Throughout Donald Trump’s 2016–20 presidential term, migrant justice was a centerpiece of liberal and left opposition to the Republican agenda. The public reacted with genuine horror to the Trump administration’s spectacles of racist, anti-migrant cruelty. Images and audio of infants and children separated from their parents in US detention centers sparked outcry against “kids in cages,” and protesters massed spontaneously at US airports when the Muslim ban went into effect.

In response, Democrats made migrant rights and immigrant contributions central to their 2020 platform, which denounced Trump’s “unnecessary, wasteful, and ineffective wall at the southern border” and “discriminatory travel and immigration bans” and called to “protect and expand the existing asylum system” and “end prosecution of asylum seekers at the border and policies that force them to apply from ‘safe third countries.’”

The outpouring of popular solidarity with and compassion for migrants was genuine. Yet today, with immigration once again at the center of the presidential campaign, the Democrats have reversed course entirely. No longer appealing to migrant rights and humanity, the outgoing Biden administration and the Kamala Harris campaign have embraced Trump’s racist, xenophobic premise entirely.