Donald Trump and his Manufactured Immigration Crisis.

[saveliberty]

Well inner city America, the Democrats are more concerned with Central American gangs than the ones you face.

These illegal immigrants fear lawlessness, yet have no problem breaking ours to enter. Makes you wonder....

 

[Coyote]

Donald Trump's signature campaign issue was immigration. He fired up his supporters, creating images of ravening hordes of Mexican invaders raping our women and killing our children. He never lets us forget that those countries "don't send us the best they send us their worst". Be afraid. They're destroying America according to Donald Trump.

What happens if there is no immigration crisis? What happens if border apprehensions are at a 46 year LOW? What does a man like Trump do? He creates a crisis as a vehicle to implement some pretty horrific policies, to beat the nationalist drums, and unite us in fear that "the other" is going to take over decent hardworking white Americans.

And the horrible thing is - he is pretty damn successful at it. Enough so that we ignore the reality in favor of Trump World. We ignore working together on a much needed SANE and SUBSTANTIAL immigration overhaul in favor of a crisis management approach to immigration based on hordes that simply aren't there and myths that are blatently untrue.

Analysis | There’s no immigration crisis, and these charts prove it

Myth No. 1: Undocumented immigrants are flooding into the United States

In fiscal 2017, apprehensions of immigrants entering illegally at the Southwest border (a proxy for the total number of individuals crossing the border illegally) hit their lowest level in 46 years.

Myth No. 2: Undocumented immigrants bring crime

The reality is just the opposite: A large body of social-science literature has demonstrated that immigrants, legal or otherwise, commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans. This chart, using Texas Department of Public Safety data compiled by the libertarian Cato Institute, illustrates this quite clearly.

Myth No. 3: Immigrants take our jobs and lower our wages

This is a more complicated question than the previous two. The best information comes from a massive summary of the literature published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) in 2017. “Most studies find little effect of immigration on the employment of natives,” that report concluded. In other words, no, immigrants are not taking your jobs.

Myth No. 4: Immigrants are a drain on the economy

In fact, research by the Cato Institute has found that poor noncitizens are considerably less likely than poor native-born Americans to use public assistance programs.​

It is misleading to cite 2017 border apprehension statistics since there was a significant drop due to the "Trump Effect", in other words "uh oh there's a new sheriff in town". However they have again spiked in 2018. Regardless of snapshot statistics, we have had serious problems at the border for decades including drug trafficking, human trafficking, kids being sold into the sex trade, murders, and thousands of immigrants dying in the desert, in train box cars, or non air conditioned trucks. It is a total mess for us and very very dangerous for the immigrants.
Illegal Border Crossings Spike in March

Donald Trump's signature campaign issue was immigration. He fired up his supporters, creating images of ravening hordes of Mexican invaders raping our women and killing our children. He never lets us forget that those countries "don't send us the best they send us their worst". Be afraid. They're destroying America according to Donald Trump.

What happens if there is no immigration crisis? What happens if border apprehensions are at a 46 year LOW? What does a man like Trump do? He creates a crisis as a vehicle to implement some pretty horrific policies, to beat the nationalist drums, and unite us in fear that "the other" is going to take over decent hardworking white Americans.

And the horrible thing is - he is pretty damn successful at it. Enough so that we ignore the reality in favor of Trump World. We ignore working together on a much needed SANE and SUBSTANTIAL immigration overhaul in favor of a crisis management approach to immigration based on hordes that simply aren't there and myths that are blatently untrue.

Analysis | There’s no immigration crisis, and these charts prove it

Myth No. 1: Undocumented immigrants are flooding into the United States

In fiscal 2017, apprehensions of immigrants entering illegally at the Southwest border (a proxy for the total number of individuals crossing the border illegally) hit their lowest level in 46 years.

Myth No. 2: Undocumented immigrants bring crime

The reality is just the opposite: A large body of social-science literature has demonstrated that immigrants, legal or otherwise, commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans. This chart, using Texas Department of Public Safety data compiled by the libertarian Cato Institute, illustrates this quite clearly.

