How different will Trump really be in immigration if you believe what he says?

Which Trump are we taking about? The Trump of the 1980’s, the 90’s, the Trump of the primaries, or the continuously re-booted Trump of the general election? I wrote this guy off a long time ago as a nut case and a compulsive liar. Using his name in a sentence containing, ”...if you believe” will always elicit the same response: ”...but I don’t believe.”

This is because the man is an incorrigible liar—brazenly so—and nobody knows what he’ll do if by some slim chance he is elected because, unlike other candidates, he has no consistent track record in anything he has done or said. He is the classic loose canon on deck—completely unpredictable without impulse control—and that makes him more dangerous than anything he has ever said.

^^I agree that I have no idea what he will really do, but to some extent it’s a guessing game with a lot of them. Obama was against gay marriage (I never believed that) until he was for it. Mitt Romney was pro-choice politically, until he wasn’t. The list goes on.

I think Trump has been fairly consistent about building a wall, deporting people here illegally, and not letting people in the country from some parts of the world until we have what he calls better vetting. I don’t really see him waffling too much on those basic ideas.

I think regarding immigration a lot of people don’t realize that what they want is reform and amnesty, but some of the very things they don’t want Trump to do is already being done by other presidents under our laws. They see Trump as going to do it to more extremes, understandable, that is what he is saying, but it’s going on now too, and a lot of people have no idea.

@JLeslie In the last three weeks, the Trump reboot has backpeddled on banning Muslims from the US (He now says that was just a suggestion, not platform policy—classic Trump equivication after the fact), backpeddled on the mass deportation of illegals, backpedaled on the Syrian refugee policy. In the process, his numbers have not risen (nobody believes the new kinder, nicer Trump) and he has even pissed off those conservatives who still back him.

Evidently, I’m not the only person unable to fathom him. Check out this Google search page and you will see a plethora of news articles from the Wall Street Journal, CNN, Time, the Atlantic, National Review, Politico and the Conservative Tribune all saying that he has backpedaled on these immigration issues. After his inflammatory xenophobia of the primary season, you still think this guy is in any way consistent and believable?

Where you been, kid?

Nothing will change. Just like the Republicans hamstrung Obama, the Democrats will hamstring Trump.

This is all political theater. Nothing will change.

And your question assumes Trump will be president. Possibly, but most unlikely.

I agree with EC which Trump, he reinvents himself once or twice a week. Except I think he has a crush on Putin which doesn’t change.

I can’t imagine a greater waste of time than trying to figure out what Trump thinks or believes about anything. While this can be regarded as just what one should expect from a politician, Trump’s belated attempt to turn things around, only serves to emphasize the absurdity of his candidacy. The thing to consider is that Trump’s fans, just like the test of us, don’t believe the stupid pledges. Anyone who truly believes that Trump is going to build a wall financed by Mexico is absolutely beyond hope. His followers are enamored with him because he has the balls to say out loud the things they WISH were possible. And this latest nonsense about the “good Mexicans” that he loves like his own children, who among either his fans or enemies believes a word of it?

I think the fact that he says he will bring manufacturing jobs back to America, yet still has his clothing line made overseas tells us everything we need to know about him.

@elbanditoroso I keep reassuring my husband Trump won’t win.

@Espiritus_Corvus I know most of the media is saying he back pedaled in immigration. I didn’t say he is always consistent. I said a lot of what he says is what we do already, and is already law.

@stanleybmanly I agree the build a wall talk is about a wish that is a big attraction for some of his supporters.

Mind you, as I have said before, my Mexican SIL, who hates Trump, was ok with AZ making that law several years ago for local police enforcement to be able to basically do INS/ICE work. I’m completely against that. That to me worse than a wall. She had said the law was fine because the US has a right to protect their borders. It seems inconsistent to me.

I just find the absolute hate difficult.

