What Was the Purpose of Opening Our Southern Border?

 

. Now that we’ve seen, in the first eight weeks of the Trump administration, a 96% reduction in illegal entries across the southern border—and this was done, remember, without the supposed need for comprehensive “immigration reform”—it’s logical to ask what the last four years were about.

Why did we have a completely open border? Why did 12 million people come into the United States from all over the world under illegal auspices? What was the reason? Why would people do that?

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And remember, right now, the United States has somewhere between 50 and 60 million residents that were not born in the United States. Twenty-seven percent of the population of California is foreign-born, of all statuses—citizen, legal, illegal.

That’s an enormous challenge in assimilation, acculturation, integration. And we’re not doing that, of course. But why would we do that? Why would we have 16%, now, of the population of the United States as foreign-born? What was the rationale behind that, especially in the context of illegal entries?

Looking back, what were the Democrats, what was then-President Joe Biden, what were the handlers of Biden thinking? I suppose they thought that maybe people who were coming in without English, without high school diplomas—for the most part—without capital, and without skills would be dependent on federal largess.

I know you’re gonna say people who are not here legally cannot get Medicaid. Well, they can get Medicaid in an emergency. In California, anybody can get Medicaid, which we here call Medi-Cal.

So many people came in illegally and got on Medi-Cal that the system is broke. It’s $6.7 billion in the hole. Fifty percent of the population, of all births, are on Medi-Cal. And 40% of the California resident population are on Medi-Cal.

So, was the idea to get people dependent on the government? And then that would make government grow and more redistribution and more higher taxes. A way of, what? Having equity? Taking from the small, supposed, greedy elite and making them pay higher taxes to fund this social welfare?

Or was it utopianism, globalism, 21st century-ism, end of the worldism? In which you think that borders are a 19th-century construct. We’re all people of the same planet, as we see in Europe. So, let’s just get rid of borders. Let’s make it everything from Yucatan to the Arctic Circle, we can just go anywhere we want in this utopian dream. There’s no difference.

Why is somebody who was born in Chiapas or Oaxaca or Michoacan to dire poverty and cartels and corruption, why doesn’t he get the chance of somebody who’s born in Malibu? Well, as social architects, maybe the Left thought he should have the chance. So, we’ll just destroy the border.

Or a third reason why—was it more sinister? Did they think that after 2020, when the majority of states changed the balloting laws to such a degree that earlier mail-in and early voting had only constituted 30% of those who voted, 70% voted on Election Day—now 70% of all American voters do not vote on Election Day. They don’t go before somebody and show a driver’s license. Did they think, under this system, they could bring in 12 million people and, in some cases, they could vote?

Now, that’s a very controversial topic. The Left says that they never do vote. I’m not suggesting that they do in numbers, although, I will suggest that although it’s illegal at the state level, in most states, it’s absolutely illegal at the federal level.

Sixteen local jurisdictions allow illegal aliens to vote in city council, school board elections, local referendums. It’s a trend that the Left is trying to cultivate and mine. So, do they think that, eventually, the more people you bring in—so you have 50 or 60 million people who were not born in the United States—they’re going to be a constituency? And equity being what it is and parity being—they deserve to vote.

Was that the long-term goal? Or was it a fourth reason, just simple nihilism, chaos? People were angry at the Trump years. Or they were angry at traditional America. They think it’s racist and sexist. It doesn’t provide diversity or equity and inclusion. So, what we’re going to do is just flood the zone. Twelve million people. And we’ll see how you like it. We’re gonna put them in hotels in New York. We’re gonna send them to the inner city. And we’re not gonna send them to Malibu or Martha’s Vineyard or Nantucket. But we’re just gonna flood the zone and just make so much chaos that you’ll have to deal with it, sort of like California. Deal with it.

I don’t have the answer. I don’t know what was behind it. But I do know that never in the history of the United States, within four years, did the government, by intent, destroy the border, welcome in 12 million people, during the first year of a COVID-19 lockdown, where all of us had to be very careful, wear masks, and have proof of vaccination, with no audit at all of the people who were not here.

