GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump several times has stunned the political pundits with his outspoken comments on what he’d like to do with immigration.
For example, when he launched his campaign, where he immediately rose to the top and, in most polls, has stayed there, he warned about having illegal aliens coming across America’s southern border.
“When Mexico sends its people,” he said, ‘They’re not sending the best. … They’re not sending you, they’re sending people that have lots of problems and they’re bringing those problems. They’re bringing drugs, they’re bringing crime. They’re rapists and some, I assume, are good people, but I speak to border guards and they’re telling us where we’re getting.”
Then he refused to back down.
Now he’s saying there should be a pause in immigration by Muslims.
Because of the violence that jihadists who are part of the faith carry out.
“There is great hatred towards Americans by large segments of the Muslim population,” he said in a released statement. “Until we are able to determine and understand this problem and the dangerous threat it poses, our country cannot be the victims of horrendous attacks by people that believe only in jihad, and have no sense of reason or respect for human life.”
His answer is a “total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States.”
Just a day after President Obama took to nationwide television to warn people not to be prejudiced against Muslims, Trump called out Obama over the two Muslims, a husband and wife, who attacked a county Christmas party in San Bernardino, California, last week, killing 14 and injuring another 21.
He tweeted, “Just put out a very important policy statement on the extraordinary influx of hatred & danger coming into our country. We must be vigilant!”
What do YOU think? How should Muslim immigration be handled? Sound off in today’s WND poll
NBC cited the nearly unanimous negative reaction from other Republicans and Democrats to Trump’s idea.
GOP candidates Jeb Bush (“Trump is unhinged”), Ted Cruz (“not my policy”), Chris Christie (“ridiculous”) and Lindsey Graham (I “condemn”) all took little time to distance themselves from the idea.
A spokesman for Ben Carson stated, “Everyone visiting our country should regisgter and be monitored during their stay as is done in many countries. We do not and would not advocate being selective on one’s religion.”
Hillary Clinton called the idea “reprehensible” and Bernie Sanders said it was “demagogues” who would have an idea.
However, longtime conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly recently said in an interview with WND that immigration is, in fact, the biggest issue America is facing.
“I think that’s the top grass-roots issue at the present time,” she told WND. “We want to vet the people who have gotten in here. … Our method of making people citizens is they have to agree to follow our laws, and they have to agree to never be a public charge.
“These coming in right now are going right on welfare,” she said. “That should not be allowed.”
She said the matter is simple: If they cannot make those promises, they don’t get in. If their nations don’t accept their return, the U.S. should cut off foreign aid to those governments, she said.
“There are so many ways the money could be used on behalf of America,” Schlafly said, “and not for the wrong purposes.”
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals just ruled that President Obama’s executive actions to change immigration law and allow millions of illegal aliens to remain in the United States are unconstitutional.
The Obama administration immediately said it would take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but Obama might be out of office before the case is decided.
Obama’s own words likely would be used against him. He has stated several times that, as president, he does not have the authority to change the law.
Schlafly said the resettlement of refugees and newcomers to the nation is getting out of control.
“Look what happened to Germany,” she said. “Germany isn’t going to be Germany any more. It’s going to be Muslim. We shouldn’t allow that to happen.”
She said U.S immigration and naturalization laws “are really very good.”
“Now we need to obey them,” she said. “The idea of just letting anybody in who shows up on the seaboard is simply unacceptable.”
Trump is not stranger to provocative statements, including about immigration.
His opening salvo in the fight led NBC and Univision to decide not to air the Trump-owned Miss Universe Pageant, but even as that decision was being announced, his poll numbers were rising.
He earlier told a national viewing audience, too, that the way to protect America, following the Muslim terror attack in Paris, was to send watchdogs into Muslim mosques.
“You’re going to have to watch and study the mosques because a lot of talk is going on at the mosques,” he said, in answer to a question about what he’d do to help protect America’s security and keep the country safe from the type of ISIS attack that just struck Paris.
When asked if he, as president, would condone the shutdown of mosques, as France has done, Trump said yes.
“I would hate to do it,” he said, Bloomberg reported, “but it’s something that you’re going to have to strongly consider because some of the ideas and some of the hatred, the absolute hatred, is coming from these areas.”
Trump may have hit a nerve with his latest statements about immigration.
A recent poll revealed fully 92 percent of Americans said immigration is a problem, with 77 percent of them rating the matter as either “very serious” or “somewhat serious” in scope.
Trump, who had led most Rpublican presidential polls since he joined the race, has grabbed the attention of conservatives with his vows to clamp down on illegal immigration and have Mexico pay for a wall on America’s southern border.
