Trump’s Immigration Policy speech, more accurately described by Rachel Maddow as a “nativist tirade” is being lauded by the far right fringe---including white supremacists and Ann Coulter. Reviews from the left and the center are describing it as “unbridled,” “hyperbolic histrionics” and “chilling.”
Josh Marshall of TPM writes:
Blood and Race and Trump
This was as wild and as unbridled a speech as I've seen from Trump. Even if you couldn't understand English, it would be stunning to watch the slashing hand gestures, the red face, the yelling. It's hard to imagine any presidential candidate in living memory giving such a speech. And again, this is if you didn't know what the words even meant.
As the speech was unfolding, I said something on Twitter that I'm sure many will find extreme or beyond the pale. But watching this speech, compared to the press conference today in Mexico City, what kept coming to my mind was the contrast between Hitler's uniformed rally speeches from the hustings and the suited, statesman Hitler we see in the old news reels in Munich and at other iconic moments in the late 1930s. Hitler is sui generis, of course. His crimes are incomparable. But the demagogic style, the frenzied invocation familial blood sacrificed to barbaric outsiders - these are not unique to him. When we see this lurid, stab-in-the-back incitement, the wild hyperbole, the febrile railing against outsiders who will make us no longer a country - the similarities are real.
Notably, the duplicity of the Trump we saw Wednesday afternoon on the stage in Mexico in contrast with the face of Trump presented this Wednesday evening delivering a speech in Arizona was striking.
Marshall describes this as “the most chilling part.”
More than anything, perhaps the most chilling part of this day is the contrast between the two men - a measured, calm statesman figure we saw this afternoon and this railing, angry demagogue figure who captured the emotional tenor of Klan rally.
Charles Blow describes this contrast as “The Duplicity of Donald Trump.” He writes:
He is not only a bully, it seems to me, but also something of a coward, who lacks the force of his convictions — or who lacks basic convictions at all. He seems to be simply playing to the audience, whatever that audience may be. He’s amenable to the mood of any particular room.
This is the most frightening type of man, whose basic character is vile but not inviolable, who springs from darkness and bends toward anything that casts light, even if that light is, as the internet loves to say, a dumpster fire.
Case in point: Trump has spent the whole of his campaign maligning Mexican immigrants, people of “Mexican heritage” and the country of Mexico itself.
The Hillary Clinton campaign was quick to remind voters of the horrid things Trump has tweeted about Mexico and Mexicans, and the list was a doozy.
Trump continued to demonize immigrants in the most offensive way and called for extremist measures including mass deportations, building a wall which he continues to insist Mexico will pay for, no amnesty or path for citizenship, idealogical tests, an expansion of deportation centers and ICE enforcement:
Trump Recommits to Mass Deportation in Fiery Immigration Speech
He said he would create a "new special deportation task force" to focus on tracking criminals. But he also promised a major expansion of enforcement in general, including a recommitment to an earlier proposal to triple the number of ICE agents devoted to enforcing immigration laws within the country. He proposed requiring all businesses to use an e-verify system to screen illegal workers and a return to work-site raids.
Trump also pledged to deport any undocumented immigrant taken in by law enforcement without regard to the severity of their crime or whether they were convicted. To add teeth to this measure, he threatened to cut off federal funding to any "sanctuary city" that ordered local authorities not to work with federal immigration officials.
"We will issue detainers for illegal immigrants who are arrested for any crime whatsoever and they will be placed in immediate removal proceedings — if we even have to do that," Trump said.
To the extent there was a pivot, it appeared to be from the hard right to the alt right.
There’s no question that Trump’s immigration speech will not win over any moderate, white voters, moreover it will drive his dismal ratings with Latino voters down. In fact, Several Hispanic Trump surrogates reconsider support in reaction to the speech.
Several major Latino surrogates for Donald Trump are reconsidering their support for him following the Republican nominee’s hardline speech on immigration Wednesday night.
Jacob Monty, a member of Trump’s National Hispanic Advisory Council, has resigned, and Alfonso Aguilar, the president of the Latino Partnership for Conservative Principles, said in an interview that he is “inclined” to pull his support.
Aguilar was once a Trump critic who earlier this summer set aside his qualms about Trump’s rhetoric toward Hispanic people, and organized a letter of support signed by himself and other prominent Latino conservatives.
The Hillary for America Latino Vote Director Lorella Praeli summed it up by saying, “Donald Trump once again showed us that he will continue his decades long record of divisiveness and campaign of hate.”
FULL SPEECH WITH ANNOTATIONS
Thursday, Sep 1, 2016 · 5:38:12 AM +00:00
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igualdad
Mexico’s President Enrique Pena Nieto rebuked Donald Trump calling his policies a “huge threat.”
"His policy stances could represent a huge threat to Mexico, and I am not prepared to keep my arms crossed and do nothing," Pena Nieto said. "That risk, that threat, must be confronted. I told him that is not the way to build a mutually beneficial relationship for both nations."
Earlier Wednesday evening, President Enrique Pena Nieto contradicted Trump’s statement that no discussion of who would pay for the wall occurred. “I made it clear that Mexico will not pay for the wall.”