It’s inexplicable. And it’s so inexplicable that I’m gonna end today with I don’t have any answers other than providing the possible choices and alternatives I outlined.

Other Countries Seem to Like Tariffs. So Why Are People Opposed to Trump’s Tariffs?

 

April 3, President Donald Trump announced it as “Liberation Day.” And by that he meant we were going to be liberated from asymmetrical tariffs of the last 50 years. And it was going to inaugurate a new what he called “golden age” of trade parity, greater investment in the United States, but mostly, greater job opportunities and higher-paying jobs for Americans.

And yet, the world seemed to erupt in anger. It was very strange. Even people on the libertarian right and, of course, the left were very angry. The Wall Street Journal pilloried Donald Trump.

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But here’s my question. China has prohibitive tariffs, so does Vietnam, so does Mexico, so does Europe. So do a lot of countries. So does India. But if tariffs are so destructive of their economies, why is China booming? How did India become an economic powerhouse when it has these exorbitant tariffs on American imports? How did Vietnam, of all places, become such a different country even though it has these prohibitive tariffs? Why isn’t Germany, before its energy problems, why wasn’t it a wreck? It’s got tariffs on almost everything that we send them. How is the EU even functioning with these tariffs?

I thought tariffs destroyed an economy, but they seem to like them. And they’re angry that they’re no longer asymmetrical. Apparently, people who are tariffing us think tariffs improve their economy. Maybe they’re right. I don’t know.

The second thing is, why would you get angry at the person who is reacting to the asymmetrical tariff and not the people who inaugurated the tariff?

Why is Canada mad at us when it’s running a $63 billion surplus and it has tariffs on some American products at 250%. Doesn’t it seem like the people who started this asymmetrical—if I could use the word—trade war should be the culpable people, not the people who are reluctantly reacting to it?

Sort of like Ukraine and Russia. Russia invaded Ukraine. Do we blame Ukraine for defending itself and trying to reciprocate? No, we don’t. We don’t blame America because it finally woke up and said, “Whatever they tariff us we’re gonna tariff them.” Which brings up another question: Are our tariffs really tariffs?

That is, were they preemptive? Were they leveled against countries that had no tariffs against us? Were they punitive? No. They’re almost leveled on autopilot. Whatever a particular country tariffs us, we reciprocate and just mirror image them. And they go off anytime that country says, “It was a mistake. We’re sorry. You’re an ally. You’re a neutral. We’re not going to tariff this American product.” And we say, “Fine.” Then the autopilot ceases and the automatic tariff ends. In other words, it’s their choice, not ours. We’re just reacting to what they did, not what we did.

Couple of other questions that I’ve had. We haven’t run a trade surplus since 1975—50 years. So, it wasn’t suddenly we woke up and said, “It’s unfair. We want commercial justice.” No. We’ve been watching this happen. For 50 years it’s been going on. And no president, no administration, no Congress in the past has done anything about it. Done anything about what? Leveling tariffs on our products that we don’t level on theirs.

It was all predicated in the postwar period. We were so affluent, so powerful—Europe, China, Russia were in shambles—that we had to take up the burdens of reviving the economy by taking great trade deficits. Fifty years later, we have been deindustrialized. And the countries who did this to us, by these unfair and asymmetrical tariffs, did not fall apart. They did not self-destruct. They apparently thought it was in their self-interest. And if anybody calibrates the recent gross domestic product growth of India or Taiwan or South Korea or Japan, they seem to have some logic to it.

There’s a final irony. The people who are warning us most vehemently about this tariff quote the Smoot-Hawley Act of 1930. But remember something, that came after the onset of the Depression—after. The stock market crashed in 1929. That law was not passed until 1930. It was not really amplified until ’31.

And here’s the other thing that they were, conveniently, not reminded of: We were running a surplus. That was a preemptive punitive tariff, on our part, against other countries. We had a trade surplus. And it was not 10% or 20%. Some of the tariffs were 40% and 50%. And again, it happened after the collapse of the stock market.

In conclusion, don’t you find it very ironic that Wall Street is blaming the Trump tariffs for heading us into a recession, if not depression, when the only great depression we’ve ever had was not caused by tariffs but by Wall Street?

