Former President Donald J. Trump falsely claimed in an interview that aired Sunday on Fox News that Latin American governments were selecting citizens they didn’t want and sending them to the U.S. border, reviving a claim which was central to his 2016 campaign.
He also accused the Chinese Communist Party – without providing evidence – of orchestrating illegal immigration to the United States and said he believed China would try to interfere in the presidential election, adding that he called President Xi Jinping ” I really appreciate it.”
Asked by interviewer Maria Bartiromo whether he believed that “military-age men” from China were “being ordered by the Communist Party to come here,” Mr. Trump said: “I think so.”
Referring to a recent incident in New York City in which a group of men identified by law enforcement officers as migrants from Latin America attacked police officers, Mr. Trump said, “The leaders of these countries are smart.” They don’t send the people in the country who do great work and who love them. They mostly send people they don’t want and put them in trailers.”
That statement was reminiscent of one of the most inflammatory sentences from his first campaign announcement speech in 2015: “When Mexico sends its people, they don’t send their best,” he said at the time, and continued: “They bring drugs.” They bring crime. They are rapists. And some of them, I suspect, are good people.” He has also repeatedly and falsely claimed that migrants from South and Central America come from “mental hospitals” and prisons.
Mr. Trump, as before, also expressed his approval of the military-style mass deportation of Mexican immigrants under President Dwight D. Eisenhower.
“He was very strong on deportations because a lot of people were coming into our country illegally, and he launched a major mass deportation,” Trump said. “He dropped them very close to the border and they came back. Then he dropped them 2,000 miles away and they never came back.”
Mass deportations are part of an extreme expansion of anti-immigration policies that Mr. Trump is planning if he is re-elected.
The interview was conducted the previous Thursday Saturday’s military strikes against several locations in Yemen controlled by Houthi fighters.
While much of the conversation focused on immigration and international affairs, there was also discussion of domestic politics.
Ms. Bartiromo asked Mr. Trump about Ronna McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, with whom he had a difficult relationship. He indicated that he would like to see her replaced. “I think she did well in the RNC initially,” he said. “I would say now that there will probably be some changes.”
He spoke as the party gathered in Las Vegas for its annual meeting, where much of the talk centered on Mr. Trump’s influence on the RNC and Ms. McDaniel’s future as its leader. Mr. Trump first recommended Ms. McDaniel for chair in 2016, and she served as a loyal leader throughout the 2020 election cycle and beyond. The two communicated directly and frequently, even when they had different opinions. Mr. Trump, for example, refused to attend one of the party’s main debates this cycle, and his team publicly pressured the party to cancel future debates.
In a separate interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday, Nikki Haley, Mr. Trump’s most recent Republican primary opponent, repeated an attack she has made several times over the past two weeks, accusing Mr. Trump of “politics to play with the USA”. Border.” Mr. Trump has loudly tried to block a bipartisan immigration and border security deal in Congress.
“He shouldn’t jump in and tell Republicans, wait until the election because we don’t want this to help Biden win,” Ms. Haley said, adding: “He’s absolutely playing politics by telling them to do nothing.” “
She walked back previous comments in which she said Texas had the right to secede, even though the Supreme Court ruled in 1869 that unilateral secession was unconstitutional.
Discussion of secession stemmed from a recent Supreme Court decision that allowed the Biden administration to remove a concertina wire barrier that Texas had erected along its southern border.
“Texas has been talking about secession for a long time,” Ms. Haley said. “The Constitution doesn’t allow that.” But she indicated she understood the impulse because “people don’t believe the government is listening to them.”
Ms. Haley also appeared on “Saturday Night Live” and appeared in a skit as a “South Carolina voter” at a CNN Trump town hall, asking why he refused to debate her.
Shane Goldmacher contributed reporting.
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2024-02-04 19:28:19
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