The New York Daily News (yeah, I know) has an interesting article, where they interviewed some Trump supporters. But these weren’t regular Trump supporters, they are members of groups that tend to not like Trump very much. Americans like women, Muslims, Blacks, Asians, Mexicans, and from India. People who have been insulted by Trump in the harshest ways, and yet they plan on voting for him.
For example, there is the Mexican-American woman whose father emigrated illegally from Mexico in the 80s and became a citizen 8 years later, but she now thinks that Trump should build his wall to keep other illegals out.
Or the Muslim-American teenager who is the son of two immigrants who fled Afghanistan, but who supports Trump’s “temporary” ban on Muslims entering the US because:
I’m Shia, and most of the refugees are radical Sunnis. … It’s not that I don’t like them; it’s that I don’t support what they do. … They killed my people and stuff, so I don’t want them to come here.
Then there is the Black pastor who has even spoken at numerous Trump rallies, because Trump will “create jobs”. He also blames the Democrats and Obama for currently heightened racial tensions.
And finally the woman who claims that Trump is not sexist because he insults everyone:
I really don’t care about what he says to other women. Women have fought very long to be treated equally to men. … If he talks about women and talks about men the same, then there’s really no difference.
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I had an Uber driver the other day who, responding to a radio story, volunteered that Obama had been a very good president especially in light of what he’s had to deal with. I agreed and said a lot of people will miss Obama even if they don’t realize it now.
He went on to say how he thought Trump would be good too because he knows how to pick good advisers and be tough with adversaries.
I just don’t know how someone makes that jump.
About muslim point.. or actually in general immigration. As someone who came to this country legally and worked my way to become citizen, I must say I have found few things extremely surprising and can’t have my head wrapped around them. Here are few:
1. America has very liberal immigration (legal) policy in general. And I am thankful to American people to have it this way. So what I do not understand here is that I have no right (when I came or before I came) to dictate to American people what their immigration policy should be. I think it was generous and I benefited from it, if it was more strict, I would have respected that as well being the will of people who are welcoming or not welcoming me. So I find, the extremely vocal illegal immigrants sense of entitlement quite surprising.
2. If Democrats (or whoever) think that we should have more generous (more liberal) immigration policy, then they need to ask people to vote for it. I have been to many countries, and never seen so much tolerance of people breaking the law. In fact in one of protests against Trump rallies, I saw a guy waving Mexican flag. So cannot understand what was meant from Mexican flag. I have seen many illegal immigrants rallies where they fly all sort of flags (constitutionally legal), but no one just catch them and deport them. I can tell you in middle east, they will be deported at the spot. Also confusing part is that you are waving Mexican flag to show loyalty to USA? Can’t understand that.
3. Trump may have phrased it poorly, and singling out Muslims may be wrong, but frankly I do not mind very temporary hiatus on immigration to sort things out. Since congress and President do not agree on policies, and both are representing will of some, lets put immigration on ballot directly. But not to uphold current laws despite if you dont agree, is something I cannot understand as well.
And I agree to the woman’s point, Trump is equally jerk to everyone. He made fun of looks of men (Rand Paul etc) before he made fun of Carly. So he is equal opportunity jerk.
This also shows how much people hate Hillary, I will not vote for her, but I will vote for Bernie if he wins nomination.
Hassan – Considering that America is made up virtually entirely of immigrants, why are you surprised that we have a more liberal immigration policy than the Middle East?
There are plenty of countries with a far more liberal immigration policy than the US. For example Canada, and European countries like Sweden and the UK.
Finally, it is hard to believe that Trump deserves the credit you ascribe to him. Trump has never explained how you could possibly tell if someone is a Muslim and thus stop them from entering the US. If your goal is to prevent Muslim terrorists from entering the US, then as you well know, Islam is a popular religion with people of pretty much all ethnicities and from many countries. Do you think asking everyone entering if they are Muslim will stop any terrorists?
Iron Knee, I may have phrased (lack of punctuation) my surprise wrong. I am not surprised at liberal policy, I am surprised at “the extremely vocal illegal immigrants sense of entitlement”. They demand immigration as their right.
I am not talking about Muslim immigration ban, as Muslims are from all races, and a terrorist can pretend to be non-muslim. I am talking about general immigration hiatus till we sort things out (what to deal with illegal immigrants here etc)
Hassan, how does a hiatus on legal immigration do anything? Those who are coming legally go through rigorous and time consuming, (up to 2 or 3 years), of scrutiny. Those that are here illegally will not be stopped by banning those coming legally. We do need to find a way to address our visa system. If terrorists come, that is probably how they will do it.
Illegal immigrants are usually here out of necessity. No jobs at home, and safety from criminals are the two main reasons. After they have been here for a long time, paid taxes, received no benefits from paying those taxes, seeing no way to become a citizen, they probably are understandably unhappy. Many have lived here, some for decades, and have homes, families and a desire to become citizens. They want what all of us have, a sense of belonging to this culture and country that they have worked in and for, for a long time.
WILDWOOD, I think it is fair point to debate, but I am not very rigid on my position.
Your second point, I am not sure waving Mexican flags gives any sense of belonging,
As an immigrant myself I’ll ad my 2 cents on the topic of immigration. I came in as a student on a F1 visa more than 20 years ago and after finding a job and changing to another visa eventually became a citizen. The entire process wasn’t that pleasant mainly because when I was on a visa the visa processing times were painfully slow. Based on my experiences my feeling re immigration are
1) Priority should be given to immigrant to try to come in to the country legally
2) The number of H1-B visas should be much more than what’s allocated to allow the best and the brightest to contribute to the US economy and to create jobs for others
3) There should be different categories of visas depending on the needs of the country eg scientists, waiters etc
I too belong to the camp that thinks sometimes those on the left are too lenient on illegal immigration. Sure some people are needy and they go through a lot to get work and reside in this country. But I think the energy fighting for their rights should go towards fighting for a legal pathway for those people and priority should be given to making the lives of people already in the country, better.
That said I have very little respect for politicians who suggest building a wall and for making other suggestions that would halt immigration in general. A wall is silly and any politician who thinks thats money well spent is not qualified to be a president in my humble opinion.
Hassan, my in-laws were Norwegian, one born here and one born in Norway. They loved this country but they loved.Norway as well and flew a Nowegian flag on specials days, but flew the American flag all other days.
Hassan, you seem to be saying that waving a Mexican flag means you can’t love America. If someone has two children, is it possible for that person to love both children at the same time? One of the things I love about America is that it is full of people who are extremely proud of their heritage, while still thinking of themselves as Americans first.
These poor, misguided souls of so many races, religions,ethnicities, genders, gender identities, and demographic categories yet uncategorized surely are too feeble-minded to realize what their own interests are. It is upon us, the enlightened elite, to contribute to Hillary Clinton’s campaign, to allow it to produce enough 60-second television spots to explain to each group individually how much Trump hates them.
WILDWOOD and Iron Knee, I do not have issue for loving multiple places and waving flags in general, I am just saying if I was illegal immigrant trying to show my love of USA and be accepted, another country flag will be last thing I wave during a protest.
Hassan, I see your point, it’s probably not a very wise thing to do.
Regarding waving a Mexican flag as a protest against Trump, I suggest the possibility that this was a reaction against one of his first major statements as a candidate for the GOP nomination wherein he stated that Mexican immigrants were rapists and murderers.