Immigration and the State of the Union
ABC News reports on President Donald Trump’s first State of the Union address last night, claiming to have fulfilled a number of his key promises while charting the course for the second year of his presidency at the start of what he called a “new American moment.” For a full text of the speech, click here.
The President took the opportunity to forcefully sell his administration’s immigration proposal. Offering a policy comprised of “four pillars,” Trump drew groans and hisses from congressional Democrats in the House chamber, even as he claimed the plan was a “bipartisan approach” that made concessions to those across the aisle and was a compromise “where nobody gets everything they want, but where our country gets the critical reforms it needs.”
The pillars included a pathway to citizenship for 1.8 million young undocumented immigrants who were previously protected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy ended by Trump last year, but further included the president’s proposed southern border wall and an end to visa lotteries and limits on family immigration sponsorships. “My duty, and the sacred duty of every elected official in this chamber, is to defend Americans — to protect their safety, their families, their communities, and their right to the American Dream,” Trump said. “Because Americans are dreamers too.”
In the speech, President Trump attacked MS 13:
Representative Joe Kennedy III offered the Democratic response to President Trump’s speech. In the response, Kennedy addressed the young immigrants brought to the U.S. as children; he spoke in Spanish as he said Dreamers are a part of America’s story and promised that Democrats will not walk away from them.
KJ