Myth No. 3: Immigrants take our jobs and lower our wages

This is a more complicated question than the previous two. The best information comes from a massive summary of the literature published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) in 2017. “Most studies find little effect of immigration on the employment of natives,” that report concluded. In other words, no, immigrants are not taking your jobs.

Myth No. 4: Immigrants are a drain on the economy

In fact, research by the Cato Institute has found that poor noncitizens are considerably less likely than poor native-born Americans to use public assistance programs.​

Why don't you visit every one of the tens of thousands of Angle Families and tell them the illegal that killed their loved one was a figment of their imagination. Their family members were permanently separated form them. Get back to us on the results, will ya?


.

Who said it was a figment of their imagination? Oh wait, that was you.

Their family members were killed by illegal immigrants who also happened to be violent. That is not reflective of those who are otherwise law abiding but for entering this country illegally.

That is like saying ban all guns because some people commit crimes with them.

In addition...are you implying that forceably separating all illegal immigrant children from their parents is some how justifiable because some illegal immigrants committed crimes that permantly seperate some families?

 

[Manonthestreet]

How the Democrats Lost Their Way on Immigration - The Atlantic

 

[Coyote]

I wrote this in a pm but I am going to add it here, because it illustrates how this could be better handled and how this administration creates it’s own crises through piss poor planning. Policies are created with out thought to how as to how they will be implemented, who is affected, what different agencies will need to or have on hand for it, in fact agencies are often caught flat footed. They create their own crises rather than resolving what is a problem but not a crisis

You do not implement any policy with out planning for what it entails, something this administration honestly seems incapable of and the media is doing it’s job in this regard. Why don’t they allow the media and even block congressmen from viewing the children in some of these facilities?

You cannot detain families indefinitely in primative spartan austere (those were their word not mine) tent cities. Trump is enamored with Arepeo there. If you want to be coldly practical, the optics are bad. If you care about people, violence, rape and risks to children increase. You have thousands of people with nothing to do but wait. And you have wardens who are often violent too. Look at refugee camps in Europe and Australia as an example.

If you are going to detain families, you need to set things up before you begin. You need shelter, food, clean water, sanitation and safety.

You also need to decide how long it is humane to detain them. 20 days is what the Flores settlement mandated, almost 3 weeks. That is a reasonable time for those whose only crime is to enter the US illegally.

So what next? You hire enough immigration judges and staff to ensure that all petitions are heard and adjudicated within 3 weeks.

And if they can’t be? For those people, you assign a caseworker (and you have to hire enough) and put them under electronic detention and let them go.

THEN you implement the policy and no one will be caught with their pants down scrambling for space, funding and losing children in the system. This is a problem, not a crises requiring urgent action and no time for planning.


.

 

[Theowl32]

Liberal white American women folks. They keep proving me right.

The left wing gasbags won't watch that. Go ahead.

 

[Coyote]

How the Democrats Lost Their Way on Immigration - The Atlantic

Good article, thanks for being one of the few to actually provide something substantive!

 

[Coyote]

Wow...really good well written thoughtful article....covering all sides. Can’t thank you enough for bringing it here.

From the research I heard, and I will have to find the source, illegal immigration’s impact on wages is minimal to non-exhistent but for one group of Americans, those without a high school diploma working in low wage jobs, and they are the ones in competition with illegals for the same jobs who have seen their wages go down some.

Manonthestreet’s article concludes with this and I agree:

None of this means that liberals should oppose immigration. Entry to the United States is, for starters, a boon to immigrants and to the family members back home to whom they send money. It should be valued on these moral grounds alone. But immigration benefits the economy, too. Because immigrants are more likely than native-born Americans to be of working age, they improve the ratio of workers to retirees, which helps keep programs like Social Security and Medicare solvent. Immigration has also been found to boost productivity, and the National Academies report finds that “natives’ incomes rise in aggregate as a result of immigration.”

