Locked in tight reelection race, Rep. Yadira Caraveo supports Kamala Harris — then condemns her

U.S. Rep. Yadira Caraveo backed Vice President Kamala Harris for the Democratic presidential nomination less than a week ago. Then, days later, she supported a Republican-sponsored House resolution “strongly condemning” Harris for the Biden administration’s “failure to secure the United States border.”

The vote Thursday was the latest to turn heads as Caraveo faces a tight reelection race in Colorado’s 8th Congressional District. While other Colorado Democrats defended President Joe Biden and Harris’ immigration record, including Gov. Jared Polis and U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette — who called the resolution a “naked political stunt” — Careveo stood out.

She argued it was part of an independent streak she’s shown as she’s represented a battleground district. But her Republican opponent, state Rep. Gabe Evans, portrayed Caraveo’s vote as part of an about-face from her past “open border record.”

Just five other House Democrats voted with Caraveo on the resolution, and all are in close races in an election cycle in which the issue of illegal immigration has become a top concern among voters. In her first election to Congress in 2022, Caraveo won in the newly formed 8th District by less than a percentage point.

The New York Times reports that since Biden took office, Customs and Border Protection has recorded more than 9.6 million migrant encounters nationwide, mostly along the southern border. Those numbers have declined sharply in recent months, but the issue has remained a point of attack for Republicans against Biden — and then, after he withdrew from the presidential race last Sunday, against Harris.

When Caraveo was a Colorado state lawmaker, she took a much more progressive stance on immigration. In September 2021, she signed a letter sent to both Biden and Harris, along with congressional leaders, requesting that Congress “divest from immigration enforcement agencies” such as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.

The 8th District takes in parts of Adams, Weld and Larimer counties north of Denver.

Evans said Caraveo “can run but she can’t hide from her open border record.”

“Less than three years ago, she called for defunding ICE and border patrol,” he wrote in an email. “You can’t get more open border than that. She’s just trying to pull the wool over the eyes of the voters in an election year.”

In response to a request for an interview, Caraveo’s campaign said Friday afternoon that the freshman congresswoman was “unable to speak on short notice.” The Denver Post first asked for comment Thursday afternoon.

“The voters of the Front Range and Northern Colorado sent me to Congress to be an independent voice who will stand up to party leaders when they’re wrong,” Caraveo said in a written statement. “That’s why I pursued my own bipartisan immigration reform package that would not only surge resources to the border, but prioritize the needs of our communities.”

The latest attempt at bipartisan immigration reform was killed by Republican lawmakers earlier this year amid opposition from former President Donald Trump.

On Thursday, the resolution Caraveo backed raised eyebrows further because it referred to Harris as a “border czar,” a term Democrats and the White House have in recent days said unfairly overstates Harris’ role in managing border issues.

Biden tapped Harris in March 2021 to “lead the White House effort to tackle the migration challenge at the U.S. southern border and work with Central American nations to address root causes of the problem,” according to reporting by the Associated Press at the time. Some media outlets earlier used the “border czar” term informally to refer to Harris, too.

Colorado State University political science professor Kyle Saunders said Caraveo, the daughter of Mexican immigrants, is “rationally moving to the center on the issue of immigration in order to try to hold or even gain back ground in the district.”

“The vote condemning the Biden-Harris administration, and specifically Harris as the ‘border czar,’ would indicate to me that Caraveo is willing to defect from what was most definitely a ‘party vote,’ ” he said. “Deviating from a party vote like that is relatively rare in today’s polarized congressional environment, unless it is absolutely necessary.”

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