Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., on Wednesday accused President Trump of sending thousands of U.S. service members to the border for Thanksgiving just to make a show for the TV cameras.

"These folks who are being deployed there ... they've left their families, they will not be home, it looks like, for Thanksgiving, and all because there needed to be some demonstration for the TV cameras based on a political agenda instead of what is a national security threat," the senator told reporters in California.

Trump has said a military presence is needed to help make sure the border is prepared for the arrival of thousands of Central American migrants. But Harris and other Democrats have said the several approaching caravans are not the national security threat that Trump says they are.

"The administration made a decision to deploy them based on a political agenda, and I believe that it is inappropriate to require the limited resources of the United States military to be used in a such a way," she said.

In a Thanksgiving Day press conference in Florida, Trump disagreed and said many of the caravan migrants are criminals who need to be kept out of the country.

"There are many criminals in that caravan, and the big caravan hasn’t arrived yet," he said. "And we're well fortified, we have fencing and walls like very few people have."

"We're not letting criminals into our country," he added.