Trump: Up to 15,000 troops could be sent to border
Members of the Central American caravan wait in line for water after spending the night in a camp on Wednesday in Juchitan de Zaragoza, Mexico. Credit: Getty Images/Spencer Platt
President Donald Trump on Wednesday said he would send up to 15,000 troops to the U.S.-Mexican border and use his executive power to end birthright citizenship, bringing the immigration debate to the forefront in the final days before the midterm elections.
“We’ll go up to anywhere between 10 and 15,000 military personnel on top of Border Patrol, ICE and everybody else at the border,” Trump said as he left the White House for Fort Myers, Florida. “Nobody’s coming in. We’re not allowing people to come in.”
Before embarking on an 11-stop tour of eight states he won in 2016, Trump doubled down on his immigration message beginning with a series of morning Twitter posts and remarks throughout the day, including during an event about job growth.
“Immigration is a very important subject. The Democrats have let immigration in our country get out of control with their horrible, not allowing us to have any votes to get passage,” he told reporters on the South Lawn.
Trump’s newest plan would triple the number of troops at the southern border from the 5,000 announced earlier to prevent a caravan of migrants from entering the country. More than 3,500 migrants — including men, women and children mostly are about 1,000 miles from the U.S. border. Their journey began about two weeks ago and they are mostly traveling on foot, according to news reports.
Trump also defended his initiative to revoke “birthright” citizenship through executive order, a plan legal experts say is not possible without an amendment to the Constitution.
“So-called Birthright Citizenship, which costs our Country billions of dollars and is very unfair to our citizens, will be ended one way or the other,” Trump tweeted. “It is not covered by the 14th Amendment because of the words “subject to the jurisdiction thereof.” Many legal scholars agree.....”
President Donald Trump said up to 15,000 troops could be deployed to the U.S.-Mexican border. Credit: The Washington Post/Jabin Botsford
He lashed out at Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, saying “before he went insane, he got it right,” in 1993 when the Democrat said the U.S. was “rewarding” undocumented immigrants and their children born in the country with citizenship.
Reid reversed his position in 1999 and issued a statement firing back saying Trump "can tweet whatever he wants while he sits around watching TV, but he is profoundly wrong.” Reid called his former stance on immigration the “biggest mistake” of his career.
Trump on Wednesday also criticized outgoing House Speaker Paul Ryan saying the retiring congressman "knows nothing about" birthright citizenship and "should be focusing on holding the Majority" in the House of Representatives.
Ryan (R-Wisconsin) was among several Republicans who on Tuesday rejected the idea that the president could change birthright citizenship. Several legal scholars, including conservatives such as attorney George Conway, the husband of Trump’s senior counselor KellyAnn Conway, are calling the move “unconstitutional.”
At issue is whether the president is able to change the 14th Amendment which states "all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."
"Both proponents and opponents of the language at the time knew exactly what it meant: Virtually anyone born in the United States is a citizen," Conway and attorney Neal Katyal, a former Obama official, wrote in a letter published in The Washington Post.
Trump in remarks Wednesday clarified that he was targeting immigrants who enter the country “illegally” and have babies in the U.S. Despite objections from the legal community, he insisted an executive order could change the constitutional provision but added: “I’d rather do it through Congress because that’s permanent.”
During a job event held earlier in the day, Trump said he wanted to see immigrants coming into the country through a system of merit to fill jobs for employers who are seeing a shortage.
The president goes Thursday to Columbia, Missouri for another rally. Beginning Friday, he will hold two rallies per day until Monday when there are three on his schedule.
He will hit states including West Virginia, Indiana, Montana, Georgia, Tennessee and Ohio.
Correction: President Donald Trump is embarking on a tour of eight states he won in 2016. A previous version of this story had an incorrect number.
Candice Ferrette covers Nassau County government and politics on Long Island. She has been a reporter at Newsday since 2011.
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