America Ferrera had some strong words for Vice President Kamala Harris’s message to Central American migrants to stay home and not try to enter the US.
As part of her first foreign trip as vice president on Monday (7 June), Harris repeated the line, “Do not come,” which was met with criticism from a number of prominent figures on the left, including Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
Sitting down for an interview on The View, Ferrera called Harris’ message while visiting Guatemala “a slap in the face”.
“First and foremost, [I feel] extreme disappointment and confusion at just how useless and futile a strategy that is,” the Superstore actor said to co-host Joy Behar on Thursday (10 June).
“I know that Vice President Harris knows the stories, too, but I have spent many years sitting in shelters, detention centers on this side of the border and on the other side of the border, with Honduran families, Mexican families, Guatemalan families, hearing the stories of the violence and the life-threatening circumstances that they're fleeing,” Ferrera added.
“For me, what she said is essentially telling a drowning person to stop flailing for their life, to not do the one thing that might save them or their child,” continued Ferrera, whose parents are from Honduras.
“I was never under the impression that we were electing perfect people,” concluded Ferrera. “I think that it is our role and our job to elect people and then to hold them accountable. And [Harris] should be held accountable to these comments because they're harmful and they perpetuate a very harmful perspective that really does make immigrants in this country less safe.”
