CNN reports . . . and what Trump actually said about the migrant caravan
It certainly would be nice if we could trust the media to report comprehensively, objectively, and intelligently on such matters, wouldn’t it?
Late Thursday afternoon Trump gave a speech and then answered questions from the press about policy regarding the caravan of illegal immigrants headed towards the U.S. I listened to it at the time, and here’s the text of his remarks.
After hearing the speech, I wasn’t surprised by the spin given by this CNN headline about it: “Trump says he will restrict asylum, claims troops will shoot at rock throwers.”
Oh did he, now?
Well, I didn’t hear him do either of those things, at least not in that way. And I believe the transcript bears that out.
On the first point, I heard him say that he would apply the asylum laws in a timely and more efficient manner, by detaining caravan arrivals rather than releasing them into the general population to very often disappear by the time their hearings are held. I heard him say that, at present, most people who do show up for their hearings are denied asylum, and that he believes the bulk of the new arrivals in the caravan will also be denied asylum. He said people in the caravan claiming asylum will still get hearings, but that the hearings will occur sooner and that “catch and release” will no longer happen in the meantime.
On the second point, this is what Trump said about how the military would treat the caravan:
And we’ve already dispatched, for the border, the United States military. And they will do the job. They are setting up right now, and they’re preparing. We hope nothing happens. But if it does, we are totally prepared. Greatest military anywhere in the world, and it’s going to be, and is now, in great shape. No longer depleted like it was when I took over as the President of the United States.
Later, in the press conference portion of the appearance, this exchange occurred:
Q With the military, do you envision them firing upon any of these people?
THE PRESIDENT: I hope not.
Q Could you see the military (inaudible)?
THE PRESIDENT: I hope not. It’s the military — I hope — I hope there won’t be that. But I will tell you this: Anybody throwing stones, rocks — like they did to Mexico and the Mexican military, Mexican police, where they badly hurt police and soldiers of Mexico — we will consider that a firearm. Because there’s not much difference, where you get hit in the face with a rock — which, as you know, it was very violent a few days ago — very, very violent — that break-in. It was a break-in of a country. They broke into Mexico.
That was the sum total of discussion of the issue. Compare that answer to the CNN article’s attention-grabbing headline “claims troops will shoot at rock throwers.” There’s a difference.
Later on in the CNN article you can see this:
A White House aide had said earlier Thursday that Trump would unveil an executive action requiring migrants to request asylum at legal points of entry and preventing them from claiming asylum if they are caught crossing the border illegally. Although the President referenced such a policy in his speech, he offered no defense of how such a plan, once finalized, could be legal, given laws presently allowing migrants the right to claim asylum once they are on American soil.
Well, perhaps the reporters might have actually looked it up. This (from July of 2017) might be the sort of thing that such an idea could be based on:
The European Court of Justice (ECJ), supreme court for the European Union (EU), has ruled that would-be migrants must seek asylum in the first country they reach.
CNN, one of the many media outlets reporting on the ruling, says this: “The European Union’s top court has ruled that refugees must continue to seek asylum in the first European country they reach, even in exceptional circumstances like the migrant crisis of 2015.” What they should have said is “especially in exceptional circumstances like the migrant crisis of 2015”, because it is during crises that having bright-line guidelines to follow become most important…
Mexico has an affirmative obligation to accept and make a judgment about the Hondurans’ claims to asylum because it, too, is a signatory to the U.N. Convention. Just as surely, the aliens themselves had an affirmative obligation to seek safe haven there. Consider that San Diego ports of entry are on the extreme west coast of the continent, whereas Honduras sits considerably east and south. A quick look at a map shows that this family spent considerable time traversing nearly the whole of Mexico and had plenty of time and opportunity to seek out Mexican officials to seek asylum. That they didn’t do so is notable.
How distressing that the Europeans, who have made such a muddle over their own illegal mass migration responses, have gotten this issue right while the leaders in our homeland security organizations still don’t seem to get it.
The problem is that here in the United States this international principle of demanding that migrants claim asylum or refuge at the first safe country they reach is mostly honored in the breach. Everyone pays lip service to it, but no one, least of all our pusillanimous political or government leaders, really expects America to demand that the international convention be scrupulously adhered to, either by those who are allegedly seeking shelter from harm, or by the countries those migrants use as doormats en route to America as the nation of economic choice.
