mikkeneko:

justsomeantifas:

Trump is not “blaming democrats,” he’s threatening them and using child separations as leverage.

I really hate how Trump’s comments which he blames democrats for child separation is being characterized that he’s literally blaming them for creating and enacting this policy. This whole controversy surrounding these comments is simply pitting him as a liar who is trying to shift the blame. All the news I’ve read and watched is correcting his tweets and comments by pointing to Jeff Sessions’ “zero tolerance,” policy to prove that Trump is bullshitting, but that’s not what he’s saying! What he’s implying is much, MUCH worse.

What’s happening here is that he’s using this children for leverage and he’s telling the democrats that this is on their hands until he gets what he wants (the wall funding, stricter immigration policies, visa changes, etc). His seemingly non-sensical statements make more sense when you look at it this way too…

This is About His Immigration Bill

Trump has said several times that the democrats are the ones who have the power here and they’re the ones that are stalling immigration reform, despite republicans being the majority. This is because the GOP has been trying to draft and discuss bills on immigration for months now. Trump’s reaction is to blame democrats which we’ve seen him do this before when his healthcare bill failed to pass! This is a tweet back in May when Trump first started to “blame democrats”:

This tweet specifically was reported on as if Trump’s first and second sentence were opposite statements. On one hand he says the democrats must end the “law,” on the other he demands stricter immigration policy. But what he’s actually doing is using Jeff Sessions’ zero tolerance policy as leverage for the wall, ending catch and release, chain migration, and the lottery visa. These are all explicitly what his State of the Union mandate listed as the requirements for him to sign immigration reform which a vote is now coming up for. 

Now, it’s important to look at the immigration bill that his own administration helped draft to fully understand this tweet and his “blame the democrats” comments. The “compromise bill” is supposed to get the republicans to all agree on a yes vote. There has been a divide amongst moderate and conservative republicans who have not been able to agree on immigration reform. He blames the democrats because none of them side with either GOP path, meaning there haven’t had enough votes to move anything along. Again, he’s blaming the democrats in the same way he did during the healthcare vote.

Stephen Miller, who helped draft this bill, has been trying to convince hesitant republicans that Trump will support this bill and that it won’t hurt them during reelections. It took days of work to draft and campaign this bill and Trump fucked that up when he told Fox News that he definitely wouldn’t sign the compromise bill. Later, the White House had to correct his statement because he didn’t know what he was talking about. Conservative republicans got scared off by Trump’s flip flopping and it became more unlikely that the bill will pass. So he targets democrats. This because he’s trying to sway them to vote with his administration’s bill and he’s using the threat of family separation to do so.

The GOP Bill is Big Fucking a Lie

The “compromise bill” has been getting semi-positive media attention because it claims to end family separation and will create a pathway for Dreamers. However, the GOP bill summary doesn’t reflect what’s actually in the bill – instead it will just allow kids to be detained like adults. And THIS is what Trump has wanted. Children and families will lose the extra legal protections they have in detentions which includes the rule that says they should not be detained any longer than necessary. Instead they would be kept with their families but held in detention indefinitely. 

Trump signed a memo earlier this year to prepare for this adjustment because it would mean more detainees. The memo ordered the government to progress on the moves to end the practice and requested a list of facilities, including military facilities, where additional detainees could be held. Which we now know is happening at military camps, and we know there’s plans for expansion.

Now if we look at Trump’s comments we will see that he’s trying to threaten pressure on democrats to vote with this compromise bill. The bill getting positive attention is exactly what helps Trump and as long as people believe this bill will help stop child separations there WILL be pressure on democrats to vote for it. Note that the bill also give Trump the money and increased security for his border wall he’s been demanding. It will eliminate the “diversity visa lottery,” curb family-based immigration, and in an effort to reduce the number of asylum seekers, the bill will make initial screenings harder and allow the US to turn back asylum seekers who come through Mexico. There’s a reason the GOP has been trying to sell this lie that the bill will end family separations, because what’s actually in it is bullshit. 

It’s About Leverage

This shouldn’t even be a surprise since Trump tried to pull the same move with DACA. He ended the program explicitly to use them as leverage with the democrats to get funding for his wall and implementing stricter immigration policies. And here’s what a White House official said about using family separation to force negotiations: “The president has told folks that in lieu of the laws being fixed, he wants to use the enforcement mechanisms that we have. The thinking in the building is to force people to the table.” He’s been playing with people’s lives for a while now and that’s exactly what’s happening here.

What Trump is implying becomes a bit more clear when you see several tweets on the subject:

See? He’s not literally blaming them for the policy, he’s telling them that it’s their fault the family separation practice continues because they won’t give him what he wants. He’s saying that these actions will continue as long as democrats hold out on voting for his immigration reform. He dehumanizing Black and brown bodies so much that he just views them as a bargaining chip and it doesn’t matter who is killed or hurt in the process. Because that’s what he does; Trump wants something so he creates a problem, he tells you that he can stop the problem if you just give him what he wants, and if you don’t then he blames you for the problem he helped create.

And it’s so fucking annoying that the news is quick to jump on this “haha Trump is stupid and says things that make no sense,” they don’t look at what his administration is actually doing or saying. Hell, Jeff Sessions said it outright this morning:

“If we build a wall, we pass some legislation, we close some loopholes, we won’t face these terrible choices.”

He’s talking about his own policy! He’s openly holding these children hostage in exchange for stricter immigration policies!  

Just a reminder that if your stalker ex says “Come back to me or I’ll kill your dog,” and you don’t go back to him, and he kills your dog, the dog-killer is still him. Not you.