Donald Trump came to Texas this week and, according to the man himself, thrust himself into harm’s way by speaking the truth about illegal immigration.
Well, since he’s the presumed frontrunner — for the moment — for the Republican Party presidential nomination next year, his visit requires a brief comment.
http://www.texastribune.org/2015/07/23/trumps-presidential-spectacle-sweeps-through-texas/
It meant nothing in the nation’s ongoing battle against illegal immigration.
Trump’s appearance was just for show. That’s understandable, though. Political candidates do these things on occasion. He swept into Laredo, bounded off his big ol’ jet wearing a ball cap emblazoned with “Making America Great Again.” He said he’s the only candidate speaking the truth about illegal immigration.
He offered zero specifics about what he intends to do about illegal immigration, although he has said he would build a wall to seal off our southern border to protect us against the flood of murderers, rapists and drug dealers who are pouring into the United States en masse.
I’m wondering, though: Is Trump going to make a similar campaign splash in, say, Buffalo, Detroit or Bellingham, Wash., cities that sit on our border with Canada? Let’s seal off our northern border as well, while we’re at it.
As the Texas Tribune reported, the brief fling in Laredo was long on sizzle and short on substance.
He said: “I’ll take jobs back from China, I’ll take jobs back from Japan … The Hispanics are going to get those jobs, and they’re going to love Trump.” There’s that third-person reference again.
According to The Trib: “The spectacle reached its apex when he held court with a crush of media at the border following a roughly half-hour closed-door meeting with law enforcement officials. Against the backdrop of a line of trucks waiting to enter the country, Trump regaled reporters with a string of boisterous predictions — that he would not only win the GOP nomination, but would also take the Hispanic vote — and vague prescriptions for the issue that brought him here: illegal immigration.”
This event kind of reminded me of the time then-Texas Attorney General Jim Mattox traipsed through the mud in Matamoros, Mexico, in the late 1980s after a University of Texas student was killed. Mattox, a Democrat, wanted to make a grand show of how he would root out the killers and bring them to justice. That’s all fine, except for this minor detail: The Texas AG has virtually zero criminal jurisdiction; the office deals almost exclusively with civil matters.
But, hey, it made for great photo ops.
So did Trump’s appearance in Laredo. That’s it.