Trump Brazenly Admits His Immigration Crackdown Is Hurting Farmers
Donald Trump just admitted that his administration’s massive deportation efforts are causing chaos for farmers—but he doesn’t care.
In a post on Truth Social Thursday, Trump took a moment to respond to criticism that his crackdown on undocumented immigrants was hurting multiple industries, including farmers.
“Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,” Trump wrote.
“In many cases the Criminals allowed into our Country by the VERY Stupid Biden Open Borders Policy are applying for those jobs. This is not good. We must protect our Farmers, but get the CRIMINALS OUT OF THE USA. Changes are coming!”
Trump managed to actually acknowledge that he had created a massive problem but then moved to blame Joe Biden for letting in criminals, who apparently want jobs on farms. Then he promised to do something but didn’t deign to delve into specific “changes.”
All of this comes as Immigration and Customs Enforcement has begun sweeping raids in rural California, where an estimated 255,700 farmworkers are undocumented, following a series of ICE arrests last week that sparked massive protests in Los Angeles.
Trump’s promise to get criminals out of the country is a massive lie. As part of the Trump administration’s inhumane crackdown on immigration, ICE has readily arrested U.S. citizens, deported families, and endangered sick children, leaving hollow promises to target individuals with criminal records in the rearview.
The thousands of National Guardsmen President Trump sent to Los Angeles in an authoritarian power play are working for free.
More than a dozen guardsmen told Military.com that they remain unpaid, as they have yet to receive official activation orders. Receiving such orders would allow them to receive pay, Tricare health benefits, and Department of Veterans Affairs eligibility. Without them, the troops dispatched aren’t getting anything.
Trump’s abrupt deployment of the guardsmen, against the wishes of Los Angeles’s mayor and California’s governor, circumvented executive norms and has resulted in thousands of soldiers who aren’t sure if they’ll be compensated for the work they’re doing. Guardsmen have also complained about their living conditions, as many of them are sleeping on cots at a Naval Base on the edge of Los Angeles.
Forcing people to work for no pay is very on brand for the president. He owes the city of Albuquerque nearly half a million dollars in unpaid safety fees for a 2019 rally. He did a similar dash in cities across the country, racking up millions of dollars in unpaid fees. Some places, like Nassau County, gave up on trying to bill Trump entirely and just ate the $1 million he owed them. Similar instances occurred in Eerie, Pennsylvania; Tuscon, Arizona; and Green Bay and Prairie Du Chien, Wisconsin. “He’s welcome here, but we need to have our bills paid. Any expenses incurred by us for him being here, or we don’t really want him here,” Prairie Du Chien Mayor Dave Hemmer said last year. “We are a smaller city and if we incurred expenses like that, we expect to be reimbursed. Or we’d say, ‘Don’t come.’” In his private life as a businessman, Trump frequently refused to pay contractors—hundreds have claimed he stiffed them for completed work as a private citizen.
Now the guardsmen are getting the same treatment.
The president was caught off guard by news that anti-ICE protests exist outside of Los Angeles.
Posing for photos with his wife, Melania Trump, on the Kennedy Center’s red carpet Wednesday evening, Donald Trump refused to believe that dissent against his anti-immigration agenda had spread to more than a dozen cities around the country.
“If this turns into another summer of unrest, what are you prepared to do, sir?” asked a Fox News reporter.
“About what?” Trump said.
“Well, the protests have spread now to 16 cities across the U.S.,” she added.
“That’s what you’re saying, and do I believe you? I don’t think so,” Trump said.
“Well, I got that from the Fox News brain room,” the reporter clarified.
But Trump wouldn’t address the national reaction. Instead, he was fixated on recalling how his administration had forcibly intervened in the Los Angeles protests—without the express authorization of the California or city government.
“What we have is a situation in Los Angeles that was caused by gross incompetence,” Trump said. “They didn’t have the police to handle it. The police were asking us to come in. They were very late, we had to go in to save a lot of ICE officers, as you know, who were holed up. They were holed up in a building.”
FOX: The protests have spread now to 16 cities across the U.S
Trump: I don't think so.
FOX: I got that from the Fox News brain room. pic.twitter.com/wvR14gnw1t
But the Los Angeles Police Department did not request Trump’s aid. On Tuesday, Los Angeles Police Department Chief Jim McDonnell denied that he had asked the White House for help in handling the protests, telling CNN that the department was “nowhere near” calling on assistance from the National Guard.
So far, anti-ICE protests have taken root from coast to coast. By Tuesday, NBC News accounted for at least 25 protests in cities across the country, with gatherings in New York, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Atlanta, San Francisco, San Diego, Denver, Seattle, Las Vegas, Raleigh, Columbus, Oklahoma City, Washington, and others.
The mass mobilization against Trump’s agenda and his illegal decisions to send hundreds of Marines and thousands of........© New Republic
