September 24, 2023

"I'm actually in favor of immigration—legal immigration. High fences, wide gates."

"Politicians in the past have appealed to xenophobia and bigotry in calling for a tough border policy. My call for a tough border comes from a different place. It comes from compassion and humanitarian conscience. I call upon all Americans, of every party and political persuasion, to face facts. President Biden's loose border policy has been a disaster. Under Biden, it's easier for migrants to enter illegally than legally. His policy is tantamount to "narrow gate, no fence.'"

Writes Robert F. Kennedy Jr., in "Biden's Border Policies Have Made Every U.S. City a 'Border Town'" (Newsweek).

44 comments:

Kate said...

Bobby's video from a couple of months ago of his tour of the Yuma port of entry is engrossing.

tim in vermont said...

"Politicians in the past have appealed to xenophobia and bigotry"

Name one. I mean a major politician with actual political power, then give me the quote.

Jersey Fled said...

When he’s right, he’s right.

R C Belaire said...

High fences, narrow gates, Bobby. Anything else is demographic suicide.

Cheryl said...

He definitely could have discussed his border policy without the needless demonizing. I’ve been pro-immigrant, pro-tight immigration policy for my whole life and I can assure RFKJ that I’m not racist.

This is exactly the kind of velvet-glove demonizing that has to stop.

Larry J said...

My wife is a legal immigrant. She complied with the laws to attend college in the US. After we married, she complied with the laws to become a permanent resident. This was in 1983, and back then, we had to sign paperwork stating that if either of us had to go on public assistance for any reason, she could be deported. Several years later, she complied with the laws to become a naturalized US citizen. She worked a career as a nurse, paid a lot of taxes, and is now retired. Through it all, she obeyed the laws. I guess that makes her a chump. She could have come here illegally, got free stuff from the government, worked illegally, and paid no taxes like the cool kids are doing.

chickelit said...

The complete lack of fence on Biden’s part only makes sense to spite Trump. So much of O’Biden’s policy is just reactionary—in reaction to Trump.

chickelit said...

Who are the Biden Admin’s strongest advocates of the current policy? AOC? Obama? Why are they so conspicuously silent? Something stinks.

Leland said...

Im skeptical that he really believes that notion and would govern accordingly. Plenty of politicians have made similar comments and then refused to build a wall. Oh, there is a gate, but only for those that are already law abiding.

Temujin said...

"It comes from compassion and humanitarian conscience."

I think the vast majority of Americans look at immigration this way. Or...at least they used to before our politicians ignored the border for so long, eventually turning it over to the Worst Administration in History. Now? Now it's a deluge of human trafficking, drugs, and young men with no job skills. Oh boy.

Proper immigration should come from compassion and conscience. But it also has to come from need. Our need- as a nation. Business need, productivity need. These need to be addressed as well. Surely we're not going to be producing what is needed without help from other people coming in from other nations. We're just not educating our own people well enough to give them the necessary skills. So we will need proper immigration. Kennedy never talks about this end of it.

Dave Begley said...

Uncle Ted started this disaster. I don’t trust Bobby.

EdwdLny said...

Well, that's nice junior, but, where the hell have you been for the past 30ish years. This isn't a new phenomenon at least in border communities. Only since multiple lib shit holes have been introduced to the reality of the 3rd world invasion that they have promoted for decades has it become a "problem ". Only very recently has their virtue signaling been put to the test, and unsurprisingly they have failed, again. So, junior you and your ilk are directly responsible for this ongoing self inflicted catastrophe, this concerted effort to erase those folks who have the chutzpah to disagree with the left. And it's only now that you notice, how convenient. What you say is bullshit because before today what you've said and done is nothing. You're a lib, another self serving shit concerned Only with how you can benefit. Not unlike every other lib, fascist twat. You're no different than traitor Joey bidet selling the country out to the chicoms and our other enemies. Bugger off.

Bob Boyd said...

Politicians in the past have appealed to xenophobia and bigotry in calling for a tough border policy.

Mr. Kennedy,

When you say a politician appealed to xenophobia and bigotry, everyone is going to assume you mean Trump and you know that. But stop and think for a moment.
When you say a politician appealed to xenophobia and bigotry, you are saying those things are living in the hearts of many millions of Americans when in fact, almost all of those Trump supporting Americans agree with what you said next. They support legal immigration. They believe we need immigration policy that makes sense for our country and our economy as well as our humanitarian impulses. For that these Americans, the ones who actually pay the price of bad immigration policy, have been slandered as racist haters by the establishment of both parties.
When you repeat this vile narrative, you are slandering the very voters you are trying to win over. You are distancing yourself from them. You are driving a wedge, not bringing people together. You are fomenting fear and hate and division. You are calling them evil and small and mean and ignorant and foolish. You sound like just another establishment politician.
You want to campaign against Trump, great. Attack his policies and his performance honestly. Don't make the same mistake most of the Republican primary field keeps making over and over again. You can clearly see the results of doing that.
I want to think you are better than that and smarter than that. I like you, sir. I'm glad you're in the race. I want you to do well. I really do. But don't go for the low hanging fruit. It's poisonous.

