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Trumps reign of fear may soon get a whole lot worse. Heres what to look for.
This was explicitly labeled an opinion piece in the paper.
Trump’s reign of fear may soon get a whole lot worse. Here’s what to look for.
By Greg Sargent February 13 at 10:14 AM
THE MORNING PLUM:
Top Trump adviser Stephen Miller, who is widely described as a chief engineer of Trump’s “America first” agenda, made the rounds on the Sunday shows, where he talked about the future of two crucial pillars in that agenda: The “Muslim ban,” and the reports of stepped-up deportation raids that have been circulating. He vowed that the White House would soon offer a new version of the ban, and defended the deportation raids as necessary to “saving many American lives.”
Both have been met with extreme blowback, and the White House has retreated (a bit) on both. But this is just the beginning. Here’s what may be really going on: These policies may merely be designed to lay the groundwork for something much more ambitious to come — it’s plausible that they may constitute a test run, an initial effort to gauge just how far the administration can go in limiting legal immigration and in expelling undocumented immigrants with longtime ties to U.S. communities. ... Miller’s comments on the Sunday shows about what is coming make this perfectly clear. Let’s take each topic in turn.
....
The stepped-up deportation raids. The latest reports indicate that as many as 600 people have been swept up in new deportation raids across at least 11 states, and immigration advocates say that the raids are targeting low-level offenders, and not just the people convicted of crimes that had previously been the priority. As the New York Times notes, it remains unclear whether this is merely stepped-up enforcement-as-usual or whether it reflects a deliberate expansion in the direction of the mass deportations that Trump promised.
What’s important to understand here, though, is that Trump and the White House are keeping the answer to that question ambiguous. While some officials have claimed this is routine enforcement directed at criminals, Trump himself suggested* that the latest raids may amount to more than this. ... Now note how Miller handled this issue. First Miller asserted that the raids were targeting criminals. But then, when CBS’s John Dickerson flatly asked Miller whether those who have not committed any crime other than being here illegally should feel worried, Miller answered: “Look, it’s not for me to tell people how to feel or not to feel.” ... In other words, maybe, just maybe, we are, or will be, targeting non-criminals, too. This is the most sensible reading of the Trump administration’s intentions, particularly in light of the other recent Trump executive order on immigration, which does away with former president Barack Obama’s old enforcement priorities (de-prioritizing the removal of low-level offenders) and vastly expands the pool of undocumented immigrants who are now targets for deportation.
....
Greg Sargent writes The Plum Line blog, a reported opinion blog with a liberal slant -- what you might call “opinionated reporting” from the left. Follow @theplumlinegs
By Greg Sargent February 13 at 10:14 AM
THE MORNING PLUM:
Top Trump adviser Stephen Miller, who is widely described as a chief engineer of Trump’s “America first” agenda, made the rounds on the Sunday shows, where he talked about the future of two crucial pillars in that agenda: The “Muslim ban,” and the reports of stepped-up deportation raids that have been circulating. He vowed that the White House would soon offer a new version of the ban, and defended the deportation raids as necessary to “saving many American lives.”
Both have been met with extreme blowback, and the White House has retreated (a bit) on both. But this is just the beginning. Here’s what may be really going on: These policies may merely be designed to lay the groundwork for something much more ambitious to come — it’s plausible that they may constitute a test run, an initial effort to gauge just how far the administration can go in limiting legal immigration and in expelling undocumented immigrants with longtime ties to U.S. communities. ... Miller’s comments on the Sunday shows about what is coming make this perfectly clear. Let’s take each topic in turn.
....
The stepped-up deportation raids. The latest reports indicate that as many as 600 people have been swept up in new deportation raids across at least 11 states, and immigration advocates say that the raids are targeting low-level offenders, and not just the people convicted of crimes that had previously been the priority. As the New York Times notes, it remains unclear whether this is merely stepped-up enforcement-as-usual or whether it reflects a deliberate expansion in the direction of the mass deportations that Trump promised.
What’s important to understand here, though, is that Trump and the White House are keeping the answer to that question ambiguous. While some officials have claimed this is routine enforcement directed at criminals, Trump himself suggested* that the latest raids may amount to more than this. ... Now note how Miller handled this issue. First Miller asserted that the raids were targeting criminals. But then, when CBS’s John Dickerson flatly asked Miller whether those who have not committed any crime other than being here illegally should feel worried, Miller answered: “Look, it’s not for me to tell people how to feel or not to feel.” ... In other words, maybe, just maybe, we are, or will be, targeting non-criminals, too. This is the most sensible reading of the Trump administration’s intentions, particularly in light of the other recent Trump executive order on immigration, which does away with former president Barack Obama’s old enforcement priorities (de-prioritizing the removal of low-level offenders) and vastly expands the pool of undocumented immigrants who are now targets for deportation.
....
Greg Sargent writes The Plum Line blog, a reported opinion blog with a liberal slant -- what you might call “opinionated reporting” from the left. Follow @theplumlinegs
*
The crackdown on illegal criminals is merely the keeping of my campaign promise. Gang members, drug dealers & others are being removed!
*
Link to tweet
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