WASHINGTON – Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, doesn’t think the hubub caused by Donald Trump’s comments on immigration are just a blip on the national radar. He sees them as a game-changer.
“Trump is going to change the debate. He will keep this immigration issue on the front of all of our debates all the way through,” the congressman told WND.
King suggested GOP presidential candidates will now be forced to declare exactly where they stand on immigration, an issue that otherwise could have been largely ignored.
Thanks to Trump, he said, the candidates “all have to have a position.”
“And some of those positions look so weak, they can’t be sustained all the way to the White House. So let’s find out early,” he said.
King has some advice for Trump when it comes to talking about immigration.
“If I were talking to him one-on-one, I would say, “Do not lose your will and drive on this. Continue.
“Whenever these groups rise up and attack you in the fashion they have, just have the attitude, ‘Well, if you don’t like that, it’s the truth and here’s some more.’ And keep shoveling the truth at them until they back up. That’s the most important thing,” added King.
“I’ve been through a good number of these, as you know. I’ve never apologized.”
King said he has never apologized for his own controversial remarks on immigration, because he does not believe he was wrong.
“You have a right to freedom of speech. You don’t have to be right, but he happened to be right, and they’re still trying to take away his constitutional right and punish his businesses. What kind of a country can we build if people can’t even utter the truth?”
Of all the Republican presidential candidates, only Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, defended Trump. WND asked King if virtually all the other candidates were in the pockets of big business looking for cheap immigrant labor.
“Hmmm,” he said, and then chuckled. “That’s a pretty good question. I’m not sure how to give that an objective answer.
“It’s reported that (Republican National Committee Chairman) Reince Priebus called Trump and asked him to tone it down. He has, I think, denied it since then, and said it was a relatively congenial phone call.”
But, the congressman said, Priebus had long ago concluded GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney lost the 2012 election because of his stance against illegal immigration and “two words: ‘Self deport.'”
“Of course, the statistics and polling data that have emerged since then do not support that conclusion. But [the GOP establishment] still adhere to that conclusion. So it’s about trying to police Republicans because they think that they need to pander to Hispanics in order to win another national election.”
Opposition to amnesty was the top issue that propelled the GOP to a landslide victory in the 2014 midterm election, so how could the GOP not treat strong opposition to illegal immigration as a winning issue?
“It is. If it was true in 2014, it is still true now. Look at Trump. Now he’s at the top of the polls. And that’s all about immigration. What’s being missed by the establishment Republicans, I think, is how energizing the immigration issue is. How powerful a message it is.”
It’s not just illegal immigration. WND recently published polling data showing opposition to increased immigration among union workers, blue- and white-collar workers, small business owners, CEOs and among whites, blacks and even Hispanics. Additionally, research showed unprecedented levels of immigration as lowering wages and depressing wages.
Why hasn’t the GOP seize those as winning issues?
“That’s an obvious question that doesn’t get answered,” King said. “One can only speculate, does that have to do with people who have an outside influence on policy? Is that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce? They’ve got a strong pro-amnesty position.”
King reflected: “How much influence does that have on John Boehner, who just announced he hopes to address (comprehensive) immigration this year? Whew. I think we have enough trouble without trying to fix it while Barack Obama’s in the White House.”
King’s comments were echoed by a former colleague.
Former Republican Rep. Michele Bachmann told WND that with “every news cycle, Donald Trump is being proven right about problems associated with illegal aliens.’
“The Democratic and Republican ruling class in Washington is petrified their false claim that massive Third-World immigration is good for America is unraveling,” she said.
Bachmann said the “ruling class should be worried, and their handmaidens in the media, because the American people are sick of watching our glorious nation be destroyed and they are longing for a true champion to fight for American greatness and sovereignty.”
“Trump just might pull this off,” she said.
Follow Garth Kant @DCgarth
