Trump’s Big Immigration Speech Was Based On 2 False Premises

The president wants you to be very afraid. The facts say you shouldn’t be.

Eighteen days into a government shutdown that began when he announced he announced he wouldn’t sign a bipartisan government funding bill approved by the Senate that didn’t include money for his border wall, President Donald Trump delivered an Oval Office speech on Tuesday night in which he grounded his case for a wall in two false premises.

Drugs

The first false premise Trump pushed is that a border wall is needed to stop the flow of drugs into the country:

Our southern border is a pipeline for vast quantities of illegal drugs — including meth, heroin, cocaine, and fentanyl. Every week, 300 of our citizens are killed by heroin alone, 90 percent of which floods across from our southern border. More Americans will die from drugs this year than were killed in the entire Vietnam War.

Trump’s facts are correct, but the conclusion he draws doesn’t follow from them. The majority of drugs smuggled through the southern border come through official ports of entry — not the areas in between them.

According to a 2015 report by the Drug Enforcement Administration, most heroin smuggled into the country comes in via vehicles driven through “legal ports of entry, followed by tractor-trailers, where the heroin is co-mingled with legal goods. Body carriers represent a smaller percentage of the heroin movement and they typically smuggle amounts ranging from three to six pounds taped to their torso, or in shoes and backpacks.”

A border wall would do nothing to prevent drugs from being smuggled via vehicles or on persons who enter the US through ports of entry.

Crime

The second false premise Trump pushed is that Americans should be afraid that undocumented immigrants will murder their families:

But Trump’s suggestion that undocumented immigrants are more prone to commit acts of violence is false. A 2018 Cato Institute study that looked at crime in Texas found that “As a percentage of their respective populations, there were 56 percent fewer criminal convictions of illegal immigrants than of native-born Americans in Texas in 2015.”

“The criminal conviction rate for legal immigrants was about 85 percent below the native-born rate,” it adds.

In an overview of the relevant social science research published last year, the Washington Post concluded, “Undocumented immigrants are considerably less likely to commit crime than native-born citizens, with immigrants legally in the United States even less likely to do so.”

Trump’s speech was littered with falsehoods

Trump’s claims about drugs and immigrant crime weren’t the only false ones he pushed during his speech. At another point, he falsely claimed that there has been a “sharp rise in unlawful migration fueled by our very strong economy.” But as Vox’s Dara Lind detailed, overall, unauthorized migration to the US has in fact fallen steadily since the Great Recession.

Trump also falsely claimed that the US-Mexico-Canada trade deal which has still not been approved by Congress will “indirectly” pay for the wall. But there is no provision in the trade deal stipulating that Mexico will provide money to the US for a wall.

Though there was speculation heading into the speech that Trump would use the occasion to declare a legally controversial national emergency that could potentially allow him to build the wall without Congress appropriating money for it, he didn’t do so. Instead, he reiterated his demand that Democrats in Congress support legislation that would provide him with $5.7 billion for a wall that is estimated to cost $20 billion or more.

- Aaron Rupar

My take: "Trump said “At the request of Democrats, it will be a steel barrier rather than a concrete wall,”  the bizarre implication this would somehow be a carrot for Democrats." Bizarre implication? Well yes, but forget that, he lied hoping to leverage a quick rush of support from his speech only now to have to face the rising truth afterward that the Democrats did not request a steel wall instead of a concrete wall.
People this presidency has been an assault on the truth but sometimes you just have to laugh.

And with that I'am done with this foolish shutdown wall sidestep. You see it is, if nothing else, just another one of Trump's tactical distractions unfortunately we have to address it because people are being hurt for nothing really.

Okay, this is two days later. Let's add this:

• A new Washington Post/ABC News poll found a clear majority of Americans blame President Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers for the partial government shutdown.
• The poll also found that a minority of people polled support Trump's claims that there is a "crisis" at the southern border and its use to support a record-breaking shutdown.
• Multiple other polls taken during the government shutdown have found that most people place the blame on Trump.

The Poll Numbers:

53% of Americans blame Trump and Republican lawmakers for the shutdown.

29% blame Democratic lawmakers.