Trump admin's 'hard-line' on immigration to include mass deportations and closure of southern border

1 year ago

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00:00Next, it's predicted Donald Trump is to name Marco Rubio as his Secretary of State.

00:05The word from insiders at Mar-a-Lago is that it's a done deal awaiting public announcement

00:09this Tuesday.

00:10The appointment of South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem to serve as the next Homeland Security

00:15Secretary is another strong rumor.

00:17But for more on Rubio, who's set to become the face of America abroad, here's Eliza Herbert.

00:26The election was at the heart of Trump's election campaign.

00:29You see it, the criminal invasion, horrible, some horrible, deathly people.

00:35And it is already shaping up to be at the heart of his next term in office.

00:39Stephen Miller, a loyal Trump ally, was the architect of the vast anti-immigration crackdown

00:44during the President-elect's first term.

00:47He will now be his new Deputy Chief of Staff, bringing with him a fixation on national identity.

00:54The reality is, is that the foreign-born population into our country has quadrupled

00:59since 1970.

01:00That's a fact.

01:01The burning issue of border control will be entrusted to immigration hardliner Tom Homan,

01:06who will take the reins as Trump's quote, border czar.

01:10The former police officer was also a key senior immigration advisor during Trump's first term.

01:16He will be tasked with carrying out Trump's promise of the largest deportation effort

01:20in the history of the United States.

01:24Is there a way to carry out mass deportation without separating families?

01:28Of course there is.

01:32Families can be deported together.

01:34The new administration is also set to include staunch supporters of Israel, such as Elise

01:39Stefanik, Trump's pick for the new United Nations ambassador.

01:44She has previously criticised the organisation over what she sees as a lack of support for

01:49Israel's war in Gaza, and garnered international attention recently when she questioned

01:54university presidents over their handling of anti-Semitism during campus protests.

02:00According to the New York Times, the new Secretary of State is expected to be Florida Senator

02:05Marco Rubio.

02:06This is him last year when responding to whether he would call for a ceasefire in Gaza.

02:11Are you filming it?

02:13I want you guys to get this.

02:14I want them to destroy every element of Hamas they can get their hands on.

02:18These people are vicious animals who did horrifying crimes and I hope you guys post that.

02:23And the person expected to oversee national security policy is Michael Waltz, a Florida

02:28representative who has made a name for himself for his virulent criticism of China, a country

02:33often singled out by Donald Trump.

02:37Let's get some further analysis of the possibility of Marco Rubio becoming the US Secretary of

02:42State.

02:43Our guest, Sean Forman, political science professor at Barry University in Miami, Florida.

02:48Sean, thanks for joining us here on France 24.

02:50We appreciate your time.

02:51We just had Marco Rubio there in an archive clip saying that he wants to see Hamas destroyed.

02:59So I can imagine Benjamin Netanyahu must be smiling at the prospect of working with Rubio.

03:06Well good evening.

03:07Thanks for having me on.

03:08Yes, I think the election, the re-election of Donald Trump to a new term in the United

03:13States does have Benjamin Netanyahu very excited and seeing who Donald Trump is naming as his

03:21picks for his national security team makes him even more excited.

03:26Marco Rubio is known to be a war hawk and the quote you played there encapsulates that

03:32perfectly.

03:34That's not a misstatement.

03:36That's the way Marco Rubio has spoken for years, particularly being strong and aggressive

03:41in his support of Israel.

03:43And in terms of the globality of the people named so far, really a tough line on immigration

03:49is to be expected, which of course was Trump's policy.

03:52Yes, I think if we look at the U.S. election results, most people think that the economy

03:59and people's views of inflation and prices were really what drove the election.

04:06Many people also say that they were they were underwhelmed with Kamala Harris and Democrats

04:11messaging.

04:12But I think running through all of that was the issue of immigration.

04:17That has been a big topic of discussion in the United States for years as one of our

04:22fault lines.

04:23So no doubt about it, with a clear election for Donald Trump, that he will select people

04:29that go along with his talking points.

04:33Most of all, his policy advisor, Stephen Miller, is the person who came up with the mass deportation

04:40plan in the past.

04:41So putting him in that position is a signal this is going to happen.

04:45Marco Rubio from Miami is a Cuban-American.

04:48He's a Latino, Spanish-speaking person.

04:52So Marco Rubio will be under a lot of pressure to slow down or to humanize this process.

05:00But it seems like, again, the Trump administration will have a hard line on immigration, will

05:06look to shut the southern border and may even do mass deportations.

05:10Indeed.

05:11I mean, the clip from Tom Homan in the report we've just played had him saying, yes, there's

05:16a way to stop families being split.

05:17That's deport the families all together.

05:19Are we likely to see, do you think, those images of families being split up, children

05:23being put into into cages?

05:25Is this likely to happen again, as it happened in the first Trump presidency?

05:30I suppose it is, if that's the plan that they go forward with.

05:35Again, they're telling us what they say they're going to do.

