| Speaker | Time | Text |
|---|---|---|
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unidentified
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The president made that one of his first priorities upon taking office. | |
| The minority leader posted this. | ||
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| On Thursday, Agriculture Secretary nominee Brooke Rollins appears at her confirmation hearing before the Senate Agriculture Committee. | ||
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| Democracy. | ||
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| Democracy in real time. | ||
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| This is C-SPAN, giving you your democracy unfiltered. | ||
| A discussion on border policy and immigration policy under the Trump administration and two guests joining us via Zoom. | ||
| We're joined by Chad Wolf. | ||
| He was the former acting Homeland Security Secretary and the Trump administration that from 2019 to 2021, serving currently as the American First Policy Institute, the Center for Homeland Security, and Immigration Executive Director. | ||
| Also joining us in studio is Carrie Talbert with Immigration Hub. | ||
| She's their executive director. | ||
| To both of you, thanks for joining us this morning. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks so much for having us. | |
| Quickly, a little bit about your perspective, or various organizations. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, your time in the Trump administration was excited that, but the America First Policy Institute, what is it? | ||
| What do you do there? | ||
| Well, sure, we're a 501c3 created about three and a half years ago at the end of the first Trump administration. | ||
| We have 20 different policy centers, and so we advocate for America First policies across the spectrum of issues, anywhere from education to health care to national security, and of course, homeland security. | ||
| And we've been doing that and we'll continue to do that. | ||
| Ms. Talbot, same question. | ||
| Your organization, a little bit about it. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Thanks so much. | |
| Yes, I'm co-executive director of the Immigration Hub and we're a network of organizations that focuses on sensible, humane, and fair immigration policy. | ||
| And to both of you, I'll ask you, first, Ms. Talbot, what did we learn about the Trump administration's sense of immigration policy from that first day yesterday? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, the breadth of those executive orders was really incredible. | |
| Unfortunately, it amounts to an almost total ban on immigration into the U.S. right now. | ||
| And, you know, I think that's really unfortunate considering our economic situation and how much we depend on immigrants and how much communities really need immigrants to help rejuvenate small towns, to help us grow. | ||
| And, you know, these executive orders really just basically turn everybody away. | ||
| You know, even people coming on visas, it's not, it's mass deportations, but it's also people even trying to come lawfully. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, same question to you. | ||
| What sense of the Trump administration's policy on immigration did we get from yesterday? | ||
| Well, I would say that the actions obviously is what the American people wanted to see after four years of basically unchecked immigration to have over 10, 12 million, depending on how you count illegal aliens come into the country. | ||
| The majority of them staying here, very few actually deported or removed. | ||
| I think it's okay to take a pause to say, okay, let's get our arms around who's here, trying to understand, put better vetting in place to understand who is coming here. | ||
| And then, of course, making sure that you enforce the rule of law. | ||
| For four years, that immigration law simply hasn't been enforced. | ||
| So I think the American people, obviously, on November 5th, wanted to change. | ||
| And I think those executive orders deliver that change. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, of the executive orders signed yesterday when it comes to immigration or border security, what was the strongest one in your mind? | ||
| Well, I think there was a couple there. | ||
| Obviously, the national emergency along that border allows DOD resources to obviously help in that fight, making sure that that border is secure. | ||
| There was several others, such as starting border wall construction. | ||
| Look, you need physical infrastructure in certain areas, not entirely across that border, but in certain areas. | ||
| And that construction was all but halted for the past four years. | ||
| And a lot of that wall, as we know, was sold off at pennies on the dollar. | ||
| And then I would say the directive to start Remain in Mexico or the migrant protection protocols was also critically important. | ||
| Ms. Talbot, then, if that's the case of yesterday, what was the most concerning of the executive order signed yesterday? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, it's got to be the so-called birthright citizenship order, which we call a second-class citizenship order. | |
| This really relates to kids who are born in the U.S. | ||
| This has been around for hundreds of years that if a child is born in the United States, they are a citizen. | ||
| That is critical to make sure that we do not have a second class in this country. | ||
| You know, we believe in border security, and it's really a total fallacy that the border is out of control right now. | ||
| Arrivals at the border are actually lower than when Trump was in office. | ||
