DONALD TRUMP ENDORSES AMNESTY FOR ILLEGAL ALIENS [DISAPPOINTING, BUT NOT SURPRISING]

Frontpage Mag ^ | 07/26/2015 | Daniel Greenfield

[SeekAndFind]

Disappointing, but not surprising.

The depressing reality though that is that most of the Republican field has endorsed amnesty in one form or another. So this isn't much of a surprise. Trump is using his own vocabulary, but he's echoing the same amnesty talking points you could hear from Marco Rubio... or Barack Obama.

During Friday's interview, Trump said the U.S. should take a two-step approach to the 11 million undocumented immigrants currently living in the country.

"Well, the first thing we do is take the bad ones — of which there are, unfortunately, quite a few," said Trump, who owns three New Jersey golf courses and once owned three Atlantic City casinos. "We take the bad ones and get 'em the hell out. We get 'em out."

But he said the country should take a different approach with "the other ones" — i.e., undocumented immigrants who have "done a good job" since arriving in the U.S.

"I'm a very big believer in the merit system," Trump said. "I have to tell you: Some of these people have been here, they've done a good job. You know, in some cases, sadly, they've been living under the shadows. ... If somebody's been outstanding, we try and work something out.

"But before we do anything, we have to secure the border because the border is like having no border," he added.

I'm sure some people will be tempted to cheer this, but compare it to Obama's own amnesty executive order.

These executive actions crack down on illegal immigration at the border, prioritize deporting felons not families, and require certain undocumented immigrants to pass a criminal background check and pay their fair share of taxes as they register to temporarily stay in the U.S. without fear of deportation.

Cracking Down on Illegal Immigration at the Border:  The President’s actions increase the chances that anyone attempting to cross the border illegally will be caught and sent back. Continuing the surge of resources that effectively reduced the number of unaccompanied children crossing the border illegally this summer, the President’s actions will also centralize border security command-and-control to continue to crack down on illegal immigration.

Deporting Felons, Not Families: The President’s actions focus on the deportation of people who threaten national security and public safety. He has directed immigration enforcement to place anyone suspected of terrorism, violent criminals, gang members, and recent border crossers at the top of the deportation priority list.

Deporting the "bad people" first is already an Obama talking point. People may think they can trust Trump, but not Obama or any of the Republicans, but like them, Trump frontloaded rhetoric about enforcement while keeping the amnesty out back.

And "secure the border first" has been the talking point of every Republican amnesty proponent.

Marco Rubio still supports legal status and a slow road to citizenship for millions of undocumented immigrants, but now says the government must convince Americans the border is secure before taking those steps.

Trump had already indicated support for amnesty earlier, now he's being clearer about it.

This is in line with what CNN’s Chris Moody reported Trump saying during a press conference in Chicago at the end of June. When asked what he would do about the illegal immigrants already residing in the country once the border was secured, Trump replied, “give them a path,” according to Moody.

When The Daily Caller sought clarification at the time from the Trump campaign, a senior adviser replied with a circuitous answer that emphasized that Trump wanted to secure the border and didn’t believe in “amnesty,” but wouldn’t explicitly reject a pathway to legalization.

Nobody likes the A-word, including Rubio and Ryan who spent the better part of a year arguing that legalizing illegal aliens isn't amnesty if they have to pay a fine. Even Obama made that argument.

The next step would be to get Trump to lay out criteria for who gets to stay and how many of them it would apply to, but good luck getting an answer.

[dragnet2]

Trump is not our candidate. He will be our nemesis.

Drug kingpins, the corrupt career professionals in DC, CNN, leftist networks, Univision, Columbia, leftists academia, La Raza and Mexico all agree with you!

You have some interesting allies there Mr. editor-surveyor.

[entropy12]

That is the method I prefer.

If the incentive of employment is removed, most illegals will self deport.

May be the next president will enforce the laws.

Thank all those voters who stayed home on election day and clear the path for Barack Hussein Obama, who will never enforce immigration laws.

[Norseman]

>>The problem with Romney is he has ZERO credibility. He’s a confirmed liar.<<

No, the problem with Romney was he was for Romneycare before he was against Obamacare.

Trump has the exact same problem, and on more issues to boot.

[Red Steel]

There’s an air of uncertainty about Trump. It’s hard to tell where he is. I don’t trust him.

There is absolutely complete certainty with the GOPE candidates that they will not build the fence or increase the border security where and when it matters.

The GOPE under Bush, pulled all funding to complete the double lined security fence in 2006. Senator Kay Hutchinson, Texas pulled the funding in an amendment either by following orders from the GOPE or them following her to do so. The GOPE was to blame.

[kabar]

I agree with you. Trump could not make it clearer that step number one is securing the border. Simultaneously, get the invaders (not his word) who are non-productive deported. It's called prioritizing.

