After Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey said he was proud that his city had the largest Somali community in the United States, President Donald Trump unleashed a vicious rant during a press conference ostensibly about the auto industry: “I wouldn’t be proud to have the largest Somalian―look at their nation. Look how bad their nation is. It’s not even a nation. It’s just people walking around killing each other…They have destroyed Minnesota.”

Trump also penned a social-media post claiming Somali gangs have taken over Minnesota and “are roving the streets looking for ‘prey’ as our wonderful people stay locked in their apartments and houses.” The Hennepin County District Attorney’s Office, which is the top law-enforcement agency overseeing the Minneapolis area, released a video debunking those claims. Nearly 90 percent of Somalis there are legal residents, with 58 percent of them having been born in the United States.

“They contribute nothing…I don’t want them in our country,” Trump added, as he has pushed forward a plan to reduce the nation’s refugee-acceptance program by 90 percent. Somalis actually have revived some downtrodden Minneapolis neighborhoods as they mostly pursue the American dream, but why pick nits? The bulk of the new refugees will be white South Africans, but I’m sure race has absolutely nothing to do with his latest immigration-related tirades and decisions.

It’s seems hardly a coincidence that Trump also has directed ire at Haitian immigrants in Ohio whom he falsely accused of eating pets. His decision to eliminate free-entry days at national parks on the Juneteenth holiday commemorating the end of slavery and Martin Luther King Jr. Day also don’t seem like coincidences. In reality, the only roving gangs that Twin-Cities residents need to worry about are the masked ICE patrols Trump has sent to the region, but that’s apparently the point.

Trump is maligning “garbage,” as he referred to a Somali member of Congress and her “friends,” to justify efforts to quash immigration from non-white countries. Can the GOP stop pretending otherwise?

Conservative media are focusing on Minnesota’s social programs, with City Journal‘s Christopher Rufo explaining that “fraud has allegedly been perpetrated by members of Minnesota’s sizeable Somali community” with “millions of dollars in stolen funds have been sent back to Somalia, where they ultimately landed in the hands of the terror group Al-Shabaab.” Minnesota’s Democratic politicians and media have been loath to “connect the dots” because of their “progressive pieties,” Rufo added.

That may be true and any fraud is appalling, but perhaps one reason for the lack of dot-connecting is Minnesota officials’ fear that the administration and its supporters would react as they have, by blaming the entire Somali community for the criminal acts of a few and using the scandal to justify heavy-handed immigration policies.

There are two schools of conservative immigration thought. The first, to which I subscribe, acknowledges immigrants often flee countries ravaged by crime, tyranny and disorder. That’s why many people come to the United States. Our nation’s settlers fled persecution. My father escaped Nazi Germany, which was literally putting people in ovens (although many Republicans lately have struggled with their views on such horrors). Under this long-standing view, Americans should welcome immigrants, but promote E Pluribus Unum.

The other conservative view, which is clearly embraced by national conservatives and populists, is that America is fundamentally a white, Christian nation and that immigration, to whatever limited degree we allow it, should align with those demographics. Some conservatives still tout the, “we’re only against illegal immigration” canard, but that’s not what’s going on here. Trump’s policies—along with much of the anti-immigration rhetoric on the right these days—are about limiting immigration in general. Minnesota’s Somalis and Springfield’s Haitians are, after all, primarily legal.

No one disputes that law-enforcement should clamp down on government fraud. The root problem is the government freebies themselves, which often are overly generous and lacking in oversight. But it’s not like fraud scandals are confined to immigrant and minority communities. One can find similar scandals involving any ethnic group (including native-born Americans).

The president always doubles down. Following the brouhaha over his comments, Trump said to supporters: “Why is it we only take people from sh**hole countries, right, why can’t we have some people from Norway, Sweden, just a few…We always take people from Somalia, places that are a disaster, dirty, filthy, disgusting, ridden with crime.” It’s clear what he’s saying.

By contrast, in his last presidential speech, Ronald Reagan said, “We lead the world because, unique among nations, we draw our people—our strength—from every country and every corner of the world. And by doing so we continuously renew and enrich our nation.” Reagan was right. Trump is wrong. Americans shouldn’t be ashamed that our nation is a beacon to the tired, poor, huddled masses, but we have reason to be ashamed of him.

This column was first published in The Orange County Register.

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Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency in no small part thanks to his promise to enforce immigration restrictions that the Biden administration largely ignored. Election year polls found more voters preferred Trump over then-president Joe Biden on the issue and even favored his proposals for mass deportations. But the reality of tough border policies is a harsh reality check; since the current administration took office, Americans have cooled on its policies and warmed to immigration.

That’s not to say the country is embracing Biden’s nudge-and-wink approach to border crossings. Instead, people seem to want a middle ground combining enforcement with a touch of humanity.

Immigration Helped Win the White House for Trump

The former president took office with big plans to roll back Trump’s tough first-term immigration policies. That didn’t go well for him as border crossings skyrocketed, alarming the public. In February 2024, Bloomberg polling found a rising percentage of voters calling immigration the “single most important issue'” contributing to lagging numbers for Biden across the swing states he eventually lost.

By April, Harris polling recorded majority (51 percent) support for mass deportations. Thirty percent of Democrats and 46 percent of Republicans wanted to end constitutionally protected birthright citizenship.

Two weeks ago, in a very belated election post-mortem, The New York Times conceded that “as public concern over border security grew, partly in response to Mr. Biden’s own actions, his administration proved catastrophically slow to change course” and ultimately lost voters to his rival.