Strategy to Trump China on the World Stage

 

I’d like to talk today about China. It seems to be on everybody’s mind, but explicitly on President Donald Trump’s mind.

That’s the one common denominator that explains his interest in Panama and not to turn over our key transit from East to West Coast to China. China has no business there. And same thing with Greenland.

He’s worried about the Chinese having access to the Arctic Circle. He’s worried about their trade surplus. He’s worried about circumventing unfair trade by assembling their products in Mexico. He’s worried about them sending raw product of fentanyl.

He’s worried about their surrogates, the sort of mad pit bulls, like North Korea and, increasingly, Iran, that he cuts the leash every once in a while and says—he being China—”Go to it. Cause chaos.”

He’s worried that China is intimidating countries in the Pacific and in Asia. Some of our strongest friends—Australia, South Korea, Taiwan, the Philippines, Vietnam. Saying things like, “The United States is in decline. You better cut a deal.”

Essentially, they’re like Japan in 1940 and they’re trying to re-fashion something like the Japanese East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. That was a mercantile system aimed at the West, which soon they were to be at war at.

So, is it all depression? No. What Trump is saying is, for us to stop this, we’ve got to balance our budget. We can’t spend $3 billion a day on interest. If we’re gonna do this, we have to have trade parity. We can’t keep running up a trillion, a trillion and a half dollars in trade surplus.

And when he looks at us at home, he says, the ESG, this environmental, social, governance, that we don’t look at productivity in stocks but whether they’re politically correct or DEI and woke, that’s anti-merit—it doesn’t work. The Chinese love it. We will not be competitive.

If we look at the border, you can’t have an open border with 30 million illegal aliens. That is a drag on productivity. You have to have security.

So, what he’s doing is, in all these areas, is identifying the threat that China poses and why we, with an open, transparent, and capital society, can achieve our preeminence or guarantee our preeminence, if we make changes.

And it’s not necessarily a pessimistic picture. I’ll just give you some statistics.

Yes, China has 2,000 fighters. We have 1,500. But fighters aren’t the only story. There are bombers, there are logistic planes, there are intelligence planes. When you look at all of the U.S. Air Force, we have about 1,500 more planes. And we have over 500 fifth-generation fighters. I think they only have about 60.

Yes, they are building 200 times more ships than we are.

Remember, we built the largest navy in World War II that turned out, by 1945, larger than all the navies in the world. We were building a liberty or freedom mercantile vessel, big 10,000-, 12,000-ton vessels, every five days. We built 3,000 of them. We built 120 carriers of different classifications.

So, we were the shipbuilder and now China is. But when you actually look at our fleets, we still have 11 fleet carriers and Navy groups around them. They are over 100,000 tons. They’re all nuclear. China has two and it’s building a third. We have about 85 to 87 submarines. They have about 60. But every one of ours is nuclear. Not theirs. They only have about six or seven.

If you look at all of these statistics on economics, they have 1.4 billion people. We have about 335-340 million people, but we produce one and a half times of nominal gross domestic product as China. So, one American produces one and a half times more goods and services than his four Chinese counterparts.

If you look at per capita income, we’re still ranked sixth in the world. China’s 73. Americans have a lot more purchasing power per capita than Chinese.

So, what Trump—let me put this all together in conclusion. China is ascendant and we are static. Trump comes in and he’s looking at things at home that will restore our global preeminence—fiscal discipline, secure borders, merit-based education, energy development. And he says, “Right now we still have the lead. And we will maintain this lead. But if we continue down the trajectory we’re on, we’re gonna be in big trouble.”

Final note. We have 5,500 deliverable nuclear weapons. China has about 500. But they’re billing six or seven a month. And they want to get up to 1,000 in five years and then keep going.

So, what Trump is doing, again, is he’s saying, “Right now our system is much superior—energy, agriculture, productivity, GDP, per capita income. But the trends in the future are not good. And if we don’t change, our rival will dominate the world. And I’m not gonna let that happen on my watch.”

And I think that explains a lot of his, otherwise, sometimes, inexplicable worries, from Greenland to Panama, to the border, to our universities.

