President Trump Faces Caravan of Truth

I’m sure that everyone has heard by now of the huge caravan of Central Americans who are now passing through Mexico en route to the US border:

“Taking a drag from her cigarette, a Mexican immigration agent looked out toward a caravan of migrants that grew larger with each step they took on the two-lane highway.

When the agent, who’d covered her uniform with an orange and white shawl, learned that the Central American migrants heading her way numbered more than 1,000, she took off for the restaurant across the street.

“I’m going to have a relaxing Coke,” she told BuzzFeed News.

For five days now hundreds of Central Americans — children, women, and men, most of them from Honduras — have boldly crossed immigration checkpoints, military bases, and police in a desperate, sometimes chaotic march toward the United States. Despite their being in Mexico without authorization, no one has made any effort to stop them. …”

The Caravan of Truth is set to arrive just in time for the kickoff of the 2018 midterm elections. President Trump reacted to this development on Twitter this morning:

Border Patrol Agents are not allowed to properly do their job at the Border because of ridiculous liberal (Democrat) laws like Catch & Release. Getting more dangerous. “Caravans” coming. Republicans must go to Nuclear Option to pass tough laws NOW. NO MORE DACA DEAL!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2018

Mexico is doing very little, if not NOTHING, at stopping people from flowing into Mexico through their Southern Border, and then into the U.S. They laugh at our dumb immigration laws. They must stop the big drug and people flows, or I will stop their cash cow, NAFTA. NEED WALL!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2018

These big flows of people are all trying to take advantage of DACA. They want in on the act!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2018

This is a crisis of his own making:

1.) First, President Trump had multiple opportunities to start building the border wall a year ago. Instead of using his political capital to demand swift action on immigration on Capitol Hill, which was the issue that won him the presidency, he chose to kick the can down the road with spending bills in order to become the rubber stamp for Paul Ryan’s Better Way agenda.

2.) Second, there was a significant drop in illegal immigration at the outset of the Trump presidency. As I said at the time, this is because illegal aliens were reacting to the rhetoric of the Trump campaign and were expecting a sweeping crackdown. It wasn’t due to any policy change. In the second half of 2017, illegal immigration ticked back up again after illegal aliens began to discern that President Trump is a paper tiger on immigration. He only cares about projecting the image of looking tough on the issue. In fact, he deported fewer illegal aliens than Barack Obama in his first year.

3.) Third, President Trump set himself up for this crisis on the border by proclaiming how much he loved the DREAMers and how Republicans wanted to save DACA. He sent out the signal for illegal aliens to risk crossing into the United States in anticipation of an impending amnesty. He shifted the whole political conversation to the left on DACA by embracing a path to citizenship for DREAMers. What happens when the Democrats succeed in retaking the House and force the issue?

4.) Fourth, President Trump signed the omnibus bill which forbids him from building his own wall. The omnibus funded sanctuary cities, reduced the number of ICE detention beds, expanded the number of H-2B visas and put limits on the hiring of new ICE agents. What kind of message does that send?

A federal judge in Seattle has opened Pandora’s Box by nullifying US immigration laws:

“SEATTLE — A federal judge in Seattle opened the door Thursday for thousands of immigrants to apply for asylum, finding that the Department of Homeland Security has routinely failed to notify them of a deadline for filing their applications.

U.S. District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez issued the ruling in a class-action lawsuit brought by immigrant rights groups on behalf of those who fear persecution if returned to their home country.

In many cases, those asylum seekers are released from custody after officials have interviewed them and determined their fears to be credible. They’re told that they’ll need to appear in immigration court, but they typically aren’t personally told that they only have a year to apply for asylum, the lawsuit argued. …”

The Caravan of Truth that is coming from Central America plans to show up and request asylum. It is going to collide with the politics of virtue signaling about DREAMers.

So far, President Trump is calling on the Senate to end the filibuster and is threatening to withdraw from NAFTA. He is just reacting to the mood of the Republican base about the issue. There is zero chance that either of these things will happen. It will be interesting to see how he handles this crisis. He really can’t afford another defeat on immigration after losing on the border wall.

I’m not going to go so far as to predict he will yield and allow these illegal aliens to enter the country. At the same time, I don’t have any confidence that the system has the capacity to stop them. Last time this happened, Glenn Beck and Ted Cruz went down to the Mexican border to hand out hot meals and soccer balls. President Trump has also talked about how much he cares about the poor DREAMers. Either way, I agree with the consensus that this will be a moment of truth for the Trump presidency. If that caravan manages to cross the Mexican border, President Trump and the GOP Congress will lose all credibility on immigration.