In likely final immigration rant as president, Trump worries about his wall being taken down

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

Donald Trump, set to be the first president to have been impeached twice, went to the U.S./Mexico border Tuesday to do exactly what we said he’d do. While there was of course a bunch of self-congratulation for the border fencing built with stolen U.S. taxpayer funds because Mexico never did end up paying for it, Trump ended his final border visit as president the same way he kicked off his racist campaign in 2015.

“President Trump traveled to the U.S.-Mexico border on Tuesday and recited a bunch of old claims about immigrants and crime that we’ve long rated false or misleading,” The Washington Post reported. “Our practice is not to award Pinocchios when we round up multiple claims, but Trump as usual butchered the facts with his spin about immigrants, ending his term as it began.” Immigrant rights advocacy group RAICES noted that networks didn’t broadcast his bullshit live, either.

Some racist lies uttered by Trump in Texas I’m not going to go into here because after five years I’m sick and tired of having to justify the humanity of immigrants following some disgusting speech he made somewhere. While I’m sure this man will remain a boil on the butt of humanity post Jan. 20, I hope this is the final time I ever have to address his racist remarks as president. If you want to read exactly what he said in Texas, here’s The Post’s roundup. 

We should however address some of his lies about policy, because this is damage that President-elect Biden can immediately begin to reverse after he takes office next week.

“One of the biggest loopholes we closed was asylum fraud under the old broken system,” Trump falsely claimed on Tuesday. “If you merely requested asylum, you were released into the country. The most ridiculous thing anyone’s ever seen. And we were taking in some people that you didn’t want to have in your country. We instituted a series of historic policy changes to shut down asylum fraud, and that’s what we did.”

“Wrong on multiple levels,” The Post corrected. Or as I immediately thought, bullshit, bullshit, bullshit.

What Trump has done is shut down the U.S. asylum system to just about everybody, through dangerous and unlawful policies like Migrant Protection Protocols, or Remain in Mexico, and the politically motivated Stephen Miller order using the novel coronavirus pandemic as an excuse to quickly expel thousands of asylum-seekers, including children.

“As of Jan 2020 (1 yr ago) @humanrights1st had tracked at least 816 public reports of murder, torture, rape, kidnapping, and other violent attacks against asylum-seekers and migrants returned to Mexico under MPP,” RAICES tweeted. “Trump's take: ‘MPP saved countless lives from crime.’” In shocking audio obtained by CNN last year, the Trump administration in fact admitted the policy was dangerous after having publicly defended it as having “successfully provided protections” to asylum seekers.

Parents forced to wait for their U.S. immigration court dates in Mexico under the policy have become so desperate, that they’ve been forced to send their children to the U.S. by themselves, resulting in another form of family separation. Among those parents has been Alexis Martinez, who recounted to NPR in late 2019 watching his children, 5-year-old Benjamin and 7-year-old Osiel, holding hands as they crossed into the U.S. alone. 

”All in all, today's appearance was a victory lap (if you can even call it that) of the only thing in his presidency Trump was able to accomplish: dismantle our immigration system as we know it,” RAICES continued. The organization noted that Trump spent time praising the out-of-control agents of Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, something that “reeks of danger. These agencies were already vile & during the last 4 years the Trump admin fostered an already rampant racism & xenophobia within them.”

But in the end, Vox reports that Trump’s main concern wasn’t the lives he’s destroyed through his policies or the enduring damage policies like Remain in Mexico has created, but instead about his precious, stupid wall. “We can’t let the next administration even think about taking it down,” he said according to the report. President-elect Joe Biden has pledged to stop building when he takes office next week. He needs to knock the motherfucker down too.

Trump to end presidency the same way he kicked off run, by attacking immigrants

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

Soon-to-be-twice impeached Donald Trump is ending his white supremacist presidency the same way he started his campaign more than five years ago: racist, anti-immigrant fearmongering. Having basically gone into hiding after inciting a violent mob of seditionist supporters who ransacked the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to overturn the 2020 election results—and resulted in numerous deaths, including of a police officer—Trump is traveling to Texas on Tuesday to bluster about the border wall that Mexico never did end up paying for.

