Thomas Gallatin: Following President Donald Trump’s weekend announcement that the U.S. and Mexico had reached an immigration deal averting his tariff threat, Democrats and the Leftmedia jumped to spin the narrative as little more than Trump engaging in political grandstanding. They couldn’t be more wrong.
House Speaker liar-Nancy Pulosi bloviated, “President Trump undermined America’s preeminent leadership role in the world by recklessly threatening to impose tariffs on our close friend and neighbor to the south. Threats and temper tantrums are no way to negotiate foreign policy.”
The New York Times sought to diminish Trump’s accomplishment by pointing out that much of the deal had been in the works for a while, and that Mexico had already agreed to several aspects of it months ago. The Times then speculated that Trump’s decision to accept the deal was actually “a face-saving way to escape from the political and economic consequences of imposing tariffs on Mexico.”
Or maybe Trump was simply holding Mexico’s feet to the fire, getting our neighbors to quit dragging their feet on what they had agreed to months ago. After May saw 132,000 arrests of illegal aliens crossing the border, it was clear that Mexico was failing to live up to promises to help stem the migrant crisis. Trump’s tariff threat appears to have given Mexican officials the necessary kick in the pants to finally act.
The obvious problem with the Left’s spin is that Trump has not shied away from imposing tariffs. He followed through on his tariff threat against China and has only continued to raise them as he presses Beijing on decades of bad behavior. Why would he be scared to hit Mexico?
But there may be another reason Democrats and the Leftmedia aim to mitigate Trump’s victory here. The latest polling shows that a large segment of Americans view immigration as the most important problem facing the nation today. Democrats and much of the mainstream media — who have long sought to downplay the border crisis — don’t want this becoming the major election issue in 2020, as it is a winning issue for Trump. ~The Patriot Post
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