DOnald Trump made illegal immigration a driving principle of his first run for president, descending the Trump Tower escalator in 2015 to claim that the US had become a “dumping ground” and that Mexico was sending “rapists” across the border .
Nearly a decade later, grim images of undocumented immigrants invading the country, killing American citizens and trafficking illegal drugs permeated the second night of the Republican National Convention on Tuesday in Milwaukee.
As Trump looked on from his red and white box in front of the stage, speakers blamed Democrats and President Biden for countless violent crimes committed illegally by migrants in the country and drew applause from delegates in the convention hall as they promised that Trump would reverse the trend.
“We are under an invasion, not figuratively, a literal invasion,” Senator Ted Cruz of Texas told the crowd, adding that every day “Americans are dying, murdered, assaulted, raped by illegal immigrants that the Democrats have freed,” and blaming Democrats for children being “sold into a life of sexual slavery.”
“This is evil and wrong and it’s happening every day,” Cruz said, prompting the crowd to join him in singing the chorus “every damn day” as he described the deaths of people allegedly killed by undocumented immigrants who had been released from prison. police custody.
Several academic studies have found that undocumented immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than U.S.-born Americans. A study published by Annual Review of Criminology in 2023 found no association between high concentrations of immigrants and increased crime levels.
Anne Fundner, a mother of four, sparked a strong reaction when she spoke about her 15-year-old son’s death from a fentanyl overdose in Southern California in 2022, which she described as “the tragic reality of open borders.”
“I hold Joe Biden and Kamala Harris — the border czar — a joke, and all Democrats who support open borders responsible for my son’s death,” Fundner said. ” and waved printed signs distributed by convention staff that read, “Stop Biden’s Border Bloodbath.”
Michael Morin took the stage to describe the death of his sister Rachel Morin, a 37-year-old mother who was killed last year while exercising on a trail in Hartford County, Maryland. A 23-year-old immigrant from El Salvador who was in the country was illegally arrested after her death, police said. “Open borders are often portrayed as compassionate and virtuous, but there is nothing compassionate about allowing violent criminals to come into our country and steal children’s mothers,” Morin said.
Randy Sutton, a retired Las Vegas police lieutenant, was excited when he described a “never-ending tsunami of illegal aliens” entering the United States. He blamed Biden’s immigration policy for crime in American cities and said police were not being respected. “Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, well, they’re on the side of criminals,” Sutton said, adding that “these pro-criminal, anti-police extremists” fear Trump’s return to the White House.
The alarmist tone of many of the evening’s speeches follows a decline in border crossings in recent weeks, after Biden announced last month that the US would stop processing asylum claims when daily arrests for unauthorized crossings exceeded the 2,500. Illegal border crossings have averaged 2 million per year since 2021.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who ran against Trump in the Republican primary praising his anti-immigration policies, said Biden supports “open borders, allowing millions and millions of illegal aliens to enter our country and overwhelm our communities.”
“Just don’t send them to Martha’s Vineyard,” he added. “They get upset.” DeSantis used Florida state funds to fly migrants to Massachusetts in 2022 to protest Biden’s immigration policies.
Trump promised on his first day in office to close the US border and begin arresting and deporting millions of immigrants living in the country without authorization. He told TIME earlier this year that he would be willing to build a series of migrant detention camps to facilitate the process if necessary.
This story originally appeared on Time.com read the full story
