Government Security News July 2016 Digital Edition

Who wins if Donald Trump’s views on immigration
policy are accepted by voters in November?
By Wendy Felix
Historically, America has done well
when everyone works together towards
common goals that pool our
collective strengths. We have built a
great nation, and much of our success
continues to derive from the
fact that we are a nation that welcomes
and integrates people from
around the world.
Yet, most of Mr. Trump’s
speech at the Republic
National Convention on
Thursday night sought to
convince all who were listening
that none of that
history is true, and Americans
are losing because
someone else is taking
something from them, including
immigrants.
Trump once again cast the foreign-born
as a grave threat to natives,
and he continues to blame
them for unemployment and crime
and proposes that anything short of
mass expulsion of undocumented
immigrants is tantamount to ignoring
the rule of law. He also cast immigration
reform as “amnesty.”
Trump’s now well-established
views on immigration policy are
not only unsupported by the facts,
but they are dangerous as well. If
Trump’s immigration policies were
ever implemented, they would have
devastating impacts on American
society, the economy, and our
standing in the world.
Oddly for a businessman, Trump’s
view of the American economy is
that it is finite and cannot be grown
when more workers, taxpayers, and
consumers are added to it. It is nonsensical
to assert that the economic
growth attributed to immigrants (as
found in numerous studies) over
the years does not in any way benefit
native-born workers who participate
in the same economy.
The Republican nominee also
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Photo: Courtesy of Disney
continues his crusade to cast all immigrants
as criminals even when
there is abundant evidence that immigration
is not linked to higher
crime rates and hasn’t been for the
past century.
The truth is, the vast majority of
Americans disagree that immigrants
are the source of our problems,
and a majority from both
political parties support a
more generous and pragmatic
approach towards
immigration policy.
Yet, Trump’s commitment
to his uninformed
views on immigration remains
strong. The fact that
he believes natives only do
well when immigrants are
removed from the country
demonstrates not only that
he is out of touch with the majority
of Americans, but that he is a bad
student of history and economics
and is willing to blindly pursue policies
that play well politically among
a small fringe group of his supporters.
Trump’s immigration policies, if
implemented, will make losers of us
all.