| The 14th Amendment, the basis of that birthright citizenship, what wiggle room is there within that in your mind, if there's any, that the president would even issue such an order? | ||
|
unidentified
|
No, there's no wiggle room at all. | |
| It's unconstitutional. | ||
| The Constitution is super clear, the 14th Amendment, that these kids are born here, they are citizens. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, question you about that as far as what the 14th Amendment says and what the executive order did. | ||
| Look, I think there's questions among legal scholars and others on whether you can take this action. | ||
| Again, the action is very, very limited when we talk about the birthright citizenship EO that the president issued. | ||
| It's just for children of illegal aliens that come here illegally. | ||
| It's not for everyone that that applies to. | ||
| Let me just go back to a comment made earlier when we talk about the lowest number of illegal crossings under the Biden administration. | ||
| It is a complete fallacy to say that illegal crossings have dropped. | ||
| It simply is not true. | ||
| When you funnel most of those through the CBP1 app or the CHNV parole process, those individuals would normally be counted as illegal apprehensions. | ||
| When you decide, as the Biden administration did, to count the individuals coming across that border differently, well, then of course your numbers are going to drop. | ||
| But the flow and the pressure on border patrol along that border has not subsided at all. | ||
| Ms. Talbot, if you wanted to respond to that? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, no, I totally disagree. | |
| The numbers have been counted the same way for decades. | ||
| And looking at the exact same numbers, you know, Biden cracked on on the border. | ||
| No. | ||
| I'll invite viewers, if they want to ask questions about immigration policy, border policy, and the Trump administration, 2027 48-8000 for Democrats, 202-748-8001 for Republicans, and Independents 202-748-8002. | ||
| If you want to text us your question or comment, you can do that at 2027-8003. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, executive orders being one way to deal with these issues, but what does the Trump administration at least desire to do through Congress to do other aspects of border or immigration policy? | ||
| Probably set out in H.R. 2 or a version of H.R. 2 that was passed in the last Congress, stalled in the Senate. | ||
| My guess is they're going to go back to elements of that, providing that provides DHS, Department of Justice, a few more authorities that they would otherwise have. | ||
| But look, you can secure that border today using executive authorities from the president or using secretarial authorities from the DHS secretary. | ||
| It's the way it's been for four years. | ||
| We heard from the Biden team that they needed Congress to do more. | ||
| And yet, the last year of the administration, they actually started to do a few more executive orders and a few more things. | ||
| They just didn't do it all the way and actually enforced that. | ||
| So it can be done. | ||
| Is it preferable for Congress to make some lasting changes? | ||
| Absolutely. | ||
| But you don't need Congress right now to secure that border. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, lasting changes such as what? | |
| Well, you can do lasting changes such as making sure that you have the ability to return individuals back to their home countries a little quicker, particularly children. | ||
| I mean, we've seen an unaccompanied alien child crisis over the last four years. | ||
| Over 500,000 have been trafficked into the United States, and that's because it's very difficult to return those children back to their parents in their home countries if they're not from Canada or Mexico. | ||
| So a few changes like that, I think, could go a long way. | ||
| Ms. Talbot, you had said that you support security issues and things like that. | ||
| A lot of people voted for the president because of these issues. | ||
| What is it about the current state of immigration then that will give you pause as far as how things are handled from here on out? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, I would also like to see long-lasting reform in Congress. | |
| I'd like to see balanced solutions that have a path to citizenship and strong border security. | ||
| That's what the American people want. | ||
| They did not vote for cruelty. | ||
| They voted for an end to chaos, which is totally understandable, and that's what we support. | ||
| We want long-term reform and laws that do both security and a path to citizenship. | ||
| And you know, just listening to this, I just am reminded of how many attacks there were on children. | ||
| There they go again, talking about attacking children. | ||
| And that's what happened under Mr. Wolf and the first Trump administration was family separation. | ||
| And we don't want to go back to that. | ||
| Yeah, let's just remember that the Biden administration has lost over 330,000 children in the immigration system. | ||
| So this idea that they care for children, that that's what their best interest was over these past four years, their actions did not show that. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, no, they're talking about two different things. | |
| So what Mr. Wolf was helping with was separating children from their parents. | ||
| That's what everyone was upset about in 2018. | ||
| The Biden administration has not lost 300,000 children. | ||
| That's ridiculous. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, a response? | ||