Let the lie come into the world. Let it even triumph. But not through you, Mr. Kennedy, not through you.

JAORE said...

"Politicians in the past have appealed to xenophobia and bigotry in calling for a tough border policy. My call for a tough border comes from a different place. It comes from compassion and humanitarian conscience."

Although we both lashed our slaves, my neighbor does so out of cruelty and bigotry. I lashed them for their educational benefit and to prepare them for the real world.

Others cheat on their wives because they are rutting pigs. I do so to spread love across the universe.

My rose smells sweet. Yours reeks of manure.

Amadeus 48 said...

RFKJr is right.

Original Mike said...

It's a lie you see constantly in the press that conservatives are opposed to immigration.. It angers me every time I see it (which is one reason they do it, of course). The opposition is to the absolute shit-show going on now.

tommyesq said...

"Politicians in the past have appealed to xenophobia and bigotry"

Name one. I mean a major politician with actual political power, then give me the quote.

Well, FDR and his Dem supporters certainly did their best to keep Jews from escaping Europe to America in the late '30's and early '40's.

Wince said...

RFKJ fails to mention how Biden’s policy has done more to stoke — by lived experience — the reaction he calls “xenophobia and bigotry“ among traditional Democrat voters than any “tough border” policy argument.

NorthOfTheOneOhOne aka Doug Emhoff's Pimp Hand said...

I call upon all Americans, of every party and political persuasion, to face facts. President Biden's loose border policy has been a disaster.

Hardly! I'm sure we'll have some lovely big migrant riots come next summer! All according to plan.

tommyesq said...

"Politicians in the past have appealed to xenophobia and bigotry"

Name one. I mean a major politician with actual political power, then give me the quote.

A long-sitting Senator in 2006 spoke about jailing employers who hire “illegals,” said sanctuary cities shouldn’t be allowed to violate federal law, and argued a fence was needed stop “tons” of drugs coming into the country from “corrupt Mexico.” He went on to say “But, let me tell you, we can build a fence 40 stories high – unless you change the dynamic in Mexico and – and you will not like this, and – punish American employers who knowingly violate the law when, in fact, they hire illegals. Unless you do those two things, all the rest is window dressing... And the reason why I add that parenthetically, why I believe the fence is needed does not have anything to do with immigration as much as drugs... And let me tell you something folks, people are driving across that border with tons, tons, hear me, tons of everything from byproducts for methamphetamine to cocaine to heroin and it’s all coming up through corrupt Mexico.”

The speaker - Senator Joseph Biden.

He went on to say that he opposed granting driver’s licenses to undocumented immigrants and that he would not allow so-called sanctuary cities to ignore federal law.

FleetUSA said...

I think he's parroting DJT's position.

boatbuilder said...

I have a liberal buddy who is married to a woman whose parents emigrated from Jamaica. He was denouncing Trump and those like myself who advocate for border enforcement as xenophobic racists.

I noted that his wife's parents went through the legal immigration process to become citizens--long and difficult. That the current non-enforcement regime grossly and unfairly punishes the law-abiding. I said that perhaps we should reform legal immigration, but if we are going to allow "illegal" immigration to flourish then there is no reason for line-cutters to abide by the law.

He said that he had never thought of it that way.
I did say he's a liberal, right?


Tina Trent said...

Some other facts include the destruction of self-made middle and professional careers by massive legal immigration. When the wealthiest .001% of citizens from poor and chaotic countries prefer to come here rather than fix their own nations, they take over professional occupations by driving down salaries and getting preferential treatment by medical and other schools that love the premium they can charge foreign students while soaking citizens who have spent their lifetimes subsidizing the very same "nonprofit" institutions being poached by wealthy foreigners.

Thirty years ago, I watched several brilliant and hardworking friends struggle to compete -- financially, not intellectually -- with the children of foreign elites for limited berths in medical schools and then internships at hospitals funded by American taxpayers.

One would think Kennedy could grasp this. That he chooses not to do so in the hope of not being called a racist (and being able to smear others as racist) tells me all I need to know about how he would conduct himself in office.

Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...

The collective left - the people I talk to here in leftwing zombie town - they all agree with Rachel Maddow - "what BORDER CRISIS?"

LOL.

Breezy said...

A trickle of Dems have awoken to the disaster of open borders. Now, let’s see the deluge. Abbott’s not stopped the buses to NYC.
Thank goodness for the moral strength of Gov. Abbott.

Heartless Aztec said...

One word on immigration: chary.

Cheryl said...

Original Mike, yes exactly. This issue makes me so mad! We have dear friends from another country who would gladly immigrate, but can’t. They would have great employment here, be super neighbors—instead we have to watch this torrent of trafficked people over the border. It’s depressing and distressing.

BUMBLE BEE said...

Hey Cheryl, didn't you notice that the vetting process has not been followed. The current arrivals have court their hearings 8 years out from now.

https://michaelyon.substack.com/p/invasion-usa?utm_source=profile&utm_medium=reader2

BUMBLE BEE said...

There are laws governing immigration, passed by DEMOCRATS.

planetgeo said...

