Ramaswamy hits Harris over border crisis amid DNC: 'Shame on her'

Former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy on Thursday excoriated Vice President Kamala Harris over her stewardship of American immigration policy as the "border czar," highlighting the adverse impacts of illegal immigration on American citizens.

Ramaswamy delivered his remarks from Trump Tower in Chicago, Ill., alongside former U.S. Ambassador to the Organization of American States Carlos Trujillo amid the Democratic National Convention.

"I'll tell you what a true leader would do. A true leader would say that 'you know what I am responsible for, the catastrophes at our southern border because I'm the vice president,'" he said. "She's too busy trying to give responsibility or claim that she was never given that responsibility in the first place... She was, call it a 'border czar.' Call it what you want. She was the person in charge of the southern border policies. But even if she hadn't been put in charge of that, if you're the vice president of the United States of America, what level of leadership do you have to show to be able to say that you're going to pretend like you had no responsibility for the catastrophic effects of not only crime, but the catastrophic effects on the rule of law in this country?"

"Shame on her for the several hundred thousand migrant children who have been released in this country but are no longer accounted for," he went on. "Recent reports coming out from the Department of Homeland Security Inspector General suggesting that number could be upwards of 30,000. Now they're revising it to suggest several 100,000 children, not talking about adults here talking about kids who are now being sold, potentially into child trafficking, child labor and worse in this country. Shame on Kamala Harris for that."

The tech mogul recalled his own campaign stop in the Windy City, saying "when I visited here back then, a lot of people in this community, in this city alone, ask themselves, 'why are they converting places like South Shore high school into an encampment for illegal migrants at a cost of $7,000 per migrant per month, when we're sitting right here following the law as law abiding citizens of this country ourselves?'"

"And I think that is the backdrop for this debate around the immigration policy and future border policies of the United States," he went on. "It was interesting to come back to Chicago [in the] middle of this convention."

"And I'm glad, actually, I'm grateful, that Democrats appear to now agree with Donald Trump's policy of building a wall," he went on, appearing to reference barriers outside the DNC to keep out irate pro-Palestinian demonstrators. "If only they cared as much about keeping illegals out of our country as they do keeping their own left wing protesters out of their own convention, our border crisis would actually be behind us."

Ramaswamy and Trujillo made their appearance as part of Republican counterprogramming to the DNC. Trump and Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, are also slated to address immigration at separate events later in the day.