| Yeah, just ask the New York Times. | ||
| It's Don Debastian of conservative writers at the New York Times, and they are the one that broke that story. | ||
| Over 330 lost in the immigration system because the Biden administration, time after time, when they had a chance to make a decision to protect children, they continue to cut corners and allow those children to be issued to sponsors that were not fully vetted and they did not follow up on where those children were. | ||
| Before we take calls, I want to ask both of you, the man at the center of policy going forward when it comes to border and immigration is Tom Holman, the so-called border czar, as it will. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, what does he bring to the table and what do you expect him to do in this new position in the White House? | ||
| Well, Tom's an operator. | ||
| I mean, he's got decades, I want to say 30 years experience, not only as an ICE officer, but also as a Border Patrol agent. | ||
| So he understands how the system works. | ||
| He understands what the bounds of what can be done within the current system, the authorities that ICE and DHS have. | ||
| But he also knows how to enforce the law. | ||
| He knows how to remove individuals from the country. | ||
| And if you allow law enforcement agents who are trained to do their job as Congress intended them to do, then you can actually, you can bring a lot here. | ||
| As the czar, obviously sitting in the White House and advising the president on what those strategies are, and then obviously it then shifts to the department to execute that with field operations and others. | ||
| So I think it's going to be a good mix. | ||
| Ms. Talbot, then, as far as the position that he assumes in the Trump administration, it comes to future border and immigration policy. | ||
| What are the concerns you have? | ||
|
unidentified
|
I just have concerns overall about this administration targeting families and kids. | |
| You know, we think there are going to be raids today. | ||
| And I don't think that's what the American people want, is to have little kids separated from their parents and then left at school with no one to pick them up after school. | ||
| Nobody wants that. | ||
| And so I just am concerned that this administration is going to run rampant over these families and communities. | ||
| Our guests joining us for this discussion, our first caller is from Greg. | ||
| He's in Wisconsin. | ||
| Independent line, you're on with both of our guests. | ||
| Greg, good morning. | ||
| Go ahead. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Good morning, and I'd like to thank both of you for being here. | |
| My concern is the fact that we have an amendment process that we have in our country, and we also give the president the power to issue executive orders. | ||
| We have a 14th Amendment in which we have an executive order in which the president has just signed in wanting to end birthright citizenship. | ||
| My concern is the fact that does an executive order override that of an amendment process? | ||
| And what is that going to look like in terms of a constitutional question? | ||
| We have a lot of executive orders that are being signed by presidents. | ||
| We have an amendment process. | ||
| The 14th Amendment strictly states ending birthright citizenship. | ||
| And I want to know what does both of the people here have an opinion about this. | ||
| And I'll just take this call and we may hear what you have to say about that. | ||
| That's Greg in Wisconsin. | ||
| Ms. Talbot. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, that's an excellent question. | |
| It's totally true that there is an amendment process. | ||
| And this was a constitutional amendment during the Civil War. | ||
| It was critically important that everyone born in the United States be an American. | ||
| That's what makes us who we are. | ||
| It makes us American. | ||
| And so an executive order cannot overrule an amendment to the Constitution. | ||
| Mr. Wolf. | ||
| Again, it's something I said earlier. | ||
| I think the executive order that the president issued is very narrow. | ||
| It's not saying every child here does not afford this opportunity. | ||
| Very, very specific, talking about the children of the illegal aliens who came into the country illegally. | ||
| And so I think it's critically important. | ||
| Look, I agree that there's an amendment process. | ||
| I think the basis of the 14th Amendment, as was said, is back in the 1800s. | ||
| It's dated, and the purpose for that, I think, is not questionable, but I think it's open to interpretation. | ||
| I think the president's comments yesterday and others have said, obviously, this is going to be challenged in a court of law. | ||
| So ultimately, my guess is that the Supreme Court will decide on whether or not it's just unlimited to anyone and everyone that comes here, or there's actually some bounds and there is some ability for the president to issue an executive order around this issue. | ||
| From Tampa, Florida, this is Kim, Democrats line. | ||
| Hello. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Hi. | |
| I think what Mr. Wolf is saying about immigration and the border is 100% correct. | ||
| We don't know who came across that border during our administration. | ||
| I think we should lock the border down, vet the people that's in the country already illegally. | ||
| Because if something was to happen with one of those people that came across that border and it happened to a Democrat's family, they're going to be up in arms and they're going to feel real bad knowing we should have vetted those people. | ||