The Associated Press reports that missing from the visit will be unlawfully appointed acting DHS Sec. Chad Wolf, who resigned Monday. But following the D.C. attack (nice job securing the “homeland” there, Chad), elected officials, editorial boards, and border communities are demanding Trump stay away too. "Normally we would welcome a presidential visit to our state. Not now,” the American-Statesman Editorial Board wrote. “Not by a president who is unhinged and unrepentant for the violent mob he sent last week to the Capitol."

“The stated reason for Trump’s visit to Alamo is to tout his administration’s work on the border wall and immigration,” the American-Statesman Editorial Board continued. “Indeed, Trump is wrapping up his term on the same note that he launched his political career, stoking fear about immigrants and exaggerating his accomplishments.”

June 16, 2015, will always live in infamy as the day he launched his presidential campaign by descending the escalators at Trump Tower to call Mexican immigrants criminals and rapists. ”When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best,” he said. “They’re not sending you. They’re not sending you. They’re sending people that have lots of problems, and they’re bringing those problems with us. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”

His comments were blatantly racist and disqualifying, but too many in the mainstream media were afraid to say so and instead merely labeled them “controversial.” Worse yet, others dismissed them as a joke. It wasn’t a joke or “controversial” to Mexicans and Mexican-Americans like me. He was talking about us. He talking about my parents and two older sisters, all born in Mexico. He was talking about me, the son of Mexican immigrants.

“Trump acts as if his legacy along the border will be construction of a ‘beautiful’ wall,” American-Statesman continued. “In truth, his legacy is one of destruction: Crying children pulled from their parents’ arms as part of his shocking family separation policy, with hundreds of kids still waiting to be reunited. Migrant kids dying in U.S. custody for lack of proper care. A shameful humanitarian crisis just south of the border as the U.S. turned its back on those who are lawfully seeking asylum. A degradation of America’s values and standing in the world.”

Now having incited a violent mob that my colleague David Neiwert writes was “intent on taking hostages and murdering them” and is now leading to an unprecedented second impeachment, Trump is returning to what he always goes to when desperate or in need of an ego boost: attacking immigrants (and doing it as likely his final trip in office).

“Rather than spend his last days in the Oval Office addressing the pressing Covid-19 pandemic and ensuring an orderly transition, Trump is doubling down on his xenophobic, white supremacist agenda,” Border Network for Human Rights (BNHR) executive director Fernando García said in a statement received by Daily Kos. Indeed, the City of Alamo said in a statement it hasn’t even been contacted about Trump’s visit.

“His presence at the borderland is a provocation, and an act of violence in and of itself,” García continued. “Border communities are calling for the dismantlement of the wall of shame, racism and white supremacy. The wall and all it represents have no place in our society, and Trump must be held accountable.”

President-elect Joe Biden’s victory and our wins in Georgia provide an opportunity to take both executive and legislative action to protect undocumented communities attacked by the outgoing administration. I hope Trump has the time of his wretched life at his precious wall Tuesday because Biden has also pledged to not build another foot of it—and because it was built using swindled funds and has caused “incalculable” harm in the borderlands, there’s a strong case for knocking the motherfucker down. The human costs of Trump’s racism, however, the fomenting of violence and the unleashing of white supremacist forces, will not be so easy to scale back. That’s the “legacy” he’s leaving us. 

“It is a presidency that has prioritized sowing division, undermining our institutions and norms, and working tirelessly to marginalize the ‘other,’” American Immigration Council policy counsel Aaron Reichlin-Melnick writes. “For Trump, there were no people more “other” than those who came to our border and asked for our help.” He writes that that to truly “defeat Trumpism, as a nation we must embrace a more humane approach toward those who are different from us, one that respects the law and our obligations to the most vulnerable.”

“The Biden administration can start by restoring humanitarian protection, and finally moving away from the deterrence-based mindsets of the past decades and create a truly welcoming process at the border,” Reichlin-Melnick continued.

Rep. Joaquin Castro to introduce bill barring federal property from being named after Trump

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

Texas congressman and House Committee on Foreign Affairs vice chair Joaquin Castro says he’s preparing legislation that would bar federal buildings and property from being named after Donald Trump, who incited a violent mob to attack the U.S. Capitol this week and to very likely try to take hostage members of Congress.

“President Trump incited an insurrection that damaged some our nation’s most significant and sacred federal property,” Castro said in a series of tweets. “Most importantly—let us learn from our past. Donald Trump should never become a future generation’s confederate symbol.”

Castro is among the over 150 House Democrats and counting who support impeaching Trump, and has also called on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment to begin the process of removing him from office.

“We must send a clear message not only to the American people, but to the world that the United States is a resilient democracy governed by the rule of law—of, by, and for the people,” Castro tweeted on Thursday. “I support invoking the 25th amendment and impeachment to remove President Trump from office.”

Castro has also called for the resignation of Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz for his role in inciting this violent mob. “He has conducted himself shamelessly,” Castro told The Texas Tribune on Wednesday, “and I think he has done this because he believes it's the only way, the only chance that he has to win the Republican nomination for president.” 

Immigrant rights groups demand ‘immediate impeachment’ of Trump for inciting violent mob

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

More than a dozen organizations including leading immigrant rights advocacy groups are calling for the “immediate impeachment, removal, and prosecution” of Donald Trump following his incitement of a violent mob that sacked the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday. Following the white seditionist siege, five people, including a Capitol police officer, are dead.

“Donald Trump incited today’s violent attack on our democracy,” organizations including the Refugee and Immigrant Center for Education and Legal Services (RAICES) and Presente said in the statement. “Every moment that he remains in office is a severe danger to our country. Congress must respond decisively and immediately. We call on Congress to immediately certify the election, impeach and remove Trump, and refer him for prosecution.”

The organizations also call for legislators who aided Trump in inciting this violent seditionist mob, including Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz and Missouri (though he actually lives in Virginia) Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, to be punished by Congress. “Further, all members of Congress who joined Trump in inciting today’s violent coup attempt based on baseless, provable lies must be held accountable through censure, expulsion, or other means,” the organizations continue.

“As of Friday morning, 159 House Democrats and 22 Senate Democrats have issued statements supporting impeachment,” Daily Kos’ Joan McCarter writes. “A Republican, Sen. Ben Sasse, is also on board, saying that he will ‘definitely consider whatever articles [the House] might move because I believe the president has disregarded his oath of office. … What he did was wicked.’”

Yet Vice President Mike Pence, who has the power to begin the process to remove Trump from office using the 25th Amendment, is nowhere to be found. But that’s because Pence is also a soulless charlatan who cast away the couple of convictions he may have had to become a starry-eyed sidekick to a reality show host authoritarian.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said that the House “may be prepared” to go ahead with impeachment if Pence doesn’t act first, but his inaction as Donald Trump continues to remain an ongoing threat to democratic values has made it clear the House must go ahead and act first—and now. “We cannot wait one day longer,” tweeted Faith for Black Lives, another one of the leading organizations to have signed the letter. “Congress must act TODAY.”

Trump says he might use pandemic relief funding to extort so-called sanctuary cities

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

Oh, not this shit again. Impeached president Donald Trump on Tuesday returned to attacking so-called sanctuary cities, but with a pandemic quid pro quo twist (I guess he really learned that lesson, right Susan Collins?): now he’s threatening to condition relief funding on local policies limiting cooperation with federal deportation agents. “Now, if it's COVID-related, I guess we can talk about it, but we'd want certain things also, including sanctuary city adjustments because we have so many people in sanctuary cities,” Trump claimed.

“Adjustments” probably means “rescinding,” because the man can’t stand anything that remotely humanizes brown people. But can he do that? No, tweeted immigration policy expert Aaron Reichlin-Melnick. “To be clear, as multiple federal courts have already ruled, Congress has to specifically give the president the authority to condition grants on sanctuary city status in order to do this—and since they haven't, he can't.” But will he try? That’s another story.

Trump also maybe confused his own very clear contempt for U.S. sanctuary cities with the reality around these policies, falsely claiming he didn’t think they’re popular, “even by radical-left folks. Because what's happening is people are being protected that shouldn't be protected and a lot of bad things are happening with sanctuary cities.”