The European Left Takes Out Conservative Politicians

 

There’s two things that ring true about Europeans and their relationship to us Americans.

No. 1, they never feel or they never admit that they’re emulated. They admit they’re affected by the ill effects they think of America, but they’re not influenced by us.

And No. 2, they’re the stalwarts of democracy. We have these pathologies of swinging hard to the right, or we’re yokels, or we’re anti-democratic, or we’re MAGA fanatics. But the Europeans are pristine Democrats, we’re told. And they’re independent of America.

But something’s happened that belies those two allegations or assumptions.

No. 1, suddenly, Europe is copying the lawfare of the United States. Remember that Letitia James, Alvin Bragg, Fani Willis, Jack Smith, and E. Jean Carroll, in civil and criminal suits, for four years tried to destroy President Donald Trump. And they had over $400 million in fines that were leveled at one point. And there were 91 felony indictments. I think Alvin Bragg actually convicted him of 32. This was in addition to trying to remove him off the ballot in 20 states and raiding his home.

So, the Europeans wouldn’t do that, would they?

The second thing is that this was a destruction or an attempt to warp democracy, not to let Donald Trump be on the ballot, to put him behind jail bars.

So, let me just tell you what’s going on in Europe. In February, this conservative, which is usually in the media termed a hard-right, far-right group, in Germany, the Alternative for Deutschland, the Alternative for Germany—it won 21% of the vote. It skyrocketed. In some areas of East Germany it won 40%.

Whether you like it or not, it represents democracy. A lot of people are fed up with German energy policy, German immigration policy, German social policy, radical environmentalism. And what did the Germans do? They immediately said, even though they have 152 seats in their parliament, the second-largest, no party—no left-wing, right-wing, centrist party—will make an alliance with them to get a majority of seats under parliamentarian democracy to run the government.

In other words, even though they had the greatest increase in their popularity, they were ostracized because somebody declared them unfit, even though they had a mandate of the people to be the second-most representative party of Germany.

In March, in Romania, a kind of an obscure conservative, right-wing candidate came out of nowhere, Calin Georgescu. And he, in the first round, he came in at the top. And he was predicted, this May, that he might be the elected prime minister of Romania.

And what happened? They declared him unfit. They said that he was—does this sound familiar—colluding with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Putin’s puppet. And therefore, they removed him from further consideration. They took him off the ballot.

There was no supreme court above that court, as there was in the United States, that said, “You can’t do that.” So, he’s off the ballot. He can’t be even considered, even though he was the largest vote-getter.

And then we come to this week’s news that Marine Le Pen, the head of the most conservative party in France, who has got enormous momentum—enormous momentum because of the violence of radical Islamic groups inside France, the open borders, the dissatisfaction with the blank check given Ukraine, etc. I could go on and on. Many of the same problems that we’re dealing with here—the far-left agenda.

It was probably scheduled to get more votes than anybody. And she had a pretty good chance, in three or four years, to replace French President Emmanuel Macron. And the high court did what? They said that she had expropriated funds, campaign funds. In other words, that she was blending—does this sound familiar—blending her own campaign with funds allotted from the European Union for other purposes. In other words, there was a distinction without a difference.

In other words, they only applied this law to her because they were terrified she was going to win in the next presidential election.

But that wasn’t the end. Does this sound familiar? Then they—the court, without a jury—sentenced her to four years in prison, two years under house arrest, maybe two years suspended. So, they’re going to take her out of the political atmosphere. Does that sound familiar? What am I getting at?

Given all these lectures we’re getting from Europeans about the pristine nature of democracy there and our bastardized form here, they have, essentially, in three major countries in Europe, eliminated any alternative to the orthodox, left-wing, socialist norm because they feared it was going to win. They always thought they were a fringe group, but now they think they’re gonna win. So, they’re de facto gone, the candidates.

And second, they’re copying the left wing, chapter and verse, of the United States. They saw what they did to Donald Trump and they said, “That is a good thing to do. We can do better.” And they have done better. Where they were unable to destroy Trump and only made him stronger, the more they tried to destroy him, the Europeans succeeded.

So, how ironic that we are the bastions of democracy, at least we ward off threats to it in a way that’s far more effective than the so-called guardians of democracy in Europe.

