Huffington Post (Op-Ed)
By Randy Borntrager
July 2, 2015
Donald
Trump's horrific anti-immigrant remarks during his presidential launch
included the claim that Mexican immigrants are "bringing drugs, they're
bringing crime, they're
rapists." Since then, the response -- from immigration groups to major
corporations to anyone with any sense of decency -- has been strong
criticism of Trump's racist remarks. Univision Network was one of the
first to fire Trump, cutting off all business ties
with him. NBC followed suit, and Macy's did too.
One
Republican candidate, George Pataki, strongly denounced Trump and
challenged his fellow Republican candidates to join him. The rest of the
Republican field doesn't
seem to have gotten the message that Donald Trump's words must be
condemned. For the most part, GOP 2016 presidential contenders have
stayed silent, refusing to take any active stance against Trump's
bigoted comments. Only when asked 11 days after Trump's
speech did Jeb Bush say that he doesn't agree with Trump. Rand Paul
literally walked away from the question yesterday. Ted Cruz actually
said he thinks Trump is "terrific."
Anyone
who aspires to our nation's highest office should have spoken up
strongly against his remarks immediately, without hesitation. It
shouldn't be a surprise, though,
that the major Republican presidential candidates did not. They didn't
want to ruffle the feathers of their party's anti-immigrant base by
speaking out against any anti-immigrant rhetoric, even rhetoric as
incendiary as Trump's.
Sadly,
Trump is gaining ground in the polls: He's in second place in the
latest New Hampshire and Iowa polls. It's rhetoric from people like
Trump that revs up that anti-immigrant
Republican base, but it's the anti-immigrant policies of the entire
Republican Party that fuel the fire. Lacking policies that are
fundamentally different from Trump's, Republican candidates fell to
their usual silence, allowing Trump to spout his anti-immigrant
rhetoric with no check from the rest of the GOP.
A
look at the immigration policies of the Republican presidential
candidates and of the Republican Party shows that while rhetoric may
differ within the party, policy
differences are few and far between. The Republican Party is an
anti-immigrant party, and GOP candidates are falling in line to promote
anti-immigrant policies.
In
the 2016 campaign, some will be quick to note that candidates with ties
to the Latino community, namely Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush, are trying to
define themselves as
different from the rest. However, while Marco Rubio briefly supported
comprehensive immigration reform, he scurried back to the tea party and
now believes that his work for comprehensive immigration reform was a
mistake altogether. Jeb Bush says he's willing
to stand up to his party, but relegating undocumented immigrants to a
second-class "legal status" and calling citizenship an "undeserving
reward" for undocumented people is sadly in line with what Donald Trump
and most of the rest of the Republican Party is
saying.
All
of the major Republican candidates oppose comprehensive immigration
reform with a path to citizenship. All oppose President Obama's
executive actions on immigration
that protect DREAMers and families from deportation. So it's no wonder
that in the days after Trump accused immigrants from Mexico of being
rapists, none proactively spoke out against Trump's fostering of
anti-immigrant fears. The GOP 2016 candidates are in
lock step on their anti-immigrant policies as they court their
virulently anti-immigrant base.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
No comments:
Post a Comment