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John Wagner
National journalist heads up the political press team at The Post newspaper
In an effort to strengthen support for his radical immigration policies, President Trump turned to an unlikely source: former President Barack Obama. In a tweet on Tuesday night, Trump joined a 2005 video clip of Obama, then Democratic senator from Illinois, stressing the need to beef up border security.
"I agree with President Obama 100%!" Wrote Trump.
At a press conference, the video shows Obama: "We simply can not allow people to go to the United States without being detected, undocumented, unchecked and bypassing people who wait patiently, diligently and legally to become immigrants to this country. "
Trump boosters grabbed the comments overnight, as cable channels continued to show images of a caravan of migrants heading toward the US-Mexico border – a procession that became a source of indignation for the president.
[Trump says there’s ‘no proof’ that Middle Easterners have joined migrant caravan, although there ‘could very well be’]
During an interview with "Fox & Friends" on Wednesday morning, White House advisor Kellyanne Conway called the Obama clip "delicious" and suggested a new litmus test of less than two weeks before the mid-term elections on November 6th.
"I think every candidate should be asked whether you agree or disagree with President Obama from 2005 onwards," she said.
It turns out that Obama had a lot more to say than what Trump shared, and it is doubtful that Trump would agree with 100%.
The 31-second clip is from a 27-minute press conference broadcast on C-SPAN in which Obama and Senator Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) Have expressed support for comprehensive legislation on the reform of the United States. That the Senate would adopt the following year.
Obama said his goal was "to bring the debate on immigration to the sensitive center" through a "comprehensive and pragmatic reform".
In fact, he ridiculed those who "enter the country illegally," claiming that they "show contempt for those who respect the law."
But Obama then rotated to make two more points.
"Having said that, securing borders does not solve immigration management alone," he said. "We will have to better manage legal immigration to put an end to illegal immigration. . . . At the present time, millions of illegal immigrants live and work here without knowing their identity or their antecedents. Partly for this reason, we need a guest worker program to replace the flow of illegal immigrants with a stream of regulated legal representatives who enter the United States after verification and with a labor law. "
Obama then turned to "a third principle," which he said "is the most important."
"If we hope to take out the 11 million undocumented workers out there, we have to give them a reason," Obama said. "I'm friendly and I understand people's frustrations with those who came here illegally, but we have to understand that they're here now, they're paying taxes, they're raising families, a lot of theirs. Children are American citizens who are born here and go to school here, and if we want to master this population, then we have to give them an incentive to make themselves known. "
"This means we will have to give them some kind of provisional legal status to eventually get citizenship," Obama said.
In a speech to the Senate in 2006, Obama looked even less like Trump, saying that "if security can begin at our borders, it does not stop there."
He went on to say: "In fact, I will not support any bill that does not provide this path to citizenship for the undocumented population, not just for humanitarian reasons; not only because these people, who broke the law, did so for the best of reasons, in order to provide a better life for their children and grandchildren; but also because it is the only practical way to control the population that is currently in our borders. "
Wednesday morning, Trump had returned to Twitter and the subject of immigration.
In a tweet, he highlighted the challenges of immigration in Europe.
"For those who want and plead in favor of illegal immigration, just look closely at what has happened to Europe in the last five years," the president wrote. "A total mess! They only wish to have this decision to redo.
In another tweet, Trump wrote, "We are a great sovereign nation. We have strong borders and will never accept that people enter our country illegally! "
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