The problem is that, although economists differ about the extent of the damage, immigration hurts the Americans with whom immigrants compete. And since more than a quarter of America’s recent immigrants lack even a high-school diploma or its equivalent, immigration particularly hurts the least-educated native workers, the very people who are already struggling the most. America’s immigration system, in other words, pits two of the groups liberals care about most—the native-born poor and the immigrant poor—against each other.​

One way of mitigating this problem would be to scrap the current system, which allows immigrants living in the U.S. to bring certain close relatives to the country, in efavor of what Donald Trump in February called a “merit based” approach that prioritizes highly skilled and educated workers. The problem with this idea, from a liberal perspective, is its cruelty. It denies many immigrants who are already here the ability to reunite with their loved ones. And it flouts the country’s best traditions. Would we remove from the Statue of Liberty the poem welcoming the “poor,” the “wretched,” and the “homeless”?​

 

[Coyote]

Donald Trump's signature campaign issue was immigration. He fired up his supporters, creating images of ravening hordes of Mexican invaders raping our women and killing our children. He never lets us forget that those countries "don't send us the best they send us their worst". Be afraid. They're destroying America according to Donald Trump.

What happens if there is no immigration crisis? What happens if border apprehensions are at a 46 year LOW? What does a man like Trump do? He creates a crisis as a vehicle to implement some pretty horrific policies, to beat the nationalist drums, and unite us in fear that "the other" is going to take over decent hardworking white Americans.

And the horrible thing is - he is pretty damn successful at it. Enough so that we ignore the reality in favor of Trump World. We ignore working together on a much needed SANE and SUBSTANTIAL immigration overhaul in favor of a crisis management approach to immigration based on hordes that simply aren't there and myths that are blatently untrue.

Analysis | There’s no immigration crisis, and these charts prove it

Myth No. 1: Undocumented immigrants are flooding into the United States

In fiscal 2017, apprehensions of immigrants entering illegally at the Southwest border (a proxy for the total number of individuals crossing the border illegally) hit their lowest level in 46 years.

Myth No. 2: Undocumented immigrants bring crime

The reality is just the opposite: A large body of social-science literature has demonstrated that immigrants, legal or otherwise, commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans. This chart, using Texas Department of Public Safety data compiled by the libertarian Cato Institute, illustrates this quite clearly.

Myth No. 3: Immigrants take our jobs and lower our wages

This is a more complicated question than the previous two. The best information comes from a massive summary of the literature published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) in 2017. “Most studies find little effect of immigration on the employment of natives,” that report concluded. In other words, no, immigrants are not taking your jobs.

Myth No. 4: Immigrants are a drain on the economy

In fact, research by the Cato Institute has found that poor noncitizens are considerably less likely than poor native-born Americans to use public assistance programs.​

Just as it was impossible to believe Obama could be on the diametric WRONG side of EVERY issue for EIGHT YEARS straight BY ACCIDENT, Coyote, you are convincing me by your constant inscrutably pro-Anything that isn't good for America (and Americans) that it IS indeed possible to stuff a dog turd into an empty skull, light it on one end, and the resultant glow given off pass as though there was actually someone home.

So, you can’t actually address any of the arguments, just lob creative insults? (For the record that one is several notches above the norm around here)...I will slot you into the Obama Derangement Syndrome category and won’t hold my breath expecting to see anything substantive from you.

 

[toobfreak]

So, you can’t actually address any of the arguments, just lob creative insults? (For the record that one is several notches above the norm around here)...

Sure I addressed your arguments! You just have to read into the abstract because I didn't think they needed spelled out. For one thing, there is no such thing as Obama Derangement Syndrome------ no one ever used that phrase when he was in office and are only stealing it now from Trump.

As to addressing the arguments: Illegals are:

1. A threat to the breakdown of the rule of law.
2. Contribute nothing to our culture but further burden.
3. Legals can get a visa to do menial labour here and go home.
4. Illegals take jobs.
5. Illegals increase crime.
6. They contribute to overpopulation.
7. They lower income for Americans.
8. They tax our legal, financial, medical and political infrastructure

There is absolutely no benefit to illegal immigration. We don't want them, we don't need them. Any country which has no control over their borders and who enters, is a country in serious disarray and decay.