@SquirrelEStuff I don’t believe Trump will effectively do anything to bring back a lot of manufacturing jobs. But, not because he manufactures abroad, but because I’m pretty sure Trump just won’t be an effective President in general. I don’t fault him for using the laws and policies of the system to run his business. Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, and little ol’ me for that matter, all think taxes should be raised to help pay off the national debt, and make the tax laws more fair across the board so the wealthy pay more. None of them are writing an extra check to the government now. They don’t have to wait until the tax laws change to pay more money.

As different as day and night.

I don’t see where building the wall is so impossible. Hell Hillary voted for building the fence before she changed to open borders. Trump is a construction guy and I’m certain he will take the wall as a challenge and prove he can do it.

We have an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants now and if 2 million are criminal illegals that’s close to 25% that everyone wants out (except maybe Obama). If we deport them and seal the border so that they can’t keep returning we’ve gone a long ways towards reducing the illegal population. Most estimates say the move south is greater than the move north right now so again if we seal the border, the numbers will continue to drop. We will have made a giant step towards solving the illegal immigration problem without breaking up any law abiding families. Seems like a good move to me.

I know what I am about to say will go over like a lead balloon…but what Trump is promising and waffling on is no different in scope or outlandishness than what Hillary has promoted and waffled on so far and both can’t hold a candle to the pie in the sky promises Obama made during both election campaigns and for the ones he can claim he delivered on…all have been complete train wrecks and financial disasters with little benefit to anyone other than the corporate cronies that got the contracts for these promises he made to us the taxpayers. This election is all about buyer beware as we are currently 20 trillion in debt and can ill afford to elect another pie in the sky president male or female…crazy or crooked and will re-define Hobson’s choice in the dictionary.

@Jakx I have my doubts those statistic are accurate. I doubt the percentage of illegal people committing crimes is that high. The number is too outrageous. Let’s say they are accurate. I wonder how many of the illegal criminals are coming through the southern border? I think quite a bit of the crime by immigrants are legal noncitizens here. Plus, we have our citizens who are criminals too. We have plenty of those. I bet over 95% of the mass shootings done in America are citizens. I’m just guessing.

I don’t see why a candidate wouldn’t just talk about crime instead and not sound like such a bigot.

Nobody, literally nobody, that I have seen on TV, has talked about putting the criminals in jail. They don’t always run across an open spot in the border. Sometimes they are coming through a legal entry point. My exboyfriend’s cousin was killed by her boyfriend. He had been married to a different cousin in the family, left her for this other cousin. Anyway, he was a legal resident, not a citizen, from Kuwait. He is still in one of our prisons. We were all glad they didn’t send him back to Kuwait. We felt he would either not be punished in his country, and/or find his way back to the US.

Let’s say the criminal is from south of our border. I wonder what’s more expensive? The wall, or jail here?

My biggest problem is Trump is not talking about any exceptions. Children who were raised here should not be deported! We, our government, ignored that the parents and children were illegal for 15 years (or whatever amount of time) and then we are going to send them out of the only home they know? That’s just crazy talk. Let’s make them legal and be able to follow their record better. The problem is we use the illegal immigrants for labor, and a lot of people on many levels like the set up.

This whole scare that a huge percentage of illegal immigrants are criminals just does not ring true to me. There are so many immigrants here who outstayed visas, or are on a tourist visa, but working, and they are not criminals. They are extremely hard workers usually, trying to stay in America for a better life. What does ring true is there is some gang activity among new immigrants, whether illegal or legal, and I have no tolerance for it. I am disgusted by it when it’s our citizens too. We need to address why the gangs form in the first place.

@JLeslie – It’s always hard to get accurate numbers, I think that’s by design. The Federal Bureau of prisons report the number of criminal aliens but that’s a total of illegal and legal which skews the numbers because 90% of those are illegals. According to Brietbart between 2008 and 2014, criminal aliens accounted for 38% of all murder convictions in the five states of California, Texas, Arizona, Florida and New York, while illegal aliens constitute only 5.6% of the total population in those states.

