Media Reports: Trump Considers Freezing Current Immigration Laws to Stop Caravan from Entering US

Mexican federal police in riot gear receive instructions at the border crossing between Guatemala and Mexico, in Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico, Friday, Oct. 19, 2018. Members of a 3,000-strong migrant caravan have massed in this Guatemalan border town across the muddy Suchiate River from Mexico, as U.S. President Donald Trump threatens retaliation if they continue toward the United States. (AP Photo/Moises Castillo)

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Breitbart news is reporting that the Trump administration is considering the use of extraordinary presidential powers to “freeze” current immigration laws to stop the caravan of over 7,000 Central Americans from entering the US illegally.

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The caravan, still approximately 1,000 miles from the US border, shows no signs of heeding Trump’s order to turn back. Trump and his advisors are said to be weighing the consequences of such an action “including interventions by progressive judges, media outrage, and hostility from the Mexican government.”

Trump considers this to be a matter of national security, as many of us do, and that the exercise of his extraordinary presidential powers at this time is both necessary and appropriate.

Breitbart’s Neil Munro said, “the multiple media reports were vague and closely timed as if a few officials — either pro-Trump or anti-Trump — leaked the reports of the pending executive action to either grab headlines or block the planned action.”

The San Francisco Chronicle reported:

The Trump administration is considering an executive action that could use travel ban-like authority to block certain asylum seekers at the Mexican border, sources familiar with the discussions said Thursday.

…First, Homeland Security and the Justice Department would issue a rule limiting immigrants’ ability to seek asylum if they are part of a population barred by the president. The rule would take effect immediately, unlike most, and be justified as an extraordinary situation.

That would clear the way for Trump to issue a proclamation directed at a specific population, expected to target the 7,000-plus Central Americans heading toward the U.S.

The Washington Post reported:

Fixated on the migrant caravan moving north through Mexico, President Trump is weighing a plan to shut the U.S. border to Central Americans and deny them the opportunity to seek asylum, asserting similar emergency powers used during the early 2017 “travel ban,” according to administration officials and people familiar with the proposal.

…Under U.S. law, foreign nationals fleeing persecution have the right to apply for asylum once they reach American soil, but the executive order under consideration would suspend that provision and bar Central Americans as a matter of national security, according to those familiar with the proposal.

The New York Times reported:

President Trump is considering taking executive action to bar migrants, including asylum seekers, from entering the country at the southern border, according to people familiar with the plan.

…The plan appeared meant as much to generate headlines to appeal to his anti-immigrant base and fuel outrage among Democrats and immigrant advocates — including legal challenges that administration officials are fully anticipating — as it was to have a practical effect on immigration.

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Such an extraordinary action would no doubt cause a great uproar from the left, however the consequences of allowing 7,000 Central American immigrants into the US is a real and direct threat to the safety of American citizens, especially those living near the border. We need only to recall the Mariel boat lift of the 1980s to realize how dangerous it would be to allow this group into the country.

Obviously, the majority of those who have joined the caravan are exactly what they say they are, people seeking a better life. But the small percentage of them who are gang members, terrorists, members of drug cartels and human trafficking rings, make this a direct threat to US national security.

If this caravan is allowed into the US, it will set a frightening precedent for the caravans that will instantly follow. Before too long, we will be facing the same problems that many European countries are currently struggling with.

What is the alternative? Troops can’t just start firing indiscriminately into a crowd of 7,000 immigrants, most of whom are simply trying to escape the corruption of their current governments and are searching for economic opportunity.

If ever there was a time for President Trump to exercise extraordinary presidential powers, it is now.

 

 

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