There are an estimated 2 million criminal aliens. How does he propose rounding them up?

The DC crowd and their paymasters keep staying vague stuff while no one goes home, the border is no more secure, and H1B Visas are distributed like candy to kids on Halloween.

H-1B visas amount to 65,000 a year. We bring in 1.1 million LEGAL PERMANENT IMMIGRANTS A YEAR who get work permits. Since 1990 over 30 million legal permanent immigrants have entered this country. We have just had the the two largest decades of legal immigration in our history. Immigrants, legal and illegal, are taking American jobs and depressing wages.

[SkyDancer]

Another sell out by the Republicans. America is doomed.

[BobL]

“Walker for sure, and probably Cruz as well.”

Agree on Cruz. I would agree on Walker if he weren’t quietly promising Amnesty to big money I would tend to believe that...but it is expensive to run a national campaign, so it’s hard to blame him.

[Norseman]

>>There’s an air of uncertainty about Trump. <<

An air? There’s a hell of a lot more than “an air” of uncertainty about Trump. He’s been all over the lot from a policy point of view for the last two decades. People who “liked what he was saying” are just now starting to come to grips with that fact. Yes, fact, not air

[kabar]

Santorum is to the right of Trump on illegal immigration and he and Walker are the only two talking about reducing legal immigration.

[arthurus]

Ike showed how.

[entropy12]

No one can be right of anybody on immigration, if the border is not sealed first.

When your boat is taking on water, first thing you must do is plug the hole.

Only after the hole is plugged, you can begin paling the water out of the boat.

A successful businessman knows how to prioritize.
Professional politicians focus on making speeches.

[Ray76]

The Uniparty must go.

[The Toll]

So if any candidate advocates a position that some illegal aliens are decent hard-working people that came here for opportunity, aren’t they by default admitting that Welfare programs should be immediately ended due to the abundance of opportunity?

[dragnet2]

You and about 4 other here keep suggesting every two days Trump has nuked his candidacy, but his numbers continue to go up. That must be painful for ya.☺

[Norseman]

>>We need a system to track and deport visa overstays.<<

I would lay 10 to one odds that the system of tracking you want is already in place, and I say that without any particular knowledge of the system.

What we need is a President who will permit the tracking to actually take place, and who will also permit the border enforcers to take action upon the information. That is what has been lacking. Obama has been the worst, but Bush wasn’t much better in that regard.

[Carry_Okie]

I’m OK with that, because it is going to take a long time to get the border secure.

Takes no time at all to say that it is. Guess who gets to determine that? I just can't imagine Trump claiming victory when it isn't really true. Can you? /s

[Red Steel]

Santorum is to the right of Trump on illegal immigration and he and Walker are the only two talking about reducing legal immigration.

Problem with Santorum no traction and he can't get his message across to general public. He doesn't resonate.

[kabar]

Cruz will not deport those who are here.

Cruz Tries to Claim the Middle Ground on Immigration

Asked about what to do with the people here illegally, however, he stressed that he had never tried to undo the goal of allowing them to stay.

“The amendment that I introduced removed the path to citizenship, but it did not change the underlying work permit from the Gang of Eight,” he said during a recent visit to El Paso. Mr. Cruz also noted that he had not called for deportation or, as Mitt Romney famously advocated, self-deportation.

Mr. Cruz said recent polling indicated that people outside Washington support some reform, including legal status without citizenship. He said he was against naturalization because it rewarded lawbreakers and was unfair to legal immigrants. It also perpetuates illegal crossings, he added.

Besides barring citizenship while instituting some level of legalization for those here already, Mr. Cruz has proposed increasing the number of green cards awarded annually, to 1.35 million from 675,000. He also wants to eliminate the per-country limit that he said left applicants from countries like Mexico, China and India hamstrung when they tried to gain legal entry to this country.

[RitaOK]

Those who didn’t see what he said and never cared in the first place, will be the pants droppers, er,...I mean poll droppers.

Greenberg projects, here. The truth of what Trump actually said has nothing in common with Greenberg’s version.

In fact, I hear nothing terribly different between Trump and Cruz, except Trump doesn’t hesitate to use the word “deportation”.

[Norseman]

>>I believe Trump is saying nothing differently than any of the other 110 candidates.<<

Then you’re probably not on the Trump train, but a whole lot of people who are on it think he’s been saying things a LOT different than the other candidates. He hasn’t though; he’s just said it louder and longer and the MSM and CNN love replaying it over and over....

The media thinks Trump will hurt the GOP, but what they’re about to learn is that a lot more people than just the Tea Party Republicans are on board with securing the border, and that this issue isn’t going to play to the Dems’s advantage the way they’ve been hoping it would.