I am fully in favour of closing the Mexican border to all those who would enter the U.S. without going through the proper channels. The Biden administration’s approach to this issue was absurd.
Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, announced that on day 1 of the new administration, approximately 300 “illegals” with criminal pasts were taken into custody. The president has said that assuring the safety of American citizens will be his first priority on this issue. But what of the many decent people who entered the country illegally, have settled into the American way of life, perhaps got jobs or had a child, and are clearly no threat to those around them? While I fully support the Rule of Law as a basic Principle, one wonders if simple human compassion ought not to influence Trump in his seeming determination to expel every “illegal” in the country.
The 14th Constitutional Amendment attempts to define the standards of American citizenship. But it is ambiguous. While some “conservatives” have suggested that “illegals” who have had babies since entering the U.S. are in no way entitled to remain in the country, Nancy Pelosi recently asserted: “If you’re born in America, you’re an American. Period!”
It’s a complex issue to which there is no simple solution, but I would hope that Trump might allow his Humanity to temper his approach to those who have in fact broken the Law, but are clearly not awful human beings.