AILA Quicktake #255: President Trump Addresses the Nation for Support on the Border Wall
Greg Chen, AILA's Director of Government Relations, discusses President Trump's remarks from his speech on January 8, 2019, and explains why we need to invest in the immigration courts rather than a border wall.
Video Transcript
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In his speech, the President delivered a his usual litany
of justifications for the border wall,
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many of them false or misleading, such as claims
that immigrants are dangerous criminals when
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data actually shows that immigrants are less likely
to commit crimes than the native born.
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Despite clear signs that leaders in his own party,
like Cory Gardner, Shelly Moore Capito,
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Lisa Murkowski, are calling for him to compromise,
he doubled down. And further inflated his
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demands not only for the wall but also for
more immigration judges, detention beds, and
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border agents. It is absurd that he’s asking
for more funding for judges, when he has escalated
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the immigration court backlog to a record
high of 800,000 cases. It is he who is
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making it harder for judges to handle their
cases efficiently and fairly.
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his shutdown all of the non-detained dockets is
forcing asylum seekers and others to wait
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what will be years for their cases to be decided.
It is jeopardizing the lives of asylum seekers
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and others seeking legal relief. His interference
with the courts is why we need
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an immigration court that is independent, not puppets controlled by the Department of Justice.
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So as predicted the President riled up his base but offered no workable solutions for addressing
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border security. Our country needs border security but that can be accomplished while also ensuring
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the orderly and fair processing of people coming
to our border. Perhaps most outrageous was
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the hypocritical concerns he expressed for
the women and children making the dangerous
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journey through Mexico to the United States
when his asylum ban and the Remain in Mexico
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plan will block asylum seekers outright or
keep them waiting in Mexico in unsafe conditions.
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He called Congress immoral but it is his policies
that are unlawful and unjust.
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They must be stopped
and AILA is fighting to do that.