From Michael Bahareen at The Liberal Patriot:
Then, starting with Obama’s second term and as amped up during Biden’s one and only, they fumbled the ball. Own-goaled big time. And Donald Trump was there to pick up the pieces. Twice.
Listening to Democrats in the pre-Trump era talk about immigration might cause some whiplash in young people today. In 1996, as Bill Clinton sought re-election, he made clear that cracking down on illegal immigration was among his top priorities. He had raised the subject in his State of the Union address the previous year and worked with congressional Republicans to pass a bill addressing the problem.
The Democrats’ platform that year also reaffirmed their commitment to securing the southern border, even as they maintained a pro-legal-immigration ethos: “Democrats remember that we are a nation of immigrants. [...] We welcome legal immigrants to America.” However, “Today's Democratic Party also believes we must remain a nation of laws. We cannot tolerate illegal immigration and we must stop it.”
A little over a decade later, as Barack Obama ran for his first term, he continued to straddle this line. During the 2008 presidential primary, he criticized George W. Bush for failing to control the tide of illegal immigration and noted that Americans’ concerns about this problem were understandable because “they’re continuing to see their own economic situation slip away.” He called for a “comprehensive” solution that included robust border security, punishments for employers that hired undocumented workers, steps to help these immigrants better assimilate (including learning English), and penalties for them including moving to the back of the line for legal citizenship.
Then, starting with Obama’s second term and as amped up during Biden’s one and only, they fumbled the ball. Own-goaled big time. And Donald Trump was there to pick up the pieces. Twice.
