Exclusive | Arizona rancher calls out Kamala Harris for last-minute border trip, says she ‘encouraged illegal immigration’

Vice President Kamala Harris is set to make an appearance at the Arizona border on Friday.

But one nearby rancher is crying foul for only now looking like she cares.

“Donald Trump built the wall and upheld our immigration laws. On day one, she stopped the wall and encouraged illegal immigration,” Tyler Klump, whose cattle ranch on the Arizona border in Douglas is a super highway for illegal crossings from Mexico, told The Post.

Tyler Klump’s cattle ranch on the Arizona border is in Douglas, where Vice President Harris is set to visit. Go Nakamura for New York Post

Klump says he believes the Democratic presidential nominee is trying to show she’s serious about the border crisis only because of the election.

Harris is set to tour the remote border stretch in Douglas Friday as part of a presidential campaign stop.

As part of her role in the Biden administration, Harris was tasked with helping to stop the illegal crossings at the border by addressing the “root causes of migration.”

But under her watch, illegal migrants poured over the border by the millions.

“Either purposefully or not, she is hurting our country with illegal immigration,” Klump said.

While on the campaign trail, Harris has referenced her time as a prosecutor in the “border state” of California — both as the state’s attorney general and San Francisco’s district attorney — where she says she cracked down on cartels.

Arizona rancher Tyler Klump climbs through an open floodgate in the border wall. Go Nakamura for New York Post

Harris has also pledged to sign a bipartisan border bill that failed to pass earlier this year, which would boost border patrol agents and funding for the wall.

However, she made just one trip to the border as vice president in June 2021, when she traveled to El Paso, Texas.

Border Patrol sources who were present for the visit previously told The Post they were instructed to completely sanitize the area to hide the true severity of the crisis during her trip.

The Post toured Klump’s property in August when piles of trash had been left behind by smugglers.

The picturesque ranch was littered with discarded water bottles, backpacks, “carpet shoes” — footwear with slip-on pieces of carpet to hide footprints in the sand — and ladders used to climb over the border wall.

Vice President Kamala Harris will visit Douglas, Arizona, Friday. REUTERS

Sometimes, the cows on Klump’s ranch mistakenly eat the trash, which can get them sick or even kill them.

“It directly affects my cattle and my livelihood… It has killed my cattle. I’ve lost a substantial amount of money,” Klump said at the time.

In recent months, illegal migrant crossings have hit new lows for the Biden-Harris administration following new restrictions on asylum access.

Border Patrol recorded roughly 83,000 migrant encounters in June, 56,000 in July and 58,000 in August — down from 250,000 in December.

Before that, the Biden-Harris admin ushered in record levels of illegal crossings at the southern border, while also allowing 1.3 million migrants to fly directly or use a phone app port of entry appointment to enter the US.

A smuggler covers his face in the background as another photographs migrants before they cross the border into the United States from Sonora, Mexico on June 26, 2024. REUTERS

However, during those low months, Klump has still seen the smugglers coming through and trying to evade detection as they sneak both drugs and people across the border.

“The foot traffic is as high as it’s ever been,” Klump previously said.

At the time, Klump shared a message for Harris: “Kamala, you’re not helping anything. You’re hurting us,” he said.

“You’re very much putting money in the hands of the cartels and putting money in the hands of a lot of people, but you’re darn sure not helping out your constituents,” said Klump.

The Arizona border is largely controlled by the notorious Mexican Sinaloa cartel, which pumps its supply of illicit fentanyl into the US.

In 2022, 50% of the deadly fentanyl seized in the US was confiscated in Arizona.