 

[OKTexas]

Donald Trump's signature campaign issue was immigration. He fired up his supporters, creating images of ravening hordes of Mexican invaders raping our women and killing our children. He never lets us forget that those countries "don't send us the best they send us their worst". Be afraid. They're destroying America according to Donald Trump.

What happens if there is no immigration crisis? What happens if border apprehensions are at a 46 year LOW? What does a man like Trump do? He creates a crisis as a vehicle to implement some pretty horrific policies, to beat the nationalist drums, and unite us in fear that "the other" is going to take over decent hardworking white Americans.

And the horrible thing is - he is pretty damn successful at it. Enough so that we ignore the reality in favor of Trump World. We ignore working together on a much needed SANE and SUBSTANTIAL immigration overhaul in favor of a crisis management approach to immigration based on hordes that simply aren't there and myths that are blatently untrue.

Analysis | There’s no immigration crisis, and these charts prove it

Myth No. 1: Undocumented immigrants are flooding into the United States

In fiscal 2017, apprehensions of immigrants entering illegally at the Southwest border (a proxy for the total number of individuals crossing the border illegally) hit their lowest level in 46 years.

Myth No. 2: Undocumented immigrants bring crime

The reality is just the opposite: A large body of social-science literature has demonstrated that immigrants, legal or otherwise, commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans. This chart, using Texas Department of Public Safety data compiled by the libertarian Cato Institute, illustrates this quite clearly.

Myth No. 3: Immigrants take our jobs and lower our wages

This is a more complicated question than the previous two. The best information comes from a massive summary of the literature published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) in 2017. “Most studies find little effect of immigration on the employment of natives,” that report concluded. In other words, no, immigrants are not taking your jobs.

Myth No. 4: Immigrants are a drain on the economy

In fact, research by the Cato Institute has found that poor noncitizens are considerably less likely than poor native-born Americans to use public assistance programs.​

It is misleading to cite 2017 border apprehension statistics since there was a significant drop due to the "Trump Effect", in other words "uh oh there's a new sheriff in town". However they have again spiked in 2018. Regardless of snapshot statistics, we have had serious problems at the border for decades including drug trafficking, human trafficking, kids being sold into the sex trade, murders, and thousands of immigrants dying in the desert, in train box cars, or non air conditioned trucks. It is a total mess for us and very very dangerous for the immigrants.
Illegal Border Crossings Spike in March

Donald Trump's signature campaign issue was immigration. He fired up his supporters, creating images of ravening hordes of Mexican invaders raping our women and killing our children. He never lets us forget that those countries "don't send us the best they send us their worst". Be afraid. They're destroying America according to Donald Trump.

What happens if there is no immigration crisis? What happens if border apprehensions are at a 46 year LOW? What does a man like Trump do? He creates a crisis as a vehicle to implement some pretty horrific policies, to beat the nationalist drums, and unite us in fear that "the other" is going to take over decent hardworking white Americans.

And the horrible thing is - he is pretty damn successful at it. Enough so that we ignore the reality in favor of Trump World. We ignore working together on a much needed SANE and SUBSTANTIAL immigration overhaul in favor of a crisis management approach to immigration based on hordes that simply aren't there and myths that are blatently untrue.

Analysis | There’s no immigration crisis, and these charts prove it

Myth No. 1: Undocumented immigrants are flooding into the United States

In fiscal 2017, apprehensions of immigrants entering illegally at the Southwest border (a proxy for the total number of individuals crossing the border illegally) hit their lowest level in 46 years.

Myth No. 2: Undocumented immigrants bring crime

The reality is just the opposite: A large body of social-science literature has demonstrated that immigrants, legal or otherwise, commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans. This chart, using Texas Department of Public Safety data compiled by the libertarian Cato Institute, illustrates this quite clearly.

Myth No. 3: Immigrants take our jobs and lower our wages

This is a more complicated question than the previous two. The best information comes from a massive summary of the literature published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) in 2017. “Most studies find little effect of immigration on the employment of natives,” that report concluded. In other words, no, immigrants are not taking your jobs.

