CNN host Erin Burnett was surprised that Vice President Kamala Harris at one point indicated she supported “taxpayer-funded gender reassignment surgery for detained illegal immigrants” — a far cry from the more centrist stance she has taken during the current presidential campaign.
“Did she actually say she supports this?” Burnett asked her CNN colleague Andrew Kaczynski during a segment on his nightly show on Monday.
Kaczynski did reported on monday Harris clearly supports a moderate stance when she filled out the questionnaire The book was distributed by the American Civil Liberties Union in 2019, when she was a US Senator representing California.
According to CNN, Harris supported taxpayer-funded gender change surgery for illegal immigrants and federal prisoners, as well as decriminalizing federal drug possession for personal use.
“It is critical that transgender individuals who rely on the state for care receive the treatment they need, including access to treatment related to gender transition,” Harris wrote in the questionnaire.
He touted his record as California attorney general, when he “pressured the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation to provide sex change surgery to state inmates.”
“Transition treatment is a medical necessity, and I will direct all federal agencies responsible for providing essential medical care to make transition treatment available,” she said.
Harris also wrote on the questionnaire that she favors substantially cutting funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the federal agency tasked with catching and deporting illegal immigrants.
On the ACLU form, Harris also indicated that she supports abolishing immigrant detention centers.
“Our immigrant detention system is out of control, and I believe we must end the unfair incarceration of thousands of individuals, families, and children,” Harris wrote in the questionnaire.
She pledged that “as president, I will focus on improving public safety, not breaking up immigrant families.”
“After President Trump was elected, I was one of the first senators to advocate for reducing funding to ICE.”
“This includes requiring ICE to obtain warrants where probable cause exists to terminate the use of detainers.”
The ACLU sent a questionnaire to all Democratic and Republican candidates running for president in 2020.
Harris sought the Democratic nomination for president that year but dropped out of the race before voting began in the primaries and caucuses.
Former Vice President Joe Biden ultimately won the nomination and defeated President Donald Trump in the 2020 election.
Harris has given only one interview since it was announced Biden would not seek a second term — effectively handing her the nomination.
He has been criticized for claiming he changed his policy positions years ago, as well as refusing to answer questions about what his current position is.
The Harris campaign declined to say whether the vice president remains in the same positions today as she was in 2019.
A Harris campaign adviser told CNN that “the vice president's position has been shaped by three years of effective governance of the Biden-Harris administration.”
The campaign declined to provide details.