I agree that Visa overstays are as big a problem as the open southern border. A good E-Verify system would help with that as would a good visa tracking system. Both are part of Trump’s plan. The problem with just making everyone legal is that it doesn’t solve the problem but encourages even more. You have to stop the influx before you can determine the disposition of those still here. If your house is flooding due to a broken water pipe, you must stop the flow of water before you can determine how to best clean up the mess.

@Jaxk I agree it’s a problem to simply give amnesty, but again, I just can’t fathom shipping out someone who grew up here practically their whole life. That person is different than an adult who came here illegally.

I also am in favor (I think) of modifying our Jus Soli policy so it’s similar to a lot of European countries.

Nothing wrong with tightening the border, but in terms of crime, I think that is more a crime issue. I think people who live in bad conditions are more likely to be criminals.

Remember all those criminals shipped out and dumped in Australia? Now, their descendants made a very nice country.

@JLeslie – I would agree that we need to address the root cause of the criminal behavior and a major part of that is poverty. The average education level of illegal immigrants is a 10th grade education. With less than a high school education we are creating a large poverty stricken population where turning to crime is more likely. Legalizing sub groups opens the door for millions more (parents, siblings, spouses, grand parents, ect.). We’re struggling with educating our own children and the massive influx of low educated immigrants only strains the system further. Trump indicated in his last speech on immigration that he’ll focus on securing the border and criminal immigrants. Once that is done we can make an informed decision on what to do with those that are left. I absolutely agree with that. Deciding amnesty before the border is secured only encourages more problems.

It’s almost amusing that Hillary and Obama are heros because they will flaunt the law while Trump is a bigot because he says he’ll enforce the law. So much for the rule of law.

@Jaxk What do you mean by flaunt the law? You feel Hillary and Obama brag about out deportation laws and enforcing them?

Nothing will be changed. If the Republicans still rule the house they will make sure that nothing will change. It will cost an enormous amount of money to do what Trump wants and in another 2 years they won’t risk their elections. The people they serve who want all these immigrants out would sing a different tune if they knew it would require such a huge amount of money to hire a crazy amount of officers to make this happen, that it would require an equal amount of taxes to make it happen. Meaning their constituents will be bled for taxes. Infrastructure would fall into further ruin and the lack of clean water and falling bridges will make immigrants become an after thought.
Not to mention, Social security will finally be pitted by the republicans and medicare and Medicaid will be gone. We will fall into 3rd world status as the rich get richer.

In 1995 during his State of the Union Address, Bill Clinton spoke just as harshly against immigration as Trump and he got a standing ovation…today Trump speaks about the same issue and is called a racist…go figure.

@Cruiser Kind of makes one wonder why the Republicans hated Clinton so much. He was moderate to conservative on a lot of issues.

@JLeslie Clinton was nothing more than a threat to the status quo…much of what we are seeing with Trump. Incumbents hate change.

@Jaxk I wouldn’t trust anything that Breitbart says. It’s a Neo Natzi right wing conspiracy rag. Breitbart makes Fox News look like it’s a liberal news station and the National Enquirer like it’s a more legitimate news paper.

http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/08/politics/immigrants-crime/

@Pandora – I can understand your trepidation about Breitbart, I have the same feelings about CNN. The problem is not that they make up the data but rather they only use data that reinforces their predisposed conclusions. For instance, in your CNN link they say the number of illegal immigrants in prison is not available so they use the number of foreign born. That is not the same. We allow a million immigrants per year into the country and they are all foreign born and they are all legal. They aren’t measuring illegal immigrants they’re measuring legal immigrants. Quite a different measurement. Here is an article from the NY Times. They do the same thing except they use non citizens. That also is measuring lagal immigration rather than illegal and doesn’t translate to the same thing. Legal immigrants are screened to eliminate criminal behavior. they also insure that the immigrant has some form of support. Either they are sponsored by family or have an employer that will guarantee a job. Illegals not only don’t have that assurance but find it difficult to find decent employment and are more likely to be poverty stricken. Poverty is the biggest determiner for crime. Especially violent crime.

We may never agree on the immigration issue but simply ignoring news you don’t like or only depending on sources you do like will only support your predetermined conclusions and not get you to the real issue or problem.