Myth No. 4: Immigrants are a drain on the economy

In fact, research by the Cato Institute has found that poor noncitizens are considerably less likely than poor native-born Americans to use public assistance programs.​

Why don't you visit every one of the tens of thousands of Angle Families and tell them the illegal that killed their loved one was a figment of their imagination. Their family members were permanently separated form them. Get back to us on the results, will ya?


.

Who said it was a figment of their imagination? Oh wait, that was you.

Their family members were killed by illegal immigrants who also happened to be violent. That is not reflective of those who are otherwise law abiding but for entering this country illegally.

That is like saying ban all guns because some people commit crimes with them.

In addition...are you implying that forceably separating all illegal immigrant children from their parents is some how justifiable because some illegal immigrants committed crimes that permantly seperate some families?

I'm saying what ever is required is justified. I've seen interviews with people who stopped short of our borders when they heard their kids would be separated, they decided they would stay in Mexico. That was before the order was receded, where do you think they are now? In the last 7 years more than 260,000 crimes, including almost 500 murders, have been committed in my State alone. No we don't need to import more crime and poverty just because you folks want an issue for elections and future voters.

Now we have an asshole running for the president of Mexico that is telling people to flood our borders. It's time to put our military on the southern border and put a stop to this shit by what ever means necessary.


.

 

[IsaacNewton]

Donald Trump's signature campaign issue was immigration. He fired up his supporters, creating images of ravening hordes of Mexican invaders raping our women and killing our children. He never lets us forget that those countries "don't send us the best they send us their worst". Be afraid. They're destroying America according to Donald Trump.

What happens if there is no immigration crisis? What happens if border apprehensions are at a 46 year LOW? What does a man like Trump do? He creates a crisis as a vehicle to implement some pretty horrific policies, to beat the nationalist drums, and unite us in fear that "the other" is going to take over decent hardworking white Americans.

And the horrible thing is - he is pretty damn successful at it. Enough so that we ignore the reality in favor of Trump World. We ignore working together on a much needed SANE and SUBSTANTIAL immigration overhaul in favor of a crisis management approach to immigration based on hordes that simply aren't there and myths that are blatently untrue.

Analysis | There’s no immigration crisis, and these charts prove it

Myth No. 1: Undocumented immigrants are flooding into the United States

In fiscal 2017, apprehensions of immigrants entering illegally at the Southwest border (a proxy for the total number of individuals crossing the border illegally) hit their lowest level in 46 years.

Myth No. 2: Undocumented immigrants bring crime

The reality is just the opposite: A large body of social-science literature has demonstrated that immigrants, legal or otherwise, commit crime at lower rates than native-born Americans. This chart, using Texas Department of Public Safety data compiled by the libertarian Cato Institute, illustrates this quite clearly.

Myth No. 3: Immigrants take our jobs and lower our wages

This is a more complicated question than the previous two. The best information comes from a massive summary of the literature published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) in 2017. “Most studies find little effect of immigration on the employment of natives,” that report concluded. In other words, no, immigrants are not taking your jobs.

Myth No. 4: Immigrants are a drain on the economy

In fact, research by the Cato Institute has found that poor noncitizens are considerably less likely than poor native-born Americans to use public assistance programs.​

Republicans in general live on the fear card, Fake Fox News exists to keep as many conservatives in constant abject fear as possible. The Republican party has used fear for 30+ years as it's core value. Trump has just taken that to it's most lowlife conclusion. They use it because fear is the most useful shortcut to anger, which they turn into votes. As not by the OP it is how Republicans create false issues and make them seem 'imminent and about to kill us' so their base recoils in terror and then anger and then goes and votes on entire falsehoods.

How To Manipulate The Ignorant 101.

 

[Meathead]

How To Manipulate The Ignorant 101.

Pussyhats and Trumpophobia?

 

[OKTexas]

Wow...really good well written thoughtful article....covering all sides. Can’t thank you enough for bringing it here.

From the research I heard, and I will have to find the source, illegal immigration’s impact on wages is minimal to non-exhistent but for one group of Americans, those without a high school diploma working in low wage jobs, and they are the ones in competition with illegals for the same jobs who have seen their wages go down some.

Manonthestreet’s article concludes with this and I agree:

None of this means that liberals should oppose immigration. