President Donald Trump on Tuesday complained that he can’t oversee the quick execution of drug dealers — and suggested that the United States should start taking its cues from China.
During a talk at the National Association of Counties Legislative Conference, Trump said that authoritarian dictatorships do a better job of stopping illicit drug use in their countries because defendants don’t have all the constitutional protections that they’re entitled to in the United States.
“You go into China, you say, ‘How’s your drug problem,’ they don’t even know, President Xi doesn’t even know what you’re talking about!” the president said. “They have quick trials, and I won’t even tell you what the punishment is, but let me just say it’s very swift.”
The president then said he didn’t believe American citizens were ready to be “tough” on drug dealers like China was.
“I just don’t know whether or not this country is ready for that, but the only countries that don’t have drug problems are countries where the retribution is unbelievably tough,” the president said.
"They have quick trials … I just don't know whether or not this country is ready for that, but the only countries that don't have drug problems are countries where the retribution is unbelievably tough" — Trump commends China for executing drug dealers pic.twitter.com/p7pz9Fc3qD
The Trump administration has a new target on the immigration front — pregnant women visiting from other countries — with plans as early as this week to roll out a new rule cracking down on “birth tourism,” three administration officials told Axios.
Why it matters: Trump has threatened to end birthright citizenship and railed against immigrant “anchor babies.” The new rule would be one of the first tangible steps to test how much legal authority the administration has to prevent foreigners from taking advantage of the 14th Amendment’s protection of citizenship for anyone born in the U.S.
“This change is intended to address the national security and law enforcement risks associated with birth tourism, including criminal activity associated with the birth tourism industry,” a State Department official told Axios.
The regulation is also part of the administration’s broader efforts to intensify the vetting process for visas, according to another senior administration official.
The big picture: “Birth tourists” often come to the U.S. from China, Russia and Nigeria, according to the AP.
There’s no official count of babies born to foreign visitors in the U.S., while the immigration restrictionist group Center for Immigration Studies — which has close ties to Trump administration immigration officials — puts estimates at around 33,000 every year.
How the new regulation would work: It would alter the requirements for B visas (or visitor visas), giving State Department officials the authority to deny foreigners the short-term business and tourism visas if they believe the process is being used to facilitate automatic citizenship.
It’s unclear yet how the rule would be enforced — whether officials would be directed to consider pregnancy or the country of the woman’s citizenship in determining whether to grant a visa.
Consular officers who issue passports and visas “are remarkably skilled at sussing out true versus false claims,” the senior official said.
“The underlying practical issue is that very few people who give birth in the U.S. got a visa for that specific purpose. Most people already have visas and come in later,” according to Jeffrey Gorsky, former chief legal adviser in the State Department visa office.
This is but one step in the administration’s plans to make it harder for people from other countries to benefit from birthright citizenship.
“Rome wasn’t built in a day,” the senior official said. “Just the legal recognition that this is improper and wrong and not allowed is a significant step forward.”
Immigration experts expect there to be a similar rule for Customs and Border Protection to go along with the State Department’s regulation.
What to watch: Most of Trump’s major immigration moves have been met with lawsuits. If the regulation leaves it to officers’ discretion to ensure that B visas aren’t used for birth tourism, it would be difficult to challenge in court, according to Lynden Melmed, an attorney and former chief counsel at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
“State Department officials have all the discretion in the world to deny people visas,” said Sarah Pierce of the Migration Policy Institute. Foreign nationals who are outside the U.S. and have not yet received visas “don’t have a lot of legal standing.”
But specific restrictions that could keep out non-birth tourism visitors — such as pregnant women coming to the U.S. for business, etc. — would be legally questionable, according to Melmed and Gorsky.
President Trump on Wednesday said his administration is once again seriously considering an executive order to end birthright citizenship months after several lawmakers cast doubt on his ability to take such action.
“We’re looking at that very seriously,” Trump told reporters as he left the White House for Kentucky. “Birthright citizenship, where you have a baby on our land — walk over the border, have a baby, congratulations, the baby’s now a U.S. citizen.”
“We are looking at birthright citizenship very seriously,” he added. “It’s, frankly, ridiculous.”
The president proposed ending the practice that grants citizenship to those born in the United States during his 2016 presidential campaign. He revived the idea last year, saying he would sign an executive order to enact the change.
Numerous lawmakers, including several Republicans, quickly pushed back on the idea and argued Trump lacked the authority to make such a change using an executive order. They cited that birthright citizenship is a right enshrined under the 14th Amendment.
Trump responded to the criticism by saying birthright citizenship would be ended “one way or another.”
The president has sought various ways to crack down on illegal and legal immigration throughout his presidency.
His administration enacted and later reversed a “zero tolerance” policy that led to the separation of thousands of migrant families; Trump has sought changes to asylum laws to keep refugees in Mexico while they wait to be processed; and the White House last week rolled out a rule that would make it more difficult for some immigrants to obtain green cards.
The Trump administration announced earlier Wednesday it would unveil a new rule that would allow migrant families to be held indefinitely, ending a procedure known as the Flores Settlement Agreement that requires children to be held no longer than 20 days.
President Donald Trump ripped into Paul Ryan on Wednesday over his comments on birthright citizenship, in a stunning rebuke of his own party’s House Speaker just a week before the midterm elections.
“Paul Ryan should be focusing on holding the Majority rather than giving his opinions on Birthright Citizenship, something he knows nothing about!” Trump tweeted. “Our new Republican Majority will work on this, Closing the Immigration Loopholes and Securing our Border!”
Paul Ryan should be focusing on holding the Majority rather than giving his opinions on Birthright Citizenship, something he knows nothing about! Our new Republican Majority will work on this, Closing the Immigration Loopholes and Securing our Border!
The Wisconsin Republican broke with Trump on Tuesday when he rejected the president’s expressed desire to end birthright citizenship through executive order.
Ryan said in a radio interview that Trump “cannot end birthright citizenship with an executive order.”
President Trump plans to sign an executive order that would remove the right to citizenship for babies of non-citizens and unauthorized immigrants born on U.S. soil, he said yesterday in an exclusive interview for “Axios on HBO,” a new four-part documentary news series debuting on HBO this Sunday at 6:30 p.m. ET/PT.
Why it matters: This would be the most dramatic move yet in Trump’s hardline immigration campaign, this time targeting “anchor babies” and “chain migration.” And it will set off another stand-off with the courts, as Trump’s power to do this through executive action is debatable to say the least.
Trump told “Axios on HBO” that he has run the idea of ending birthright citizenship by his counsel and plans to proceed with the highly controversial move, which certainly will face legal challenges.
“It was always told to me that you needed a constitutional amendment. Guess what? You don’t,” Trump said, declaring he can do it by executive order.
When toldthat’s very much in dispute, Trump replied: “You can definitely do it with an Act of Congress. But now they’re saying I can do it just with an executive order.”
“It’s in the process. It’ll happen … with an executive order.”
The president expressed surprise that “Axios on HBO” knew about his secret plan: “I didn’t think anybody knew that but me. I thought I was the only one. “
Behind the scenes: “Axios on HBO” had been working for weeks on a story on Trump’s plans for birthright citizenship, based on conversations with several sources, including one close to the White House Counsel’s office.
The legal challenges would force the courts to decide on a constitutional debate over the 14th Amendment, which says:
“All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Be smart: Few immigration and constitutional scholars believe it is within the president’s power to change birthright citizenship, former U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services chief counsel Lynden Melmed tells Axios.
But some conservatives have argued that the 14th Amendment was only intended to provide citizenship to children born in the U.S. to lawful permanent residents — not to unauthorized immigrants or those on temporary visas.
John Eastman, a constitutional scholar and director of Chapman University’s Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, told “Axios on HBO” that the Constitution has been misapplied over the past 40 or so years. He says the line “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” originally referred to people with full, political allegiance to the U.S. — green card holders and citizens.
Michael Anton, a former national security official in the Trump administration, recently took up this argument in the Washington Post.
Anton said that Trump could, via executive order, “specify to federal agencies that the children of noncitizens are not citizens” simply because they were born on U.S. soil. (It’s not yet clear whether Trump will take this maximalist argument, though his previous rhetoric suggests there’s a good chance.)
But others — such as Judge James C. Ho, who was appointed by Trump to Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, in New Orleans — say the line in the amendment refers to the legal obligation to follow U.S. laws, which applies to all foreign visitors (except diplomats) and immigrants. He has written that changing how the 14th Amendment is applied would be “unconstitutional.”
Between the lines: Until the 1960s, the 14th Amendment was never applied to undocumented or temporary immigrants, Eastman said.
Between 1980 and 2006, the number of births to unauthorized immigrants — which opponents of birthright citizenship call “anchor babies” — skyrocketed to a peak of 370,000, according to a 2016 study by Pew Research. It then declined slightly during and following the Great Recession.
The Supreme Court has already ruled that children born to immigrants who are legal permanent residents have citizenship. But those who claim the 14th Amendment should not apply to everyone point to the fact that there has been no ruling on a case specifically involving undocumented immigrants or those with temporary legal status.
The bottom line: If Trump follows through on the executive order, “the courts would have to weigh in in a way they haven’t,” Eastman said.
Fact is Republicans and Fox News have long targeted only Hispanic or Asian “anchor babies” claiming they were a national security threat. (cough) (cough) racism (cough) (cough)
The Trump administration’s flawed argument is over the line in Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” claiming it only referred to people with full, political allegiance to the U.S., such as citizens or green card holders.
The problem with this thinking is the writings of the authors of the 14th amendment clearly show the line in the amendment refers to the legal obligation to follow U.S. laws within the U.S. border.
Finally, you can’t change the Constitution with an executive order. Can’t happen.
All Trump is doing is riling up his insanely racist base, who are trained by Republican news to fear all foreigners, to show up at the polls one week away.
On the same day as immigration protests and marches were held throughout the nation, President Donald Trump called for those entering the country without proper paperwork to be immediately escorted “back out.”
“When people come into our Country illegally, we must IMMEDIATELY escort them back out without going through years of legal maneuvering,” Trump opined in a midafternoon tweet.
He then added this about U.S. law: “Our laws are the dumbest anywhere in the world. Republicans want Strong Borders and no Crime. Dems want Open Borders and are weak on Crime!”
When people come into our Country illegally, we must IMMEDIATELY escort them back out without going through years of legal maneuvering. Our laws are the dumbest anywhere in the world. Republicans want Strong Borders and no Crime. Dems want Open Borders and are weak on Crime!
Trump’s tweet follows an earlier tweet where he claimed, “I never pushed the Republicans in the House to vote for the Immigration Bill.” Just a few days ago, however, he said just that.
I never pushed the Republicans in the House to vote for the Immigration Bill, either GOODLATTE 1 or 2, because it could never have gotten enough Democrats as long as there is the 60 vote threshold. I released many prior to the vote knowing we need more Republicans to win in Nov.
President Donald Trump on Monday doubled-down on his position that due process for illegal border crossers is too time consuming, advocating instead for a border security system that prevents undocumented immigrants from entering the U.S. illegally in the first place.
“Hiring manythousands [sic] of judges, and going through a long and complicated legal process, is not the way to go – will always be dysfunctional [sic]. People must simply be stopped at the Border and told they cannot come into the U.S. illegally. Children brought back to their country,” the president wrote on Twitter, splitting his message into two posts. “If this is done, illegal immigration will be stopped in it’s [sic] tracks – and at very little, by comparison, cost. This is the only real answer – and we must continue to BUILD THE WALL!”
Trump’s border security and immigration policy has been the subject of significant criticism in recent days as outcry grew over the administration’s “zero tolerance” policy that led to the separation more than 2,000 children from parents who brought them illegally into the U.S. The president signed an executive order last week aimed at keeping families together but has continued to press for tougher border security, blaming Democrats unwilling to accede to his immigration and security proposals for issues at the border.
In his efforts to point the finger at the minority party in both houses of Congress, Trump has gone so far as to undercut his own party’s efforts at passing immigration reform legislation, writing on Twitter that House Republicans are wasting their time trying to pass such a measure when it is unlikely to pass in the Senate.
The president’s Monday derision of a legal process by which undocumented immigrants are removed from the country without judicial proceedings or review was an extension of an argument he put forward over the weekend, when he wrote that “when somebody comes in, we must immediately, with no Judges or Court Cases, bring them back from where they came.”
“We cannot allow all of these people to invade our Country,” he wrote. “Our system is a mockery to good immigration policy and Law and Order. Most children come without parents.”
Trump’s contempt for the rule of law was on full display when he mocked the very idea of due process for immigrants, and seemed to suggest ending immigration courts altogether.
