was running for president in the 2020 primaries, but she dropped out before voting began.

In an interview with CNN in August, Harris mentioned that she had changed some of her positions, but stressed that her “values ​​have not changed.”

“The vice president’s positions have been shaped by three years of effective governance as part of the Biden-Harris administration,” a Harris campaign adviser told CNN.

Democratic presidential candidate and U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a campaign stop in North Hampton, New Hampshire, U.S., September 4, 2024. A 2019 ACLU questionnaire revealed a number of her previous more progressive stances
Democratic presidential candidate and U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a campaign stop in North Hampton, New Hampshire, U.S., September 4, 2024. A 2019 ACLU questionnaire revealed a number of her previous more progressive stances (REUTERS)

“As president, she will take the same pragmatic approach and focus on common sense solutions in the interest of progress,” a spokesman added.

Harris’ tougher rhetoric on immigration enforcement is a stark departure from the position she took in the 2019 poll.

She wrote that she would close private prisons and immigration detention centers, adding that she would cut ICE funding.

“Our immigration detention system is out of control and I believe we must end the unjustified detention of thousands of individuals, families and children,” the then-senator wrote. “I was one of the first senators after President Trump was elected to advocate for cutting funding for ICE.”

“As president, I will focus law enforcement on increasing public safety, not on tearing apart immigrant families. This includes requiring ICE to obtain a warrant when there is reasonable suspicion to end the use of warrants,” she added at the time.

ICE warrants are agency requests to local or state law enforcement to detain a person for up to 48 hours longer than the original release date to allow ICE to potentially deport them.

When asked for comment, the Harris team referred to a statement from Fox News communications director Michael Tyler.

“This questionnaire is not what she is proposing or what she is campaigning on. When you talk about immigration or border security, she has made it very clear how she has governed and how she wants to govern when she is president of the United States,” he said. “When you talk about border security, for example, she has made it clear that the bipartisan border security package that Donald Trump killed because he thought it would benefit him politically, if it lands on her desk, she will sign it and enact it.”

On the issue of trans rights, Harris said in 2019 that she supports taxpayer-funded gender reassignment surgeries for federal prisoners and detained immigrants.

“It is important that transgender people who rely on state care receive the treatment they need, including access to gender transition-related care,” Harris wrote. “That’s why, as Attorney General, I pushed the California Department of Justice to offer gender transition surgery to state prisoners.”

“Transitional care is medically necessary and I will direct all federal agencies responsible for providing primary health care to implement transitional care,” she added at the time.

Harris also said in the questionnaire that she supports decriminalizing drug possession for personal use. Her answer addressed only the legalization of marijuana, pointing to the Marijuana Justice Act, which she co-sponsored and which would have legalized the drug at the federal level.

She added that drug use should be viewed as a public health issue rather than a criminal problem.

“Throughout my career, I have supported treating drug addiction as a public health problem, with an emphasis on rehabilitation rather than incarceration for drug offenses,” she wrote at the time.

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