| We don't know if Talibans came across. | ||
| We don't know if ISIS came across. | ||
| We need to keep the border shut, come across legally, go to the American embassy in your country, get a visa, apply for immigration status in your country. | ||
| If you're given it, you're giving it. | ||
| If you're not, you're not. | ||
| We can't go to other countries and get in the way these people come here and get into this country. | ||
| We don't know who's here. | ||
| It can happen to one of my grandchildren. | ||
| Because I'm out working and I hear somebody came to this country legally and destroyed a school. | ||
| Okay, that's Kim in Tampa, Florida. | ||
| Mr. Wolfe, you had talked about this idea of security and shutting the border down, so to speak. | ||
| What's the manpower required? | ||
| What's the money required? | ||
| And does the federal government have that? | ||
| Well, again, when we talk about shutting the border down, we talk about shutting the border down to folks deciding to cross illegally, to the cartels, to the gangs, and others. | ||
| Obviously, there's a good amount of trade travel, legitimate trade, legitimate travel coming across that border. | ||
| That should continue. | ||
| As far as manpower and additional resources, absolutely, it's going to take more. | ||
| It's why the president issued the national emergency to allow DOD to provide some resources as well. | ||
| Look, for four years, the border has been broken in one manner or another. | ||
| So the new team's going to have to get in there, assess what's been done, build the capabilities and authorities back up. | ||
| We've had Border Patrol agents detailed from the northern border for four years because the border has been out of control. | ||
| If it wasn't, you wouldn't have agents detailed from all over the country. | ||
| So they're first going to have to get their hands around what's been broken, build it back up. | ||
| I'm sure Congress, I'm sure, I'm sorry, I'm sure the new administration is talking to Congress inside this reconciliation package about what more resources that the Department, not only DHS, but obviously DOJ, State Department, and other elements that are critically important to securing that border need. | ||
| Ms. Tommy. | ||
| What about this idea of more manpower, more money to deal with issues along the border? | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, actually, the Biden administration sought more money, but Republicans were always blocking it. | |
| And so, yeah, we do think that there's an important role to play for technology and infrastructure and vetting. | ||
| And, you know, they already do that. | ||
| We do know who's here, and they do vet people. | ||
| And actually, the Biden administration was trying to push people through legal channels. | ||
| And actually, I want to call Mr. Wolf's attention to these executive orders because a lot of them do actually apply to people coming lawfully, including the birthright citizenship one, does apply. | ||
| There's actually a Kamala Harris provision in there saying if your parents came on visas and they have a kid here, that kid does not qualify for citizenship. | ||
| So that would have ruled her out for president. | ||
| So I think really we need to be careful here about just the sweeping immigration ban that's in these executive orders. | ||
| Mr. Wolf? | ||
| Again, this is what the American people voted for. | ||
| You can say that they didn't, but we saw four years of an out-of-control border where we allowed anyone and everyone to come across. | ||
| We saw individuals on watch lists that were released into the United States, and then we had to go and find them because the overwhelming number of individuals coming to that border time and time again. | ||
| And so the measures that the president has put in place along with his team, it's what the American people want to see. | ||
| You may not like it, but the majority of Americans voted to make sure that that border is secure, that we stop the hundreds of thousands and millions of individuals coming across that border, released into American communities almost as quickly as they come across that border. | ||
| The American people wanted to stop. | ||
| They voted for President Trump, and that's what these executive orders do. | ||
| Mr. Wolfe, one of the actions yesterday was the shutdown of something called the CBP1 app. | ||
| What is the app and what is the purpose of the shutdown? | ||
| And did you agree with that move? | ||
| Well, I did agree with it. | ||
| And again, we talked earlier about how you count numbers. | ||
| And I think the comment was it's the way they've always been counted. | ||
| We have never used the CBP1 app, the manner in which the Biden team used it. | ||
| And so therefore, they counted those numbers differently. | ||
| So that's just fact and reality. | ||
| What it allowed is if you were an illegal alien and you were in northern Mexico, at least initially, and then they broadened that to basically anywhere in Mexico, that you could sign up for on the CBP1 app for an appointment at a port of entry, allowed to come in through that port of entry and then released into the United States. | ||
| You weren't actually asked about asylum status. | ||
| You were given parole to come into the United States, and then you could claim asylum at a later time. | ||
| And so that was basically just facilitating folks coming into the country legally. | ||
| Now the Biden team called it a legal pathway. | ||
| Obviously, that stopped on day one. | ||
| That, as well as a parole program for four countries, what we call the CHNV program. | ||