But that was then. Public attention is now occupied not by images of crowds surging across the border and crimes committed by undocumented immigrants, but by stories of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and often rough tactics. While federal officials have arrested some serious criminals—though the vast majority of those taken into custody have no criminal convictions and only about 5 percent have violent convictions—Americans hear far more stories about worksite raids that scoop up peaceful, hard-working laborers.

Rounding up gangbangers is popular. Separating families is not.

This week, The Marshall Project journalism nonprofit reported that “the Trump administration’s revival of family detention has swept thousands of children into ICE custody. At least 3,800 children under age 18, including 20 infants, have been booked since Trump took office.”

But Harsh Enforcement Alienates the Public

The public isn’t seeing what it expected and that’s affecting people’s opinions.

“As the Trump administration escalates its immigration enforcement efforts, 53% of Americans say it is doing ‘too much’ when it comes to deporting immigrants who are living in the United States illegally,” the Pew Research Center revealed this week. “That share is up from 44% in March.”

As you’d expect, there are sizable differences in views between supporters of the two major political parties. Eighty-six percent of Democrats and independents who lean toward that party oppose the Trump administration’s immigration policies, compared to 20 percent of Republicans and Republican leaners. But opposition is rising in both groups.

Importantly, “47% of Hispanic Republicans say the administration is doing too much, up from 28% in March.” That’s a large part of the electorate that drifted in the GOP’s direction in the last election and could just as easily move away.

This isn’t a sudden shift. By July, Gallup found that support for mass deportations had plunged “with 38% now favoring this as the administration is attempting it, down from 47% last year when it was a Trump campaign promise.” The firm also reported that “support for allowing undocumented immigrants to become U.S. citizens has risen to 78%, up from 70% last year.”

In the same survey, “a record-high 79% of U.S. adults say immigration is a good thing for the country.”

That month, 52 percent of respondents called Trump’s approach to immigration policy “too harsh” in The Economist/YouGov polling.

That is, the Trump administration quickly lost the American people with its approach to border enforcement and hasn’t gained them back. Voters didn’t like Biden immigration policies and opted for something different—as a candidate, the current president was very open about what he planned to do—but they don’t like harsh enforcement any better than they cared for near-total lack of enforcement.

So, what do people want when it comes to immigration?

Americans Want a Humane Middle Ground

Obviously, Americans like a welcoming policy towards immigrants—so long as they follow the rules. That can be a problem, given that the legal path to settling in this country is almost impossible to navigate. A 2023 Cato Institute report by David J. Bier noted that “fewer than 1 percent of people who want to move permanently to the United States can do so legally” and that “immigration is now prohibited in a similar way to alcohol during Prohibition.”

Unfortunately, most people don’t realize that only a very fortunate few can find a legal path to entry.

Americans also agree with the president’s occasional promise to deport “the worst of the worst.” In the recent Pew poll, 97 percent of U.S. adults favor deporting those who are in the country illegally and have committed violent crimes. Fifty-two percent of respondents support deporting undocumented immigrants who commit nonviolent crimes.

That’s a policy with a solid base of support. But, as mentioned above, according to the most recent data crunched by Cato’s Bier, only about 5 percent of those detained had a violent criminal conviction. “Nearly three in four (73 percent) had no criminal conviction.”

Americans want border enforcement. But they’re not overall hostile to immigration—they favor increased legal immigration. They want ICE to target human predators who crossed the border illegally, not workers and their families.

So, there is an opening for a middle ground on border enforcement between Biden’s dereliction of duty and Trump’s iron fist. Arresting and deporting dangerous criminals while creating a credible legal path to immigration could win favor with the American people.

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12/19/1940: U.S. v. Darby argued.

 

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Will a hyperadvanced AI be a danger to humanity? That’s nothing compared to the threat posed by military contractors.

That’s the implicit conclusion of Tron: Ares, the third installment in the series that began with 1982’s Tron. This threequel inverts the previous films’ formula: Rather than humans trying to enter a digital world, Ares tells of an AI (Jared Leto) from inside “the Grid” finding its way into meatspace. It’s a sci-fi spin on a fairy tale formula quite familiar to Disney, which made all three of the Tron films. The AI wants to be a real boy.

Standing in Ares’ way is the tech executive (Evan Peters) who built him and intends to sell him to the highest bidder as a supersoldier who could be easily resurrected infinite times. Having achieved self-awareness, Ares decides it would be more meaningful to live just once. The message is as unsubtle as the film’s pulsating Nine Inch Nails soundtrack: It’s the humans who develop and use AI for malicious ends, not the tech itself, who should worry us.

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The Kennedy Center hosted director Jack O’Brien’s production of The Sound of Music from September to October. O’Brien’s rendition left little to criticize: stunning sets, apt casting, and exquisite vocal performances. Cayleigh Capaldi’s high notes could have fractured the glass chandelier. The 65-year-old musical’s depiction of an us-vs.-them mentality emerging around the Anschluss was particularly poignant in the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination and the Manichean responses to it. The musical’s anti-authoritarian message was unchanged by President Donald Trump’s recent ascension to chairmanship of the center.

The exclusion of “I Have Confidence” and the deviation from the original lyrics of “Something Good” and “Sixteen Going on Seventeen (Reprise)” are the only areas where this production could be improved. There’s nothing wrong with recognizing our capacity for wickedness or the mutual sense of ownership that characterizes marriage.

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