This little segment of Trump speech on Saturday hasn’t gotten any press that I could find. So, read it here or nowheres.
Transcript from President’s speech on Saturday January 19, 2019
Provisional status will be granted to certain current TPS recipients for three years, providing 300,000 immigrants whose protected status is facing expiration more certainty as Congress works on a larger immigration deal.
I first read this article in the Washington Post a month ago, Haitian immigrants revived America’s turkey town. This Thanksgiving together might be their last. I thought about writing about it here, but just didn’t bother since I don’t have the knack to get much notice for my effort. And the readers here already hate Trump beyond the limits of toxic rage, so what would I be adding.
But, then he referred to this in that speech, a formal one that was on every channel, and by adding to all the good things he will do for getting his “beautiful wall with the golden door” if it is funded by the opposition, he mentioned TPS, an anagram meaning Temporary Protected Status that few knew, so it just passed the viewers and the media by.
Trump’s theory of immigration is quite simple, we want the best and brightest, those who will advance our society, as opposed to the most needy, or desperate, characterize by coming from “shithole” countries. He argues that such people are often violent, joining gangs (and he goes into explicit detail of the extent of the horrors that they perpetuate). Lets, for just the moment, accept that there is an element of truth to his broad generalization. Poverty and criminal offenses do have a positive correlation, something that has been known for a long time. It has something to do with the quality of legal defense associated with poverty, but that’s not the point of this essay.
Assuming that Trump’s broad policy is that impoverished immigrants are a net loss to our country, it would be reasonable to expect that when there are a class that are the exception, he just might acknowledge it, and then to show he is not a simplistic bigot, make a distinction by welcoming such a group into this country. Let’s learn a bit about these Haitians who Trump is threatening to deport, unless he gets his wall -— which would be a victory to propel him into a second term.
The arrival of workers such as Petit-Frere eight y,ears ago reshaped the company and the town around it, filling vacant homes, creating new businesses and injecting money into local grocery stores and retailers that had seen incomes stagnate.
If these workers are sent home, local officials fear it could unwind much of the revival the area has seen in the past eight years.
“If the Haitians and other immigrants suddenly went away, not just in Mount Olive but in eastern North Carolina, agriculture would suffer an amazingly hard blow,” said Charles Brown, the town manager who helped many of them acclimate there. “They’ve contributed to the economy. They’ve contributed to the labor market.”
This is the reality of immigration from our country’s beginning. It’s always been controversial, even in the days when the only services that government would provide for those who couldn’t make their own way was burial at “potter’s field.” Most of them, my own family for instance, sacrificed their very lives, working long hours in airless factories, for the goal of having their children make it in this wonderful land.
I’m not asking that Trump admire the “teeming masses yearning to breathe free” or even want to associate with them, but when he makes a public speech that, in effect, says he will deport the very group, in this case Haitians, who were allowed here after a devastating earthquake,, he clearly defines the depth of his bigotry. His is not a policy based on a hard reality that many who would like to live in this country may not do so. This is defined by decisions that reflect the values of elected officials who will, or will not, rewrite our immigration laws.
In this speech, he confirmed that no matter how essential those on TPS are to the survival of an industry or city;, out of nothing I can see other then pure vindictiveness, he will deport them, unless Democrats meet his political demands.
