Entrepreneur, former Republican presidential hopeful and Trump surrogate Vivek Ramaswamy blasted Vice President Kamala Harris on Thursday over her views on immigration.

“From one kid of legal immigrants to this country to another, my message to her is shame on you,” Ramaswamy said at a Trump campaign news conference in Chicago to counter the Democratic National Convention. 

Ramaswamy -- and a video played earlier in the news conference -- attacked Harris over past comments she made, including saying in 2017, “It is wrong to somehow suggest that an undocumented immigrant is a criminal.”

Harris’ staff told The Washington Post in 2017 she was referring to the act of being unlawfully present in the United States is a civil violation, not a criminal offense. And a 2012 Supreme Court ruling said “as a general rule, it is not a crime for a removable alien to remain present in the United States.”

The undocumented population includes people who improperly entered the U.S., those who entered legally but overstayed their temporary visas and those who have been granted deferred action status. 

Ramaswamy, as many other Republicans have done, also repeated a false claim that President Joe Biden put Harris in charge of border security.

In March 2021, Biden assigned Harris with leading the administration’s efforts to address the root causes of what propels people in Guatemala, El Salvador and Honduras to attempt to migrate to the U.S. Border security is the responsibility of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.

The White House has never used the term “border czar” to describe Harris’ role.

But that did not stop Ramaswamy from accusing her of trying to dodge responsibility for what he called failed border policies. He also blamed Harris for “permitting the deaths” of four American women allegedly killed by undocumented migrants.

“I challenge Kamala Harris tonight … to have a spine and to apologize to the family members of Laken Riley, of Rachel Morin, of Kayla Hamilton, and of Brenda Altman,” said Ramaswamy, who ran for the Republican presidential nomination this year.

“And if she does that tonight, I'll disagree with her, I'm not going to vote for her, but I'll give her credit for doing that.

But if she doesn't, it will tell you all you need to know about a president who is hiding in the shadows from an actual policy debate about the future direction of the United States.”