In an interview that aired during Thursday morning’s “Fox & Friends,” host Brian Kilmeade pointed out that Trump’s crackdown has contributed to a monumental backlog in immigration courts.
“You need more judges,” Kilmeade said. “How close is that?”
“Think of it, we are the only country, essentially, that has judges,” Trump said. “They want to hire thousands of judges. Other countries have, it’s called security people. People that stand there and say ‘You can’t come in.
“We have thousands of judges, and they need thousands of more judges,” Trump said. “The whole system is corrupt, It’s horrible. So, yeah, you need thousands of judges based on this crazy system.”
“Who ever heard of a system where you put people through trials?” Trump asked. “Where do these judges come from? You know, a judge is a very special person. How do you hire thousands of people to be a judge? So, it’s ridiculous. We’re going to change the system. We have no choice for the good of our country.”
Trump’s ignorance of immigration courts is staggering, even by Trump’s standards. There are only just over three hundred immigration judges in the United States, and the number of new judges needed to address the backlog is between 200 and 250, not “thousands.”
And Trump is also wrong about the level of due process afforded in immigration courts, where the government is not required to provide legal counsel and, children often end up representing themselves in perfunctory proceedings.
But even worse than our current dysfunctional immigration courts is the prospect that Trump would try to do away with them, as he suggests.
Time and again, Trump has shown contempt for bedrock democratic concepts like free speech, freedom of the press, and an independent Justice Department. Unfortunately, Republicans in Congress have shown equal contempt for their own role as a check on the White House, which makes Trump’s despotic ruminations that much scarier.
President Trump on Wednesday voiced support for confiscating guns from certain individuals deemed to be dangerous, even if it violates due process rights.
“I like taking the guns early, like in this crazy man’s case that just took place in Florida … to go to court would have taken a long time,” Trump said at a meeting with lawmakers on school safety and gun violence.
“Take the guns first, go through due process second,” Trump said.
Trump was responding to comments from Vice President Pence that families and local law enforcement should have more tools to report potentially dangerous individuals with weapons.
“Allow due process so no one’s rights are trampled, but the ability to go to court, obtain an order and then collect not only the firearms but any weapons,” Pence said.
“Or, Mike, take the firearms first, and then go to court,” Trump responded.
Trump met with lawmakers on Wednesday to discuss gun laws and school safety in the aftermath of a Feb. 14 shooting at a high school in Parkland, Fla., that left 17 people dead.
The suspected shooter, Nikolas Cruz, was able to legally purchase the AR-15 reportedly used in the shooting despite numerous calls to law enforcement about his unstable behavior.
In an interview with Fox News’ Sean Hannity, Republican nominee Donald Trump said that as President he would start racial profiling United States citizens, and should their views be “extreme” he would have them deported.
As an example, Trump used the father of Omar Mateen, the man who killed 49 people at Pulse nightclub in Orlando — in spite of his status as a U.S. citizen.
“I’d throw him out,” Trump said of Seddique Mateen, according to the Washington Post. The former reality TV star said that racial and religious profiling is something our country should start practicing in the interest of protecting itself.
“But look,” said Trump, “we have — whether it’s racial profiling or politically correct, we’d better get smart. We are letting tens of thousands of people into our country. We don’t know what the hell we’re doing.”
“And frankly, the Muslims have to help us, because they see what’s going on in their community,” he said. “And if they’re not going to help us, they’re to blame also.”
Regarding Seddique Mateen, Hannity asked, “What do we do when we find somebody that has extreme views? Do we throw them the hell out?”
“I’d throw him out,” Trump said as the audience cheered. “If you look at him, I’d throw him out. You know, I looked at him. And you look, he’s smiling.”
Donald Trump is putting forth a proposal that would be a clear violation the 1st, 4th, and 14th amendments to the United States Constitution, as well as existing laws.
Mateen is a U.S. citizen, a status that is considered irrevocable except in extremely rare cases in which naturalized citizens become “denaturalized.” Typically, to be denaturalized one must get caught forging documents, falsifying important information or concealing of relevant facts, refusal to testify before Congress, membership in groups attempting to overthrow the government and dishonorable discharge from the military.
Racial profiling is the practice of targeting individuals for police or security detention based on their race or ethnicity in the belief that certain minority groups are more likely to engage in unlawful behavior.
