Vice President Kamala Harris’s third foreign trip will see her grapple with the migrant crisis — in Europe.
The veep travels to France on Monday for four days of high-profile meetings with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other European leaders as they gather in Paris to mark Armistice Day, which commemorates the end of World War I.
While there, she will take part in the Paris Conference on Libya, a diplomatic effort aimed at encouraging peaceful elections that could stem the tide of illegal migrants escaping the civil war-torn country for Europe.
Harris will voice “a deep concern for human rights and the situation of migrants and refugees, and reinforce the imperative of protecting vulnerable people, including those fleeing conflict,” a senior administration official said last week.
The vice president has come under fire for her ineffective performance as President Biden’s point person on the migrant crisis at the US-Mexico border, which has worsened on her watch.
Her European assignment also includes a one-on-one meeting with Macron, where she will continue the Biden administration’s fence-mending efforts in the wake of a bitter diplomatic rift over the AUKUS submarine deal with Australia.
Biden sheepishly told Macron last week he had been “clumsy” in blindsiding France with news of the pact, which left America’s oldest ally out of a military plan meant to counter China.