Moskowitz taunts Comer over Harris border probe

Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-Fla.) mocked Rep. James Comer’s (R-Ky.) past attacks on him Monday after the Republican chair of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee announced a new probe into Vice President Harris.

Moskowitz posted on social media Monday that he’s ready for “round 2” of a fight with Comer, posting a comic panel of the congressman surrounded by Smurfs making fun of Comer.

One of the Smurfs in the image declares the Harris probe a “fishing expedition,” while another gifts Comer a brain.

The post referenced a battle between Comer and Moskowitz at a House Oversight hearing last November, when Comer took a jab at Moskowitz’s blue outfit, calling him a “Smurf.”

Comer’s probe specifically requests that U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) turn over any of its correspondence with Harris’s office, intending to hit the vice president over border policy. The CBP is largely outside of Harris’s policy portfolio as vice president.

The CBP is tasked with managing day-to-day operations at the border but has little role in addressing broader immigration goals in the region. Harris was involved with broader strokes of immigration policy, especially earlier in the Biden administration, but never worked on day-to-day operations.

In his letter to the CBP, Comer said it’s “unclear what actions, if any, Vice President Harris has taken to fix the border crisis.”

He asks for all documents and communication with Harris’s office “related to the southwest border or illegal immigration.”

Democrats have fought Republican efforts to blame them for the border, noting that the GOP tanked a bipartisan immigration deal earlier this year after it came under criticism from former President Trump.

President Biden in June implemented a policy restricting asylum and movement at the border. There was a drop in border crossings that brought them comparable to Trump-era levels after those actions.

“In June, the Border Patrol recorded 83,536 encounters between ports of entry, the lowest number since January 2021, and below the number of encounters between ports of entry in June 2019, the last comparable year prior to the pandemic,” the Department of Homeland Securtiy said last month.

Rebecca Beitsch contributed.