Yesterday, John Bolton’s book; The Room Where It Happened officially went on sale. Although Bolton dealt mainly with national security issues, his book offers us a glimpse into Donald Trump’s immigration rhetoric. It is understood that Donald Trump is using the immigration issue to bolster his support among his base. Trump has unleashed a war on immigrants.
Bolton’s participation on the immigration issues was beyond his portfolio so his book gives us few examples of how Trump views immigration. However, his book adds additional context to Trump’s immigration views.
The following are selected quotes from the book about the immigration issue:
According to Bolton, during a meeting where Kirstjen Nielsen was attempting to explain the difficulty in closing the U.S.-México border to immigrants during the migrant caravan crisis, Donald Trump scolded here with “you’re wrong. There’s no way we can’t close the border. Tell them the country is closed. We don’t have the people [such as immigration judges] to do all these things. That’s it. It’s like a movie theater when it gets filled.” [page 208]
Note the, it is like a movie theater analogy Trump used.
Stephen Miller Is Conspiring on Immigration
It is understood that Stephen Miller is the architect of the Trump immigration agenda. However, even with Trump, Miller apparently must conspire to get his xenophobic immigration policies in place.
“On Monday morning, Columbus Day, I met with Stephen Miller, the White House policy lead on immigration. As we were talking, Kushner walked in and asked, ‘Can I join the conspiracy?’” [page 209]
Bolton Wants Immigrants
However, as with most Trump officials, especially among the Republicans, immigrants are needed in America, and wanted. Bolton makes this clear.
“My [Bolton] personal view was that America would benefit from far more legal, controlled immigration, whereas illegal immigration was undermining the foundational sovereignty principal that the US decided who was allowed in, not the would-be immigrants.” [pages 209-210]
The war on immigrants is not over. Far from it. Bolton’s book gives us more context. Trump just issued another directive to further curtail immigration based on the dubious attempt at protecting U.S. jobs. We will analyze this further in another post.
