Focus on the Border Wall

#Facts on Border Security: 1.) Arrests of migrants crossing the border illegally have declined precipitously over the last two decades, from a high of 1.6 million in 2000 to 396,000 in fiscal 2018. 2.) The largest number of "illegals" are individuals who remain in the U.S. after their visas expire, with Canadians at the top of the list. 3) According to the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, 17,000 "criminal aliens" crossed the border in 2018. The vast majority were convicted only of non-violent crimes, traffic offenses and entering the U.S. illegally. Nor has anyone who crossed the border ever been found to be responsible for a terrorist act. 4.) The number of asylum seekers jumped from 55,5984 in 2017 to 92,959 in 2018. The vast majority of them are families traveling from Central America to present themselves to authorities at the border, as the law entitles them to do. 5.) Most illicit drugs enter the U.S. through cars or trucks passing through points of entry, or are smuggled in from the sea.

#National Emergency Was Unnecessary: In his rambling speech announcing a national emergency, President Trump said: "I could do the wall over a longer period of time. I didn't need to do this. But  I'd rather do it much faster." "And I didn't have to do it for the election -- 2020. And the other reason we're up here talking about this is because of the election -- because they want to try to win an election, which it looks like they're not going to be able to do."

#National Emergency Flip-Flop: Donald Trump had a different view of declaring national emergencies when Barack Obama was president. His tweet of November 20, 2014 said: "The pubs must not allow pres Obama to subvert the Constitution of the US for his own benefit & because he is unable to negotiate w/Congress."

In going the national emergency route, Trump is proposing to get $3.6 billion from military construction funding; $2.5 billion from the Department of Defense drug-interdiction program; and $600 million from the Treasury Department's asset-forfeiture fund. He may also tap disaster-relief funding to get to a total of $8 billion. Tapping military construction funding may be an act of bad timing, as a shocking report has recently come out revealing severe deficiencies in the housing of military families. The Pentagon has pledged to find the money to fix the many problems being faced by the military families.

#National Drug Control Strategy: The National Drug Control Strategy report says nothing about building a wall on the border. As "Newsweek" points out, the words "wall" and "barrier" are never mentioned in the context that Trump uses them.

#No Military Threat: Air Force Gen. Terrence O'Shaughnessy told a Senate committee that he sees no military threat coming from the southern border.

#Trump on Wall Building Progress: Trump boasted on December 11, 2018 that: "Our Southern Border is now secure and will remain that way." On January 2, 2019, he claimed that "much of the wall has already been fully restored or built." On February 1, 2019, Trump said: "The chant should be 'Finish the wall.' "

President Trump told his El Paso rally attendees that "right now" the border wall was being built on the Rio Grande River. No such wall was being built.

#Safety of El Paso: In his State of the Union speech, President Trump said the following about El Paso: "The border city of El Paso Tex. used to have extremely high rates of violent crime --one of the highest in the entire country, and considered one of our nation's most dangerous cities. Now, immediately upon its building, with powerful barriers in place, El Paso is one of the safest cities in our country." El Paso never had "one of the highest" violent crime rates in the country. The drop in El Paso's crime rates (as did crime nationwide) occurred before the wall was ever built.

#Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has warned every Republican that "if you don't stand behind this president, we're not going to stand behind you, when it comes to the wall. This is the defining moment of his presidency. It's not just about a wall, it's him being treated different than any other president." Trump is being treated "different": He is being treated more leniently than any other president.

#Border Wall Polling: According to a Gallup poll published this past month, 60 percent oppose significant new construction border walls -- 81 percent support a path to citizenship for immigrants in the U.S. illegally; 61 percent oppose deporting all immigrants in the U.S. illegally back to their home country -- 75 percent favor hiring more Border Patrol agents.