| These two programs facilitated more and more illegal aliens into the country. | ||
| And again, the American people said we've had enough of it. | ||
| And if I understand it correctly, those who are in the queue, so to speak, of the CBP1 meant their appointments were automatically canceled. | ||
| What would you say to them? | ||
| Yeah, again, elections have consequences. | ||
| And if you're in the queue or you've got an appointment six months from now, six weeks from now, again, the American people, and I think the Trump team was very clear throughout the campaign and others that they intended to end that program pretty quickly. | ||
| Ms. Talbot, the ending of the program and the implications. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yeah, I mean, I think American people would agree. | |
| If you stand in line, you should be able to get what you're standing in line for. | ||
| The government promised that. | ||
| And it's really unfortunate, I think, that we're moving away from where we should be headed, which is a really organized, no chaos kind of situation where people can stand in line. | ||
| And that's what the American people want. | ||
| I do not think they voted for the chaos that these executive orders are about to cause. | ||
| What they want is a very orderly situation at the border. | ||
| And mostly they voted for the economy. | ||
| They want prices to go down. | ||
| And immigrants help prices go down. | ||
| I think people are going to be really shocked when their prices at Walmart go sky high and the grocery store go sky high because these immigrants who are picking strawberries and helping with fruits and vegetables suddenly are getting rounded up. | ||
| I don't think that's what people want. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, that's a common argument that we've heard as far as the impact on immigrants and the economy. | ||
| What would you make of that argument? | ||
| Yeah, I hear that a lot, which is basically the argument is our economy is so dependent on, I guess, illegal immigrants that we should just ignore the law, allow them to come in, allow them to stay so that we have a great economy. | ||
| I just, I don't fundamentally believe that. | ||
| I think if you enforce the law the right way, a smart way, you target, which we have heard the president, we've heard Tom Oman talk about, you target criminal aliens in communities. | ||
| There's over 600 to 700,000 of these individuals in the United States today. | ||
| There's over 1.5 million final orders of removal. | ||
| These are orders given to individuals to say you have no legal right to be here in the country. | ||
| You need to remove yourself. | ||
| And they've decided to defy that court order. | ||
| So even if you just focus on these populations and you remove them, you deport them, that's a historic number of individuals without really getting to a lot of other folks here that are here illegally. | ||
| So this idea that you're going to target the agricultural industry or one industry or another in a way that you're going to have such a major impact, I don't believe that that's the prioritization of the Trump team. | ||
| Here is Susan. | ||
| Susan's in Indiana, Republican line for our guest. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Yes, good morning. | |
| I have a question for Ms. Talbot. | ||
| I always hear the arguments about, like she was saying, taking the children away and that they might be at school. | ||
| What about the mothers and fathers that had to now bury their children because of illegal immigrants that have either raped, murdered, drunk driving, that have killed their children? | ||
| Those children will never come back to their parents. | ||
| So there's no option for that. | ||
| Another question I'd like to be addressed is every time the Democrats talk about getting rid of the illegals, they refer to them as crop pickers, laborers in hotels. | ||
| To me, this is kind of talking about like maybe slave labor. | ||
| I don't think we appropriated ending slavery as to the rise in cotton cost. | ||
| So I'd like to hear your opinion on that. | ||
| Thank you. | ||
| That's Susan in Indiana. | ||
| Ms. Talbot. | ||
|
unidentified
|
Well, certainly all workers should be treated fairly and given a fair wage. | |
| And, you know, that's why it's important that we eventually do immigration reform and have people register with the government, get right with the law, and be able to continue contributing. | ||
| You know, we need more workers. | ||
| Our population is getting older, and we need people to help us take care of older folks, help us, you know, in our hotels and on vacation, et cetera. | ||
| And I think our lives will be better for it. | ||
| You know, I do definitely feel so horribly for those families who have lost a loved one. | ||
| It's just awful. | ||
| And those folks are already deportable. | ||
| We already have laws on the books saying they should be deported, and they should be deported for sure. | ||
| So it just is a horrible situation. | ||
| I don't know that we can have our entire system based on just a few folks who are committing such horrible crimes, but we do have to make sure we do as much as we possibly can to protect those families. | ||
| On that vein, the Senate yesterday passing what's known as the Lake and Riley Act, and it would require, according to MBC, immigration and custom enforcement to take custody and detain undocumented immigrants who are charged, arrested, or convicted for committing acts of burglary, theft, larceny, or shoplifting. | ||
| What do you think about the act itself? | ||
|
unidentified
|
You know, that bill had some provisions in it that I don't think people were fully aware of. | |
