Another migrant missile aimed at America left its launch pad in Honduras this morning, which means we’re in for another eight to nine weeks of tearful tales about the poor, huddled, but determined masses heading for the border with Mexico.
And we’re in for another eight to nine weeks of stories about the Big Fat Meanie in the White House.
But the Big Fat Meanie — that would be President Donald Trump — is not backing down, at least not yet. The partial shutdown of the federal government goes on, as Democrats refuse to pass a funding bill that gives the president what he wants — money for a border wall.
He continues his Twitter war with “Chuck and Nancy” — House Speaker Pelosi and Senate Minority chief Schumer — and says the polling data show that Americans are on his side.
They want the border defended. He agrees. Active-duty troops, the Pentagon announced, will stay for at least another eight months.
Caravan Departs
In Honduras, they apparently haven’t gotten the message.
“Television footage on Monday showed several hundred people in the violent city of San Pedro Sula huddled together and waving Honduran flags as they began a journey that will likely take weeks or even months to reach the U.S.-Mexico border,” Reuters reported Tuesday morning.
About 700 Hondurans started the march north, not for asylum but instead to find a job. “I’m determined to find a good job in the United States,” 24-year-old caravan member Darwin Perez told Reuters. “It’s a difficult road ahead but I hope President Trump’s heart might soften, and that he won’t be so hard and will let us enter.”
And, Reuters reported, “other migrants, some traveling with spouses and children, echoed Perez’s dream to find work in the United States.”
They can dream all they want. Should they make it as far as Tijuana, they have a long wait in line. About 2,500 illegal aliens from the last border strike force remain there, hoping they can get across the border and pursue phony asylum claims.
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Troops To Stay a While
That’s all the more reason to build a wall, and keep American troops on the border, which is what Trump plans to do, the Defense Department announced yesterday.
“In response to the December 27, 2018 request from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Acting Secretary of Defense Pat Shanahan approved Department of Defense assistance to DHS through Sept. 30, 2019,” the DOD announced.
That eight-month extension includes the department’s “transitioning its support at the southwestern border from hardening ports of entry to mobile surveillance and detection, as well as concertina wire emplacement between ports of entry. DOD will continue to provide aviation support.”
Citing a Pentagon spokesman, the Washington Post reported that “the Pentagon has about 2,300 active-duty troops on the southern border assisting the Department of Homeland Security, down from a height of 5,900.” And “about 1,100 soldiers and Marines are assigned to border support in California, with an additional 600 troops in Texas and 650 in Arizona.”
The troopers landed at the border in October to support border agents and reinforce physical barriers.
Trump: Build the Wall
Thus did President Trump again tell open-borders Democrats the shutdown continues until he gets money for a wall.
“A big new Caravan is heading up to our Southern Border from Honduras,” he tweeted this morning. “Tell Nancy and Chuck that a drone flying around will not stop them. Only a Wall will work. Only a Wall, or Steel Barrier, will keep our Country safe! Stop playing political games and end the Shutdown!”
Trump pointed to polling data that show support for his position. “Polls are now showing that people are beginning to understand the Humanitarian Crisis and Crime at the Border,” Trump wrote. “Numbers are going up fast, over 50%. Democrats will soon be known as the Party of Crime. Ridiculous that they don’t want Border Security!”
That datum comes from Rasmussen Reports, which found that “most voters continue to favor strongly controlled borders and reject House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s charge that it is immoral for the United States to build a border wall.”
Fifty-three percent of likely voters “think it is better for the United States to tightly control who comes into the country.”
Last week, the polling organization found that “two-out-of-three voters still think illegal immigration is a serious issue, but nearly half of voters think the government isn’t working hard enough to stop it.”
If those data hold true across the nation, Trump has the support he needs to continue the shutdown until open-borders Democrats surrender.
Photo: AP Images
