Trump-aligned group bashes Harris over the border in ad blitz across battleground states

EXCLUSIVE — An outside political group that supports former President Donald Trump is releasing a new ad across multiple battleground states admonishing Vice President Kamala Harris over her work leading the Biden administration’s response to the southern border crisis.

Preserve America, a pro-Trump super PAC, is releasing a new TV and digital spot in the battleground states of Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin, as part of an eight-figure ad campaign running from the opening ceremony of the Olympics until Labor Day.

The ad, titled “Damage,” features the testimony of Julie Ann Willoughby, an emergency room nurse and Republican State representative in Arizona, discussing the toll of the border crisis on the healthcare system. 

“I’ve seen firsthand the damage that Kamala Harris caused as our country’s borders czar,” Willoughby charges in the new ad, showing her wearing scrubs and appearing to be at a hospital. “Hospitals everywhere are overwhelmed and American patients are paying the price.”

“My patients are covering the healthcare costs for people here illegally while their own care is jeopardized,” Willoughby says, looking straight into the camera. “Kamala Harris is weak and dangerous.”

The ad, shared first with the Washington Examiner on Thursday, is the latest attack against Harris for her role in the administration’s handling of the U.S. southern border, which has seen unprecedented levels of migrants.

The issue has been a major political liability for the Biden administration as Republicans have sought to use the border crisis as an example of President Joe Biden’s failures as president and now Harris’s after she became the presumptive Democratic nominee last month.

Since Biden made his exit and endorsed Harris, the vice president has largely not mentioned the crisis on the southern border and her role in immigration policy, which is now in the spotlight. However, she has begun reflecting on her time prosecuting transnational gangs and drug traffickers as the attorney general of a border state during her rallies.

“In that job, I walked underground tunnels between the United States and Mexico,” Harris said during a rally in Atlanta last week. “I went after transnational gangs, drug cartels, and human traffickers that came into our country illegally. I prosecuted them in case after case, and I won.”

Harris also continues to point to a border bipartisan compromise bill that Sens. James Lankford (R-OK), Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ), and Chris Murphy (D-CT) and officials from the White House put together in February, which ultimately died under political pressure from Trump.

“It was all set to pass, but at the last minute Trump directed his allies in the Senate to vote it down,” Harris said. 

Preserve America was set up during Trump’s unsuccessful 2020 reelection bid and was relaunched to help the former president win back the White House in 2024. 

The ad is the third one from Preserve America to criticize Harris over border security. The group spent $100 million on advertising in 2020 to support Trump and a source familiar expects they will exceed that number in 2024.