Immigrant rights advocacy group America’s Voice pointed out in 2017 that these policies are actually pretty popular among police departments. “In order for the police to be most effective at their jobs, they need to be able to work with immigrants who report crimes, give tips, or testify as witnesses,” the group said. “In order for immigrants to trust the police, they need to know that an interaction with law enforcement won’t lead to their deportation.”

And that makes communities safer for all. “Research backs this up; one analysis has shown that sanctuary cities see 15% less crime than non-sanctuary cities,” the group continued. “Another found that two-thirds of the cities that had the highest jumps in murder rates in 2016 were not sanctuary cities—in fact, they are the opposite, generally eager to hold immigrants for ICE pick-up and detention.”

But, again, just because Trump can’t do something doesn’t mean he and henchman Stephen Miller won’t try. They’ve already exploited a pandemic that has killed nearly 60,000 Americans to, in just a just a couple of examples, deport children who are supposed to be protected by U.S. law, and implement draconian immigration changes that have been the stuff of anti-immigrant leaders’ dreams.

“We cannot allow the Trump administration to exploit a public health crisis to further their anti-immigrant agenda,” the American Civil Liberties Union tweeted in response to Trump threatening to hold funding hostage. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, House Oversight Committee chair, tweeted a simple and concise “no.” No word on this extortion threat from Sen. Collins, however.

That time congressional Republicans postponed recess to rush … the deportation of DACA recipients

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

The U.S. is hurtling full-speed toward an iceberg, but the bumbling idiot at the helm continues to insist that everyone is safe to go back to their cabins. In fact, as Daily Kos’ Laura Clawson pointed out earlier on Thursday, impeached president Donald Trump has declared emergencies where there are none as a public health crisis is exploding across the nation. But he’s not alone in this criminal negligence: He’s getting an assist from the congressional Republicans who protected him from impeachment and removal from office.

“McConnell ally says Senate won't take up House coronavirus bill until after recess,” tweeted CNN correspondent Ana Cabrera. “’The Senate will act when we come back and we have a clearer idea of what extra steps we need to take,’ Sen. Lamar Alexander told reporters.” People’s lives are at stake, but Republicans are clearly laying out their priorities, immigration policy expert Tom Jawetz points out: “I'm old enough to remember when House GOP postponed August 2014 recess in part to make sure they voted on a bill to strip protections from DACA recipients.”

Roll Call reported at the time that the anti-immigrant legislation wasn’t going to be “taken up any time soon” by the Democratic-led Senate, “which already left for August recess.” Nor did this legislation, which would have effectively ended DACA, have had any chance of being approved by President Obama, who had implemented the program in 2012. That didn’t matter to House Republicans, who, led by Iowa’s most infamous white supremacist, Steve King, were really just trying to send immigrants a message: Get the fuck out.

I'm old enough to remember when @HouseGOP postponed August 2014 recess in part to make sure they voted on a bill to strip protections from #DACA recipients. https://t.co/NroDLmPSX5 https://t.co/lqNTDzmBhA

— Tom Jawetz (@TomJawetz) March 12, 2020

Our nation installed in the Oval Office a white supremacist sexual assaulter grifter who has no idea what he’s doing, but the blame for this incompetence isn’t solely his to bear. It’s also on the congressional Republicans helping him worsen a true national crisis, and who as a body had already shown themselves to be cruel and inhumane when the impeached president was nowhere near the White House and still on television judging a reality show.

Cages installed outside Iowa caucus sites remind public to not look away from anti-immigrant abuses

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

Iowans on their way to caucus in Des Moines on Monday may encounter a reminder from a leading immigrant and refugee rights advocacy group: in the midst of the Republican Senate’s sham impeachment trial, threats of war with Iran, and other imperial presidency horrors, abuses at our southern border and in detention facilities across the U.S. continue. 

“We put up a dozen chain-link cages in the city, placing them outside caucus sites, media offices, and other prominent places in the city, like city hall,” RAICES said in a statement received by Daily Kos. “These cages have fake children inside covered with mylar blankets, symbolizing the children jailed in detention along the border and throughout the country. Each cage includes a #DontLookAway sign and plays an actual recording from a child who was kept in detention.”

