Too often Presidents have ignored their campaign promises, reversing themselves after the election is safely in the bag. Many observers predicted that Donald Trump’s promise to take vigorous action against illegal aliens would suffer that very fate.
Instead, Trump kept faith with the voters and has gone to war with the establishment of both parties to carry out his promises.
Just a few days after taking office, Trump issued an executive order calling for resumed construction of “a physical wall on the southern border.” Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama had failed to continue building the wall authorized by Congress in 2006. Trump also included funding for construction of the wall in his budget request to Congress for the current fiscal year.
Knowing that a wall cannot, by itself, stop all illegal entry, Trump has also authorized the hiring of an additional 5,000 Border Patrol agents and 10,000 Federal employees to speed up the rate of deportations.
Now Attorney General Sessions has followed up by instructing US Attorneys to make deportation a higher priority, and to treat the use of false documents as the serious crime it is. He also ordered an end to Obama’s “catch and release” policy for those caught crossing the border. One hundred fifty new judges are being added so that deportation cases can be tried and completed more quickly.
Illegal aliens are being rounded up for deportations, and courthouses are no longer treated as a privileged sanctuary.
Trump is also following through on his promise to take action against “sanctuary cities”, issuing an executive order and supporting funding restrictions in the budget bill now before Congress.
Democrats have responded by threatening a government shutdown to prevent anti-illegal alien policies from being enacted in the budget. Protecting illegals is, for them, a higher priority than a functioning Federal government. However, public opinion polls say that such an approach is not popular, and is likely to hurt Democrats.
Keeping promises is a new idea in Washington, but it may help relieve the well-earned cynicism about politics. Attorney General Sessions spoke correctly when he said, “This is the Trump era.” It is, and it makes a difference.
