The Patriot Post® · Reuters Buries the Immigration Lede

It was their own poll, for Pete’s sake.

And yet the headline reads, “Half of Americans oppose immigrant detention camps.”

That may be true, but it’s not news. Americans are a compassionate lot, and even as their country is being wrecked by Joe Biden’s open borders and an Ohio’s worth of illegal immigrants streaming across our border, the thought of holding these people in detention camps doesn’t sit well with most folks. But, again, that’s not news.

Not until the very end of the second paragraph, in fact, do we get to the real news: “Some 54% of registered voters opposed the use of detention camps while 36% supported such a move and 10% said they did not know or did not respond, the poll found. Still [and here’s the news], 56% said most or all immigrants in the U.S. illegally should be deported.”

Wow. Why were the activists at Reuters so reluctant to share this finding? Perhaps it disappointed them too deeply.

Drilling down into these numbers, we find that some 85% of Republican voters believe most or all of these 10 million illegals should be deported. Meanwhile, only 26% of Democrats — the party whose adherents want to make the country browner in the belief that Hispanics will ultimately reward them with a permanent voting majority — favor mass deportation. This sounds like something of a Mexican standoff, but 61% of independents also favor mass deportation, so if he wins, Donald Trump would have a serious mandate for just the sort of massive deportation program he’s been promising.

How many illegals are we talking about? Some 10 million have come across on Biden’s sleepy watch, but the total number of illegals here now is easily double and perhaps triple that. In any case, the American people have come a long way since 2016, when they elected Trump despite a majority of Americans disfavoring a border wall.

How might a mass deportation program be enacted? Reuters continues:

In an interview with Time Magazine published in April, Trump said he would consider using camps but that “there wouldn’t be that much of a need for them” because people would be rapidly deported.

Tom Homan, a former Trump immigration official who could join a second administration, said tents would be needed as more immigrants in the U.S. illegally are arrested and held for deportation, exceeding existing detention space.

Questions abound: Which agency or agencies would be responsible for such a massive round-up? Will there be distinctions made among men, women, and children? Among countries of origin? Will those with criminal records be deported first? How might one’s criminal status be accurately ascertained? What rules of engagement will be in place to protect our agents from violent encounters?

Clearly, the devil will be in the details, but the will, at least, is there.

Florida Senator Marco Rubio, himself the son of legal immigrants from Cuba, is emblematic of the nation’s changing views on illegal immigration. Rubio had previously worked on the notorious Gang of Eight comprehensive immigration reform proposal that provided a path to citizenship for illegals. He once said that Trump’s deportation plan wasn’t workable. Yet he’s since reconsidered. “Yes,” he said during an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” Sunday, when host Kristen Welker asked him whether he supports Trump’s plan to use the military to deport illegals. “We cannot absorb 25, 30 million people who entered this country illegally,” he added. “They’re here illegally. What country on earth could tolerate that?”

Indeed, no country can tolerate it, at least not in these numbers. (Incidentally, Rubio was also asked by Welker whether he’d accept the results of the 2024 presidential election “no matter what,” but he wouldn’t play along. “No matter what happens? No! If it’s an unfair election, I think it’s going to be contested by each side.” When Welker tried again, Rubio walloped her: “You’re asking the wrong person. The Democrats are the ones that have opposed every Republican victory since 2000. Every single one.”)

January 20, 2021, seems like a long time ago, but we remember certain parts of Biden’s inaugural address like he uttered them yesterday.

“Unity, unity,” he preached. “Today, on this January day, my whole soul is in this: Bringing America together. Uniting our people. And uniting our nation.” It sounds laughable now, doesn’t it? And yet he has united us in one important respect: He’s united us against his presidency, which will take its place alongside James Buchanan’s as the worst in American history.

But there are two other ways in which Joe Biden has united us: in favor of a border wall, and in favor of mass deportation of illegals.

Donald Trump ran on the former in 2016, only to be largely foiled by an intransigent Congress. This year, he’s running on the latter, and, should he win, we expect him to pursue that promise doggedly.