Pictured is Vice President Kamala Harris, the first woman and first Black vice president of America: Clevelandurbannews.com and-Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com

By Kathy Wray Coleman, associate publisher, editor in chief

WASHINGTON, D.C.-Vice President Kamala Harris, America's first woman and first Black vice president, will visit the Mexico-U.S. border this week, her first trip to that particular border and one that follows criticism that the vice president was avoiding such a trip even after returning earlier this month from her first foreign trip as vice president, a three-day visit to Guatemala and Mexico.

The Mexico–United States border is an international border separating Mexico and the U.S. that extends from the Pacific Ocean in the west to the Gulf of Mexico in the east.

Harris, 56 and a Democrat, had said that she would visit the border in due time and that there is no quick fix to the influx of Central American migrants to the U.S.

A former California attorney general and U.S. senator, she said there’s a reason people are arriving at our border and that it is prudent in the least to "ask what is that reason and then identify the problem so we can fix it.”

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said during a press briefing during the height of the controversy that the vice president was doing what President Joe Biden assigned her to do relative to the immigration controversy, and that Harris was  focused on foreign policy in Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvado.

But those critical of the situation, mainly Republicans, wanted more answers as pressure mounted for the Biden administration to do more on the U.S.-Mexico border fiasco.

The president has since changed his tone and will send Harris to the border this week, a decision that follows criticism also by Guatemala President Alejandro Giammattei, who said,  after meeting with Harris earlier this month, that the Biden administration and Democrats in general are responsible for the border crisis in his country as it relates to the U.S .

The controversy over the initial reluctance of President Biden to visit the Mexico-U.S. border or to send Harris in his place has racial overtones, critics say, at least where Harris is concerned, and it comes as Congressional Republicans cry that the Biden administration is soft on immigration and responsible for an influx of migrants along the southern border.

U.S. border agents reportedly detained some 100,000 migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border in February alone, with nearly a 70 percent increase in that amount in April,  U.S. Customs and Border Protection data shows, the highest monthly total since a major border surge in mid-2019.

The numbers just keep getting worse, data show, the worst figures in some 20 years.

Immigration advocates say it is partly because America provides a more viable alternative to their poverty and crime ridden homelands, even with its substandard and often illegal wages.

Foes warn that the crisis of illegal border crossing heightens crime in the U.S.

U.S. immigration policy has suddenly become a testing ground on how the vice president handles foreign policy matters amid increased scrutiny from some mainstream media pundits and from policy makers both inside and out of her political party.

Republicans say the Biden administration has watered down immigration policies in place under the former president Donald  Trump's administration while Democrats argue that Trump's immigration policies were racist and anti-Democratic, and that they marginalized women, children, and people of color.

Harris ran for president last year, and later vice president on the Democratic ticket.

She is the first woman of color to compete on a major party presidential ticket in America.

On the campaign trail for her unsuccessful bid for president she had a tone amenable to the nation's immigrant community as she pushed immigration reform policies.

Biden later tapped her to run for vice president on his presidential ticket.

Clevelandurbannews.com and-Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com,

By Kathy Wray Coleman, associate publisher, editor-in-chief

Clevelandurbannews.com and-Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, the most read Black digital newspaper in Ohio and in the Midwest. Tel: (216) 659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.coml By Kathy Wray Coleman, associate publisher, editor-in-chief:

CLEVELAND, Ohio- The City Club of Cleveland will hold a virtual debate on Tuesday, June 22 with eight of the 13 11th congressional district congressional candidates for the Democratic primary for the special election of Aug. 3 to fill the seat left vacant in March when then congresswoman Marcia L. Fudge joined President Joe Biden's cabinet as secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

The special general election where the Democratic and Republican winner of the primary will square-off is Nov 2.

The online debate begins at 5:30 pm.

The livestream will be available beginning at 5:30 p.m. To watch the debate live online CLICK HERE.

A debate between the two Republican primary challengers was canceled.

This year's 11th congressional district candidates' debate by the City Club is being held virtually due to the coronavirus pandemic.

The Democrats debating at 5:30 pm are front-runners former Ohio senator Nina Turner and Cuyahoga County Councilwoman and County Democratic Party Chairwoman Shontel Brown, former Ohio senators Shirley Smith and Jeff Johnson, former state representative John E. Barnes Jr., Tariq K. Shabazz, Will Knight, and Dr. Seth Corey, a Cleveland Clinic physician and researcher at the Lerner College of Medicine.

Ohio's 11th congressional district includes most of Cleveland and several of its eastern suburbs of Cuyahoga County, a largely Black pocket of  Akron, and a few staggering suburbs of Summit County.

It is one of two majority-minority congressional district's in Ohio that is specifically protected under the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Cuyahoga County is a Democratic stronghold and is a 29 percent Black county.

It is the second largest of Ohio's 88 counties, behind Franklin County, which includes the city of Columbus, the state capital and Ohio's largest city.

The last three congresspersons who have represented Ohio's 11th congressional district have been Black Democrats, namely former congressman the late Louis Stokes, who is Ohio's first Black congressperson, the late Stephanie Tubbs -Jones, who succeeded Stokes, and Fudge, who followed Tubbs-Jones into office and served 12 years in Congress before accepting Biden's invitation earlier this year to lead HUD.

Also dubbed "America's Citdal of Free Speech," the City Club of Cleveland is a cozy non-partisan debate club in downtown Cleveland that was founded in 1912.

It traditionally uses a luncheon format with a question and answer session with its speakers and guests but sometimes branches out to hosts forums in larger places like the convention center where former president Barack Obama spoke in 2015, a speech that came during his second term in office and one that highlighted his economic policies.

Since its founding the renowned City Club has hosted an array of public policy issues and notable people, including mayoral and gubernatorial candidates, and other sitting U.S. presidents, including Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush.

Other prominent speakers include former archbishop Desmond Tutu, Civil Rights icon Rosa Parks, Jimmy Hoffa, the late U.S. senator Robert Kennedy, and the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who would not agree to his speech being publicized.

Clevelandurbannews.com and-Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, the most read Black digital newspaper in Ohio and in the Midwest. Tel: (216) 659-0473. Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview. CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL