text: Republicans are pro-legal immigration and anti-illegal immigration. Democrats intentionally make no distinction between these two things to try to paint Republicans as being anti-immigrant. But it’s simply not true. In 2018, Gallop reported that 158 million people around the world want to immigrate to the United States. Obviously, the U.S. can only absorb a small fraction of those each year and so we, like every other nation, have a process by which people from around the world can apply to legally come here. The United States grants over a million immigrants legal status every year, most of whom are people of color.
  Illegal immigration is what happens when that process is circumvented by people who decide they are not going to follow the rules that everyone else is following. They “jump the line,” getting ahead of 150 million people waiting patiently around the world because they can sneak across a border. This is not fair to the people all over the world who either don’t have access to such a border or who are trying to respect the laws of the country they desire to live in. It is also not fair to the citizens of the country they are sneaking into because it prevents them from vetting who is coming to live with them. And it depresses their wages and employment opportunities because the undocumented immigrants often don’t have to pay taxes and so work for less. They also get access to driver’s licenses, public education, free health care and many welfare programs paid for by the taxes on American citizens.
  One of the things President Trump campaigned on was cracking down on illegal immigration. It is unknown how many undocumented immigrants are already here, but most estimates put the number between 10 and 20 million. Tens of thousands were crossing illegally every month when Trump campaigned on building a “wall” to help with the situation. There was already a wall or fence covering some of the border, so this was of course not a brand new idea. But similarly to what has happened with many other issues, as soon as Trump is for something, Democrats automatically become against it because they define themselves by being “anti-Trump”.
  Whenever people are asked for evidence that President Trump is a racist, the same few examples are usually given. One of the top examples is always that Trump wants to stop illegal immigration with a wall. Suddenly, top Democrats who long have been in favor of walls and border enforcements are against all of that and label Trump a ‘racist’ for wanting to restrict immigration to the legal variety. Nancy Pelosi has even called a wall ‘immoral.’ It is immoral for a nation to have an enforced border according to the Democratic Party.
  It’s worth reviewing what some of these Democrats have said about illegal immigration and border enforcement to demonstrate the hypocrisy. Barack Obama once said, “We simply cannot allow people to pour into the U.S., undetected, undocumented, unchecked and circumventing the line of people who are waiting patiently, diligently, lawfully to become immigrants in this country.” Bill Clinton, “All Americans, not only in the States most heavily affected but in every place in this country, are rightly disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country. The jobs they hold might otherwise be held by citizens or legal immigrants. The public service they use impose burdens on our taxpayers. That's why our administration has moved aggressively to secure our borders more by hiring a record number of new border guards, by deporting twice as many criminal aliens as ever before, by cracking down on illegal hiring, by barring welfare benefits to illegal aliens. In the budget I will present to you, we will try to do more to speed the deportation of illegal aliens who are arrested for crimes, to better identify illegal aliens in the workplace...” Hillary Clinton, “You can't continue to have open borders. And you've got to put more technology and personnel along the borders to make sure we know who know who is coming into our country and prevent people from entering illegally.” “Illegal immigration is wrong,” said Sen. Charles Schumer. Hillary Clinton, “I voted numerous times when I was a senator to spend money to build a barrier to try to prevent illegal immigrants from coming in and I do think that you have to control your borders.” Here’s Joe Biden, “I voted for a fence... I voted for 700 miles… punish American employers who hire illegals… I'm the guy... that setup a drug czar…People are driving across that border with tons of everything from meth to cocaine to heroin.”
  This could go on and on with quotes from most major Democrats who are on the record as voting for hundred of miles of fencing. In 2013, All 54 Senate Democrats voted to pass the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, And Immigration Modernization Act which included 700 miles of fencing and a doubling of border patrol guards. Though they’ve all said things similar to President Trump’s statements and have been in favor of things similar to what Trump advocates, they all seem to have amnesia about it to appease the new Democratic Party base which considers things like borders to be ‘racist’ and walls to be ‘immoral’.
  A funny gag that has been done several times is to read quotes about immigration said by prominent Democrats to college students who think they are Trump quotes and watch them criticize the speaker as being ‘racist’, ‘white supremacist’, ‘xenophobic’, etc. But having a border and a wall is no more racist than having a lock on the door of your house. It doesn’t mean you hate your neighbors or think they are bad people. It just means you want to vet who is coming into your house (because some people out there are bad), how many people can be in your house, etc. Every sane person does this. Harry Reid even argued against birthright citizenship: “If you break our laws by entering this country without permission and give birth to a child, we reward that child with U.S. citizenship… No sane country would do that, right?” Right.
  A little-known fact is that President Obama has deported many more people than Donald Trump. Far more actually. But Trump is the one being called anti-immigrant and ‘racist’. Here is a quote from Professor Lars Maischak of Fresno State: “To save American democracy, Trump must hang. The sooner and the higher, the better.” Maischak wants “a monument honoring the Trump assassin” and says “Justice = The execution of two Republicans for each deported immigrant.” How many Democrats does this nut case think should be ‘executed’ for the 2 million illegal immigrants that President Obama deported? By the way parents, be careful where you send your children to college. There are a surprising number of unhinged and even violent Professors out there. See WhatHappened.com for many examples.
  One aspect of illegal immigration that President Trump has been focused on addressing is the abuse of the ‘refugee’ status and the process to apply for ‘asylum’ after became very clear that our asylum process was being severely abused. Border crossers were outnumbering the available immigration judges by 10,000 to 1. Giving everyone an individual hearing was swamping the system, so they were just being given an initial interview and a court date to return. A USC study showed that 91% of asylum claims are bogus (don’t meet the requirements for asylum) but 90% pass the interview and were being released into the country usually never to be seen again. The extent of the system’s brokenness created a huge incentive for more people to come. Soon 100,000 a month were arriving in caravans that Democrat’s spent a lot of time claiming did not exist. Illegal crossers were further exploiting the “family unit” loophole which prevented them from being deported if they had children in tow. They brought their own children, other people’s children and in some cases arranged for the same children to cross multiple times with different adults. There were a lot of accompanied and unaccompanied minors put in danger by this whole process.
  Something had to be done. Trump was ultimately able to reduce the number of illegal crossings by over 90% via several measures. He ended the “catch and release” immigration magnet that allowed the illegal crossers to disappear without ever showing up to their court hearing. By threatening Mexico with tariffs, he got them to agree to guard their southern border with 6000 troops and implement 'first nation asylum', whereby asylum applicants to the US must remain in Mexico while being evaluated. By February of 2020, the apprehension of migrant families illegally crossing the border fell by 92% from the 2019 peak. Univision’s Jorge Ramos acknowledged that Trump accomplished his promise of building a wall and making Mexico pay for it. Trump's negotiations with Mexico had gotten Mexico to become the wall for him at their expense and manpower. “Mexico is now the wall. President Trump got his wish,” said Ramos.
  The Kids in Cages Lie:
  Did Donald Trump put “kids in cages”? This is another lie that Democrats invented. While illegal immigrants who were single adults could fairly easily be deported, U.S. laws prevented “family units” from being instantly deported. However, a 9th Circuit ruling prevented children from being placed in the detention facilities where their parents were being held. Basically the 9th Circuit required the government to separate children from their parents as long as their parents were being held. Therefore, contradictory laws said that when a family unit arrived illegally, they could not be deported and at the same time, they could not be kept together. They were in fact kept together as much as possible and were not put in “cages”. The facilities were as nice as could be expected for a system being overwhelmed through no fault of its own, and the people working there (many who were Hispanic themselves) were caring and accommodating.
  Furthermore, this broken system was not created by President Trump. The whole thing worked the same way under President Obama, but it was only Trump who was accused of putting “kids in cages” by almost all Democrats. Michelle Obama was still making the bogus claim at the Democratic Convention in August of 2020. But ironically, all or almost all of the ‘evidence’ Democrats used to ‘prove’ that Trump put kids in cages were Obama administration era photographs. This happened again. And again. And again. Photos kept going viral of Trump’s “kids in cages” which continued to be pictures taken during the Obama administration. It was almost comical, but they were duping a nation. One was even from Iraq and one was from staged protest. These photos were shared widely on social media by celebrities with millions of followers and used by Democratic politicians to create Fake News.
  Here are a few examples:
  The circles are to show that the viral “kids in cages” photo came from a 2014 picture.
  Look at this heartbreaking picture that Jennifer Lopez shared with her 45 MILLION followers (who many in turn shared with their followers and on and on). This poor girl is being separated from her mother by TRUMP and put in a CAGE! Actually, it is a 2014 picture taken in Iraq! J-Lo’s heart was in the right place. She just didn’t realize she was being played.
  This picture became a very famous “separation” photo which was then used on the cover of Time. Again, supposedly this crying child is being separated from her family and put in a cage we are to imagine. But her father, Denis Valera, confirmed that she was never separated from her mother.
  This famous “kid in cage” picture was a staged photograph that was setup outside the Dallas City Hall. But that didn’t stop it from going viral helping to cement the idea in people’s minds that Trump was putting kids in cages.
  There are many more examples so just one more. Here is Moby ‘informing’ us that in “Trump’s America” there is “an ICE prison bus FOR BABIES.” He says “We need to take our country back from the Republican mons…” That last word probably means “monsters” since the GOP is turning America into “a land of belligerence and cruelty and unspeakable heartlessness.” OMG! Better vote for Democrats or there will be more “ICE prison busses FOR BABIES!” Except… Yes. Yet again, this is a picture taken (in 2016) during the Obama administration. And incidentally, it had nothing to do with an ICE prison bus for babies. So much of what Democrats think they know is false because they stay in their Fake News bubble and refuse to look at, debate or even talk to the other side. If the other side disagrees with them, it can only be because they are bad people. Monsters.
  And if the “kids in cages” concept were not bad enough, there will always be people who will take a bad idea farther. Enter, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who started calling our temporary immigration detention centers, ‘concentration camps.’ In doing so, she explicitly referenced the Holocaust saying 'Never Again'. 'A presidency that creates concentration camps is fascist.' AOC was widely criticized, especially by Jewish groups who saw this as a form of Holocaust minimalization, if not outright Holocaust denial.
  People who believe her “concentration camp” description started doing extreme things. In the August, 2019 “Dayton Mass Shooting ,” a man open-fired killing 9 people. He was a self-described 'leftist' who hated Trump but said he would “happily vote for” Elizabeth Warren. In addition to supporting Antifa and saying things like “I want socialism” and “Vote blue for gods sake”, he called migrant detention centers “concentration camps.” In July of 2015, Willem Van Spronsen, wrote “I am Antifa” before attacking an ICE facility in Tacoma, WA. with a rifle and incendiary devices. He had set some fires and was trying to ignite a propane tank when he was killed by police. If he had blown that tank, many could have died. Before his attack, he wrote a manifesto to justify his attack on, referencing AOC’s language, “concentration camps” and note Antifa members think they are fighting 'facists'. In August of 2019, gun shots were fired indiscriminately into the windows of San Antonio ICE and GEO buildings.
  So, we started with a bad idea (kids in cages), that was turned into a worse idea by AOC (concentration camps). Enter Rosie O'Donnell, who took AOC’s ridiculous concentration camp claim and multiplied it by a million. “Yeah, the concentration camps,” said Rosie. “There are over 100,000 camps.” The United States is running over 100,000 concentration camps she says. That statement is so deranged, so unhinged, so detached from reality that no comment about it should be necessary. But she got very little, if any push back from Democrats on this. One then has to wonder how many Democrats are out there who find these kinds of claims plausible.
  President Obama's own ICE director Thomas Homan tried to inject a little bit of reality into the rhetoric, “I've been to that facility, where they talk about cages. That facility was built under President Obama.” “The kids are being housed in the same facility built under the Obama administration.” Oh? Where were all the loons back then ranting about “kids in cages” and “concentration camps?” Most likely, the rhetoric was entirely political opportunism designed to harm the Trump administration. But as usual, there was collateral damage done by the lie inspired violence.
  Illegal Immigration Brings Crime
  By definition, illegal immigrants cannot be vetted the way legal immigrants can be. Some of the most violent gangs terrorizing the U.S. like MS-13 are largely comprised of illegal immigrants. 32% of federal prisoners are aliens, and of those over 90% of those are in the country illegally. A John Lott paper called 'Undocumented Immigrants, U.S. Citizens, and Convicted Criminals in Arizona' showed that undocumented immigrants are at least 142% more likely to be convicted of crime than other Arizonans – 163% more likely to commit first degree murder than are U.S. citizens. According to DHS, ‘DHS prevented 3,755 known or suspected terrorists from traveling to or entering the U.S. in FY 17. That's in addition to 17,526 criminals, 1,019 gang members' in 2017 alone. (Note, DHS is another agency Democrats currently want to “defund” because ACAB.) These are legitimate problems created by the lack of vetting ability that illegal immigration brings. None of this comes close to claiming that ‘immigrants’ in general are criminals or are more likely to be criminals than non-immigrants. The claim is simply that people who illegally immigrate to the U.S. are more likely to be criminals than people who legally immigrate. This should be uncontroversial and unsurprising.
  It also turns out that illegal immigration brings danger and crime for the people making the journey, especially women and girls. As reported by Eleanor Goldberg in Huffpost, “According to a stunning Fusion investigation, 80 percent of women and girls crossing into the U.S. by way of Mexico are raped during their journey. That’s up from a previous estimate of 60 percent, according to an Amnesty International report.” Stopping or minimizing the flow of illegal immigration will therefore prevent many tens of thousands of rapes.
  This article is a good place to highlight how fake the Fake News can be by using Illegal Immigration as an example. No misrepresentation is too low when trying to falsely smear Trump as a racist or xenophobe. Watch how they all in lockstep (except Fox and other conservative sites) completely and intentionally misrepresent a situation. In May of 2018, Fresno County Sheriff Margaret Mims was talking to President Trump specifically about MS-13 gang members. MS-13 is a very violent and murderous gang that kills in especially brutal ways. They terrorize mostly minority neighborhoods and Trump’s crackdown on the gang has helped those neighborhoods tremendously.
  Sheriff Mims said to President Trump , “There could be an MS-13 gang member I know about, if they don’t reach a certain threshold, I cannot tell ICE about them.” Trump responded, “You wouldn’t believe how bad these people are. These aren’t people, these are animals, and we’re taking them out of the country at a level and at a rate that’s never happened before.” He was clearly and obviously talking about MS-13 gang members. It is simply not possible to honestly claim that he was talking about immigrants in general.
  So how did the Fake News media represent the exchange? They almost all claimed he was talking about “Undocumented Immigrants” or even just “Immigrants” in general. Only Fox News provided the accurate context. Look at breathtaking level of dishonesty in these headlines and descriptions. In addition to the blatant lies they are telling below, not one of them even mentions MS-13.
  These ‘News’ organizations should be ashamed of themselves and shame on those Americans who are not able to see through the blatant and easily debunked lies that are thrown at them every day. The fake news is having the desired effect by generating massive outrage across the nation. Millions of people think they know that Trump called immigrants animals and other falsehoods. Trump famously has said that “Fake News is the enemy of the people.” And it is. The Fake News ironically even misrepresented that (fake news about fake news) by claiming he said that the media in general is the enemy of the people. Honest media is not but fake news is. Wake up and #WalkAway.
  John Black is the founder of the WhatHappened.com website.