I am a legal immigrant, now a proud and productive U.S. citizen. And I know many others like me. There isn't a single one of us who cheers the current policy or who believes it's being done for noble motives of any kind. And we're incredulous that it's even a matter of serious discussion or debate.

It's a complete con. On BOTH sides of the aisle. The Biden puppet management team is doing it to stuff the ballot box and to overwhelm the U.S. social services and financial system (Cloward-Piven), and the GOPe are fully but quietly supporting it for cheap labor and retail sales.

America has never been, nor is it now, a xenophobic country. Quite the opposite. So it astounds legal immigrants like me that this con still is in play with the enthusiastic amplification of the complicit media.

Narr said...

On immigration, I'm firmly in the middle, just as I am with abortion.

I strongly oppose it for some groups, and strongly support it for others.

n.n said...

I favor emigration reform to mitigate progress and collateral damage at both ends of the bridge and throughout. I favor immigration that is not compelled by circumstance or social progress. I oppose all policies of diversity, inequity, exclusion (DIE) (e.g. albinophobia, coups without borders). #HateLovesAbortion

Larry J said...

boatbuilder said...

"I noted that his wife's parents went through the legal immigration process to become citizens--long and difficult. That the current non-enforcement regime grossly and unfairly punishes the law-abiding. I said that perhaps we should reform legal immigration, but if we are going to allow "illegal" immigration to flourish then there is no reason for line-cutters to abide by the law.

He said that he had never thought of it that way."

I know quite a few legal immigrants. Every one of them that I know hate illegal immigration. No one likes to feel like a chump for following the rules.

Regulated legal immigration brings in many good people every year. Unregulated illegal immigration like we're seeing under Biden brings in millions of people, some no doubt good but many no doubt not good.

Larry J said...

boatbuilder said...

"I noted that his wife's parents went through the legal immigration process to become citizens--long and difficult. That the current non-enforcement regime grossly and unfairly punishes the law-abiding. I said that perhaps we should reform legal immigration, but if we are going to allow "illegal" immigration to flourish then there is no reason for line-cutters to abide by the law.

He said that he had never thought of it that way."

I know quite a few legal immigrants. Every one of them that I know hate illegal immigration. No one likes to feel like a chump for following the rules.

Regulated legal immigration brings in many good people every year. Unregulated illegal immigration like we're seeing under Biden brings in millions of people, some no doubt good but many no doubt not good.

Political Junkie said...

High fences and no gates

Yancey Ward said...

RFK is saying the right things, but I don't believe he would actually lift a finger to implement those things. It is the wedge he is using to get the nomination, and it is a smart political move on his part.

The Democrats' plan is simple- flood the country with 10-20 million newly illegal immigrants by 2028, then offer to do nothing about keeping future ones out in return for an amnesty and quick track citizenship. In the interim, you put as many of the asylum applicants as you can in cities like Dallas, Houston, San Antonio, Miami, Cleveland, Cincinnati, etc. and then accidentally register them as voters send them ballots in 2024 and 2026. As 2020 showed, it won't matter how openly fraudulent it all is, by the time anyone can file a court objection the election is over and in the books.

n.n said...

From rare and safe to overt, full blown Democratic gerrymandering.

Bill R said...

That is entirely correct, well-reasoned, and very well said.

I wonder who wrote it for him.

Joe Smith said...

My father's side were legal immigrants via Ellis Island.

My mom's side got here on the boat after the Mayflower or thereabout.

I love legal immigrants.

But we, as a nation, should be able to pick and choose.

There are only so many illiterate (even in their own language) ditch-diggers that are needed.

And I say this as the grandson of a ditch-digger...

n.n said...

Does he support the Chinese' Tibet democratic solution?

mikee said...

Feigned interest in RFKJr is a means of deflecting interest from dementia Joe. Prove me wrong!

rcocean said...

RFK is a fake. He's in favor of Amnesty for those here. He's in favor of letting everyone in Legally. He just doesn't like "Chaos at the border".

He wants to attack Biden but has the same end goal

And i do NOT love immigrants. Fuck the sainted "immigrant". Constantly talking about how wonderful immigrants are is what got us into this mess. Some immigration is OK. But we have over 300 million Americans, and we don't need anymore.

But lets be honest, this issue, like every other issue in the USA, is about $$ or people playing class warfare disguised as virtue signalling. Immigration means cheap labor, which means the well off get even richer. But hey lets not talk about that, lets talk about how we love all those poor immigrants. Such hard workers! Natural conservatives, donchaknow.

Joe Smith said...

"And i do NOT love immigrants. Fuck the sainted "immigrant". Constantly talking about how wonderful immigrants are is what got us into this mess. Some immigration is OK. But we have over 300 million Americans, and we don't need anymore."

Some immigrants (cough Musk) create hundreds of thousands of jobs.

I want to be able to pick the smart ones...

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Immigration and naturalisation has been two agencies for a long time - one the legal immigration side that works hard to keep people out (we have foreign adoptees as sons and a guest worker DIL), and one the illegal enforcement side that is strangely divided: rank-and-file who believe that criminals should be sent back, and supervisors who believe that sticking it to The Man is good because it kicks decent people in the balls.