05:39Now, when it comes actually time to try to round up tens of thousands of people and how

05:47you store them, how you process them, how you send them back to their country of origin,

05:53all that's going to take time and money.

05:56And it's going to be very delicate.

05:57But I think we could see those images.

06:00You know, again, on the selection of Marco Rubio, it's interesting because Marco Rubio

06:04back in 2012 was one of the U.S. senators that was part of a bipartisan deal trying

06:09to come up with a framework to fix immigration, to legalize the people who were here undocumented,

06:17to allow them to stay and become legalized in 2012.

06:21That plan didn't pass.

06:22And in fact, our country has gone even more hard line to the point now where the plan

06:27is, you know, round up and deport people here without proper papers.

06:32So no matter how they do it, it's not going to look good on video.

06:36Sean, how's it going to work between Marco Rubio and Donald Trump if indeed that goes

06:40ahead?

06:402016, Rubio was, well, he said some very, how can I put it?

06:45I'll be diplomatic, unnice things about Donald Trump.

06:48And Donald Trump, you know, he returned the compliment in many ways in spatefuls talking

06:53about little Marco and all that kind of stuff.

06:55They made friends or they made up.

06:57But is this basically the truth about this is that their relationship looks to be as

07:03though it might be something that's quite volatile?

07:06I think it is.

07:07Every relationship with Donald Trump is quite volatile.

07:10That's what we've learned.

07:11He likes you when he likes you.

07:12And when he doesn't, he will make it known.

07:14He will put it on social media.

07:16He will cancel you from his administration.

07:19He'll try to get you canceled in public.

07:21So, yes, I think Marco Rubio in 2016 was the first one to try to take on

07:27Trump directly with insults.

07:29But little Marco was put in his place and he was vanquished from the presidential election.

07:34And instead, he became a right hand man, a lieutenant in the first Trump administration.

07:38And now he's going to have an even bigger role now.

07:40So I think as long as they're getting along and they're on the same page, everything's

07:44great.

07:45But that could change in a minute's notice, just like anybody with Donald Trump.

07:48As you pointed out, Rubio is of Cuban heritage.

07:51It doesn't mean to say that if you are Cuban, your chances of getting to the United States

07:54have improved, does it?

07:56No.

07:57In fact, they may not improve.

08:00For many years in the United States, we had a policy where if you came from Cuba, as long

08:05as you touched U.S. soil, you would get an asylum claim and you could stay.

08:09That was the so-called wet foot, dry foot policy.

08:12Didn't apply to people from other countries.

08:14When Barack Obama was president, he changed that so that you don't get automatic asylum

08:19coming from Cuba.

08:21And even though Marco Rubio is of Cuban heritage, he's favorable towards Cuban American people.

08:28He's not at all favorable towards the Cuban regime.

08:31And he will certainly have a hard line there and not make it easy for people to migrate

08:36from Cuba this way, because it's all part of trying to fix the system, regularize immigration,

08:43but also try to change the regime in Cuba.

08:46So I don't think we're going to see any softening on policy.

08:49In fact, we're going to see an even tougher stance from a Trump-Rubio administration.

08:53That is something that, of course, Trump has promised when he was doing his, well, his

08:59acceptance speech.

09:00We can call it that.

09:01It wasn't yet at that point that he could be accepting it, but certainly looked like

09:05it was all beyond Kamala Harris.

09:08I think the first policy thing he mentioned was borders.

09:10Then it was immigration.

09:11That was the thing.

09:12And then it was economy.

09:14I mean, clearly, Rubio going around the world, representing the USA, the face of American

09:19diplomacy.

09:20Does he have the pedigree?

09:21Final question.

09:22Does he have the pedigree?

09:23I believe he does.

09:24Real quick on the immigration.

09:25I'm in Miami.

09:26I'm in Florida.

09:27We know about the border states.

09:28But immigration became an issue in Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and Michigan.

09:33That's in the north.

09:34That's why Trump won.

09:36But I do think Marco Rubio has been a senator since 2010.

09:39He was a state representative before that.

09:41He's a student of foreign policy.

09:43He's been on the Senate Foreign Relations and Intelligence Committees.

09:48He's traveled the world.

09:49He knows Latin American politics as well as European.

09:52So I do believe he has the pedigree and the experience.

09:54He's not a token pick as a Cuban-American from Miami.

09:58This is a guy who has experience in the U.S. Senate for 14 years now, and he's ready to

10:03be U.S. Secretary of State.

10:04If selected, he'll be approved easily by the U.S. Senate, and he'll have that job.

10:10Sean Foreman, political science professor at Barry University in Miami, Florida.

10:13Thank you very much for joining us and sharing your knowledge of Marco Rubio, the possible

10:20pick for Donald Trump to be his secretary of state.

10:23We await, of course, the confirmation of that.

10:25But thank you to Sean Foreman for joining us.

10:28Pleasure to speak to you, Sam.

10:29Thank you very much.

10:30Time for a very short break.

10:32After that, the news continues.

10:33Stay with us.

Trump admin's 'hard-line' on immigration to include mass deportations and closure of southern border

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