WASHINGTON, D.C., USA — A new ad from the Trump Campaign is taking aim at Vice President Kamala Harris, making a claim about immigration during her term.
"Under Harris over 10 million illegally here," the voiceover in the ad states.
The ad includes the text “over 10 million illegal border crossings.”
So, let’s Verify.
THE SOURCES
WHAT WE FOUND
The Trump Campaign ad references an article published in The Economist in January of this year.
The quote from the ad does not appear in the article and doesn’t mention the number 10 million at all in reference to border crossings under Biden and Harris.
It does reference the number of illegal immigrants living in the United States, referencing data from the Pew Research Centre showing an estimated 10.5 million illegal immigrants were living in the U.S. in 2021.
Pew estimates 11 million illegal immigrants were living in the United States in 2022.
The number peaked at 12.2 million under the Bush administration.
Data shows the number dropped under Obama and in the early part of Trump’s term before climbing late in Trump’s term and continuing under Biden.
So, the claim from the ad’s voiceover saying “under Harris over 10 million illegally here” is technically correct, but not all of them arrived while she was in office.
U.S. Customs and Border Patrol data shows a little more than 7 million border encounters from January 2021 to June of this year.
THE ANSWER
While that number doesn’t reflect the total number of illegal immigrants who successfully made it into and remained in the United States under Biden and Harris, it falls well short of the 10 million illegal border crossings suggested in the ad.
So we can Verify that this claim is false.