So that might be the legal basis for saying that future asylum-seekers must “request asylum at legal points of entry” and be prevented “from claiming asylum if they are caught crossing the border illegally.”
But in his speech Trump also discussed hearings on asylum for the detained people who try to come here as part of the caravan, so it seems that Trump was not saying that people in this particular caravan wouldn’t be able to claim asylum once here. I’ve cued up the relevant passage from his remarks, and I encourage you to watch the whole speech for yourself as well:
In addition, Trump clarified the general process of seeking asylum:
Asylum is not a program for those living in poverty. There are billions of people in the world living at the poverty level. The United States cannot possibly absorb them all. Asylum is a very special protection intended only for those fleeing government persecution based on race, religion, and other protected status.
It certainly would be nice if we could trust the media to report comprehensively, objectively, and intelligently on such matters, wouldn’t it?
[Neo is a writer with degrees in law and family therapy, who blogs at the new neo.]
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Comments
The enemedia have chosen sides.
They must be regulated as entertainment outlets, or be put out of business.
It is time to shut them down.
“enemedia”? Is this a blend of enemy and media or enema and media?
Works either way.
Exactly.
Yes.
Where does “regulated as entertainment outlets” mean? Where did you get the idea that “entertainment outlets” are less heavily protected by the first amendment than anyone else? The first amendment protects everyone equally, and if you have a problem with that then you are the enemy of the people, the enemy of the freedoms that are the only thing making this country worth defending. If the US ever dumps them it will deserve to be overthrown.
No you fatuous dimwit.
Journalist shield laws protect journalists from having to reveal sources, and insulate them from consequences of their own actions. This has to end, especially since those actions are now in violation of campaign laws.
For your ignorance:
https://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/Journalist+Shield+Laws
Additionally, libel and slander laws have been so diluted as to be rendered meaningless
As for entertainment companies: no, they are not regulated the same as news-gathering organizations and outlets.
You remain extraordinarily ignorant, and a large part of the problem.
The media is almost universally the spokespeople for the leftist National Socialist Democratic Party. They almost always hit the talking points and political spin of the leftist party, and frequently use nearly identical language.
The level of trust in the media is low for a reason. They are not reporting news, especially anything regarding Trump or Republicans, but even shut down stories which refute the leftist stances and causes in dramatic ways.
They treat the media as a propaganda machine rather than a means to inform the people of the truth. When people hear things directly, then hear their opinions spewed as if it is new, the two do not mesh right. It’s like seeing a photograph and a poor drawing done by crayons, and they claim their versions are not fake.
You referred to the Dems as the “National Socialist Democratic Party.” It seems you are trying to relate them to the Nazis. But the Dems aren’t “national socialists,” they’re “international socialists.” And that makes it very difficult to distinguish them from “communists” of the Soviet stripe. Hitler established the Nazi party as German socialism for the German people, rejecting “international socialism” (i.e. Soviet-dominated “socialism,” aka “communism”). People often misunderstand the relationship between the Nazis and the Communists, believing that they were diametrically opposed. Not so. They were rivals because they were so similar.
The fight between the Nazis and the Soviets was like a fight between brothers who liked the same girl
The CNN article states “Although the President referenced such a policy in his speech, he offered no defense of how such a plan, once finalized, could be legal, given laws presently allowing migrants the right to claim asylum once they are on American soil.”
Obama ended the “wet foot, dry foot” policy for Cubans in January 2017.
“Effective immediately, Cuban nationals who attempt to enter the United States illegally and do not qualify for humanitarian relief will be subject to removal, consistent with U.S. law and enforcement priorities, Obama said.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/314057-us-will-end-wet-foot-dry-foot-policy-for-cuban-citizens
Didn’t Obama say that President Trump couldn’t use his pen to change immigration policies/laws? He sure seemed to make a bunch of decisions without Congress’ OK
Cubans remained — and still remain — entitled to claim asylum, just like anyone else. The “dry foot” rule was that they didn’t have to claim asylum, they got it automatically.
Let’s see… which group is hoping for a bunch of women and children to get hurt or killed by our military? Conservatives or liberals?
What are a few lives if the optics are good.
There’s going to be a lot of CS gas, rubber bullets, and sonic weapons employed long before lead goes flying.
What the left needs to do to get their “made for tv moment” is to ensure some fire crackers go off sounding like gunfire so the troops down there will fire. They’ll have their Kent State moment, it will be televised, and it’ll be ok for dead bodies to be in the streets because it would be a sacrifice to a higher cause.
I seriously doubt the troops will have live rounds on their person or in the weapon. That is the way to absolutely ensure that no such incident occurs.
It is simply incredible how stupid liberal/progressives are. We see them skipping along to taking over the House and possibly the Senate. But, then they behave like total Bolsheviks during the Kavanaugh hearings. This stimulates the Trump base, which is not too thrilled with Congressional Republicans, to be energized and head for the polls to vote Republican. Not happy with that fiasco, they double down by increasing the attacks ob Republican politicians and staffers. Because of their efforts to use violence to terrorize non-Democrat voters, we have a loon mailing pipe non-bombs all over the country, which target liberals. This probably suppressed the Democrat vote somewhat, particularly the senior vote. Then the liberal/progressive media goes whole hog airing not stop views of a refugee caravan which looks more like an invasion force than a bunch of starving refugees fleeing “violence”. And, they miss the boat, because the caravan, if it continues at the present pace, will not arrive at the border before the midterms. This means that if the horde uses violence to attempt to force entry into the US and US authorities use violence in self defense, they won’t get any footage of dead children, or other people, to use to sway public opinion against Trump and the GOP BEFORE the election. And, in the meantime, it appears that this horde is coming to invade the US of A.
Timing is everything in life. And the liberal/progressives, including the Democrats do not have it.
What seems to be missing from the caravan mission is that once they got to Mexico they were no longer worried about terror or hunger. How is it that refugees fleeing such horror will not stop at the first place that accepts them? This is all about the gravy train in the US. They know if they stay in Mexico they will have to work and struggle to make a good life for themselves and their families. In the US, the bleeding hearts will offer them a good life without them lifting a finger.
How is that not a declaration that soldiers will be instructed to shoot rock-throwers? If you regard a thrown rock as a deadly weapon — which it is — then of necessity you respond to it as you do to any other deadly weapon. What are these soldiers’ orders if they’re shot at with actual firearms? Do they return fire, or do they dodge and hide? If you instruct them that rocks are to be treated as if they were firearms, doesn’t it follow that they are to respond to rock-throwing as they would to live fire?
I think in this instance CNN got it right, Trump did say that rock-throwers would be shot, and he’s 100% correct.
Trump has already said (in a later exchange with the media, being the extremely open to the media president he is) that he hopes they wouldn’t be shot, that he never said the military would shoot them and that they ought to be arrested if they throw rocks at troops, that being a serious offense.
As a practical matter it’s not up to Trump. But, I don’t like playing this game because if Telemundo reports people might be shot, maybe people will throw fewer rocks, and maybe that’s the point of saying something where people get the message someone might be shot for it. Let’s hope the border doesn’t become Israel vs. Gaza like that.
Are people who fire guns at US soldiers arrested?
The President actually sounded very measured and reasonable in the version quoted here.
But I would really like to hear that warrants have been issued to arrest the organizers of the caravan for human trafficking.
I don’t see how. The issue here is not a UN convention but US law. A US statute is what entitles people on US soil to claim asylum and have their claim heard fairly by a finder-of-fact. Nothing in that statute says it makes a difference where they were before they came here. The only way to change this would seem to be for Congress to change the statute. Nothing the EU court finds about an EU statute is relevant, unless the two have comparable text.
Once again the media proves that either they are deficient in understanding English or are out and out liars.
Pick one.
Embrace the healing power of ‘and’
Remember that wall that the MSM and Dems scoffed at because border crossing immigration wasn’t a problem? I haven’t seen anyone apologize for that crapshow of grandstanding. When you couple it with the recent reports of vastly underestimated illegals (many of whom are the harder kinds to track…in other words, NOT the overstayed visa variety), you realize that they should get a dozen pinocchios.
Maybe he should have said that rock throwers will be stoned.