| Like, it actually allows state attorney generals to just go into federal court on any immigration case, even just individual cases. | ||
| That's really going to clog our federal courts. | ||
| And it's just too bad that they rush that through Congress and we're going to have these awful repercussions in the courts. | ||
| And also, you know, picking people up who have they stole some M ⁇ Ms at 7-Eleven, some kid who steals something. | ||
| Those are not priorities. | ||
| We need to focus on actual priorities, like the previous caller said, people who have serious crimes. | ||
| Those people should be priorities for deportation, not somebody who made some mistake when they're 17 and was just charged, not convicted. | ||
| Mr. Wolf, you can respond to the caller and you can respond to the passage of the Lake and Riley Act. | ||
| Yeah, it's unfortunate that we have to pass a bill to actually tell the federal government to detain dangerous individuals and not let them go into communities. | ||
| But after four years, that's exactly what we had to do because I agree that there are certain laws on the books that allow individuals to not only be detained and to be removed, but there's a lot of leeway. | ||
| There's a lot of discretion, unfortunately, in immigration law. | ||
| And so what this bill says is you must do it, right? | ||
| It doesn't give that leeway or discretion anymore. | ||
| And it's unfortunate because it shouldn't be that way. | ||
| We should have a federal government, whether you're Republican or Democrat, that enforces the law. | ||
| It doesn't cherry pick which laws to enforce and how much to enforce them. | ||
| There's always going to be prioritization. | ||
| You always need to prioritize. | ||
| But when you're prioritizing and you're still letting dangerous individuals go free, that's when the American people have a problem. | ||
| I think that's when Congress has a problem. | ||
| And that's why the bill passed, I would say, overwhelmingly, not unanimously, but overwhelmingly in both chambers. | ||
| Chad Wolfe, formerly of the Trump administration, joining us for this conversation. | ||
| He's with the America First Policy Institute, Carrie Talbot, the Immigration Hub. | ||
| She serves as their executive director. | ||
| Just to warn both of you and our audience, and just a few moments from now, we're expected to take you live for the swearing in of Marco Rubio to become the next Secretary of State. | ||
| We'll show you some of that process as it plays out and as we continue our conversation with our guests. | ||
| While we're talking about that, Mr. Wolf, the incoming Secretary of State, the role that Marco Rubio may have in immigration and border security issues. | ||
| I know it's more of a Homeland Security thing, but does he play a role? | ||
| Well, actually, he plays a big role. | ||
| Obviously, we think about Homeland Security. | ||
| We think about DHS because they have agents and officers on the ground, whether it's Border Patrol agents or ICE officers or USCIS officers. | ||
| So they play a very outsized role in immigration as far as processing individuals. | ||
| But the Department of State, the Department of Justice are two key agencies, particularly when we talk about the incoming Secretary of State and what he needs to negotiate with some of our foreign countries that allow individuals to be returned there, that allow certain measures to take place. | ||
| Obviously, Mexico plays a big role here. | ||
| Certain other countries in Central and South America play a very big role. | ||
| And the State Department is the lead negotiator in a lot of that. | ||
| And so, you know, Senator Rubio, or now Secretary of State Rubio, is going to have to play a big role with his team as well. | ||
| Carrie Talpert, the influence that Marco Rubio has on these issues, the Secretary of State. | ||
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unidentified
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Yes, actually, I worked with Marco Rubio on the 2013 immigration bill when he actually supported a sensible, balanced approach that included path to citizenship and border security. | |
| But yeah, I agree that he will play a really important role, especially with Latin America, because a lot of the policies that Trump announced last night actually depend on cooperation from countries like Mexico. | ||
| Mexico has already said that they do not intend to take all these folks who are not Mexican. | ||
| And so this is going to be a real hurdle for the Trump administration. | ||
| Again, we will take those comments and that event featuring the Secretary of State, the incoming Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, when it happens, we'll continue on with calls. | ||
| Ron in Maryland, Independent Line, good morning. | ||
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unidentified
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Good morning, C-SPAN. | |
| Well, you know, if Mexico isn't going to take and those people who are crossing their southern border, their southern border, illegally, then they need to do something about it. | ||
| So I'm really disturbed with your guest there, your female guest. | ||
| I apologize. | ||
| I didn't get your last name. | ||
| What she is saying, America, is that we should prioritize cheap labor over the safety and well-being of human beings, especially female and children. | ||
| This is really disturbing. | ||
| And then earlier she said that, well, they are. | ||
| The Biden administration was betting these people who are crossing our border. | ||
| Do you mean to tell me that we're supposed to believe that? |