Today, even with President Trump’s victory, leftist elites have their tentacles in every aspect of our government.

Democratic Sen. Coons: 'Your Average Middle American' Is Too Stupid to Find Greenland on a Map

 

While speaking to CNN's Dana Bash on Monday morning, Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE), provided Republicans with the perfect opportunity when it comes to the issue of getting involved with Greenland. 

Coons was trying to highlight his party's issue with the Trump administration looking to get involved with Greenland for the sake of national security. As Townhall covered all last week, Vice President JD Vance and Second Lady Usha Vance traveled to Greenland, where they met with American Guardians at a U.S. Space Force base on the island. The Democratic senator claims he wants to see the administration focus on other issues, arguing that perhaps Americans are hoping for that as well. He couldn't just say that, though. He had to insult these Americans in the process as well.

In remarks that the Rapid Response 47 X account aptly noted amounted to Democrats "SHOWING THEIR TRUE COLORS," Coons offered that "your average Middle American" couldn't even find Greenland on a map, implying that they were too stupid. 

"Look, your average Trump voters laughs at us and says 'he's owning the libs,' and your average Middle American says 'why are you wasting your time on Greenland? I can't even find it on a map!'"

A fuller clip shared by Bash doesn't exactly help, as Coons laughed over President Donald Trump's remarks about his interest in the territory, even calling them "insane." Without missing a beat, after he insulted "your average Middle American," Coons went on to fearmonger about threatening the NATO alliance, as he also mentioned concerns from the Danes and Canadians. 

The senator also went on to stress that "we have to focus on the two issues that I said were the main issues to the Democratic Party and working Americans." If that's really the case, why would Coons make such an insulting point about part of the country, and one that Republicans aptly capitalize on.

SHOWING THEIR TRUE COLORS: Democrat Sen. @ChrisCoons thinks "your average Middle American" is too stupid to find Greenland on a map. pic.twitter.com/ethsbnBWgT

— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) March 31, 2025

"We could spend all of our time huffing and puffing about how ridiculous it is, but look, your average Trump voter laughs at us and says, 'He's owning the libs.'" That's what Sen. @ChrisCoons told me on @InsidePolitics about President Trump not ruling out taking Greenland by… pic.twitter.com/JxCf7zcm7o

— Dana Bash (@DanaBashCNN) March 31, 2025

That's not a good look for the senator, least of all because Greenland isn't that difficult to find on a map. It's a massive island located in North America, just northeast of the United States and Canada. Further, why did Coons, whose state isn't actually located in "Middle America," feel the need to focus on a certain part of the country?

The remarks insulting "your average Middle American" has been trending over X for Monday. Coons has not posted about those remarks from his own X accounts, though he did share another part of that same interview from his political account, to do with claims against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk. 

One of those Republicans chiming in to express outrage about Coons remarks included someone who is much closer to Middle America, Rep. Lisa McClain (R-MI), who also serves as the House Republican Conference chairwoman.

"Unbelievable! Democrats cannot contain their hatred for President Trump and the millions of Americans who proudly supported Republicans in November," she posted, sharing a clip.

McClain also addressed other insulting remarks against everyday Americans from other Democrats, including Hillary Clinton when running for president in 2016, remarks she's since doubled down on, and then President Joe Biden. 

"First they called us 'deplorables,' then they called us 'garbage,' and now we’re just stupid," she added in her post.

A White House aide provided Townhall with a statement on Coons' remarks, one which also referenced Clinton's "deplorables" insult. "The deplorable comment stuck because it perfectly sums up how Democrats really feel. This is how they talk behind closed doors--they have nothing but contempt for everyday Americans," the aide said. 

Unbelievable! Democrats cannot contain their hatred for President Trump and the millions of Americans who proudly supported Republicans in November.

First they called us “deplorables,” then they called us “garbage,” and now we’re just stupid. https://t.co/Z1CNt5auQD

— Lisa McClain (@LisaForCongress) March 31, 2025

Every single day, here at Townhall, we will stand up and FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT against the radical left and deliver the conservative reporting our readers deserve.