RAICES, which in 2018 donated millions to assist in the reunification of families separated by the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy, seeks to keep a focus on anti-immigrant policies that, in just a few examples, have jailed record numbers of people in inhumane Immigration and Customs Enforcement facilities (and in direct defiance of congressional limits), contributed to the in-custody deaths of a number of children and other vulnerable populations, and blocked the U.S. and international rights of asylum-seekers.

“We’re doing this as the administration has broken records in immigration detention by keeping up to 55,000 people jailed at once, and has sent back more than 60,000 people to Mexico to await their asylum hearings in conditions that are utterly depraved, as we have been documenting for months,” RAICES continued in the statement. “We’re doing this as the Trump administration has quadrupled workplace raids that target people holding a job and paying taxes in this country.”

x

x

x

This isn’t the first time RAICES has used installations to call attention to the rights of immigrants and refugees. At the 2019 South by Southwest Convention, the group recreated the notorious “ice boxes” where migrants are initially held by Border Patrol, and then later that year installed cages across New York City. “We’re replicating the action in Des Moines at the height of the most anticipated caucus in modern history,” RAICES said. “We’re doing this because almost no politicians in this country are laser-focused on immigration. While some do far better than others, the horror at our border still goes ignored far too often, absent from the policy debates and statements from elected officials.”

But our nation’s immigration system doesn’t have to be this way. The group points to its Migrant Justice Platform, which pushes for major changes to our current and unjust system, including “a full moratorium on deportations, an end to immigrant detention, citizenship for all 11 million undocumented people in the country, demilitarization of the border, the dismantling of ICE and CBP, and the formation of truth and reconciliation committees examining the human rights abuses committed against immigrants by past administrations,” the group said.

“The horrors at our border and throughout our immigration system are too often ignored by the public and politicians,” chief advocacy officer Erika Andiola said in the statement. “We’re asking people in Iowa and across the country: Don’t look away from the terrors enacted in your name. Don’t look away from the kids in cages, the asylum-seekers turned back at our border, the deportation raids destroying communities across the country. This anti-immigrant crackdown has to end.”

Texas Rep. Veronica Escobar to give Spanish-language Democratic response to State of the Union

Posted on by Gabe Ortiz

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have announced that Rep. Veronica Escobar of Texas will deliver the Spanish-language Democratic response to Donald Trump’s State of the Union speech next month.

“In the House of Representatives, she is making a difference for El Pasoans and for all Americans, as she fights to end the gun violence epidemic and to protect children and families at the southwest border,” Pelosi said in a statement. “Her values and vision beautifully represent our party and our country, and we look forward to hearing her positive message of progress.”

As noted by Pelosi in the statement, Escobar made history as one of the first Latinas to be elected to represent Texas in Congress, alongside her colleague (and manager in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial) Rep. Sylvia Garcia. Like many of her freshman colleagues, Escobar has made a powerful mark in Congress during her first year in office. 

Following the white supremacist terror attack in El Paso last year, Escobar filled the presidential void to become a comforter-in-chief to her distraught community while condemning the kind of rhetoric that influenced the attack. When Trump asked her to join him during his visit to El Paso, she declined, saying, “I refuse to be an accessory.” Escobar has also been a compassionate advocate for immigrant families, and has helped lead investigations into some of the most harmful anti-immigrant policies from the Trump administration. 

This past November, Escobar was elected by her colleagues as the newest member of the House Democratic leadership team. “Congresswoman Escobar’s election to the Democratic House leadership is monumental for Latino representation in Congress,” Latino Victory Project said at the time. “Since day one, Escobar established herself as a steadfast, hard-working leader in the freshman class, whose penchant for consensus-building did not go unnoticed.”

“I am honored to be delivering the Democratic Spanish-language response to President Trump’s State of the Union and look forward to addressing our nation on the progress Democrats have made For the People,” said Escobar in the statement.  “Our diversity is our strength.  Now more than ever, Democrats will continue to celebrate our diversity, defend our democracy, and work for a more equal and just nation.”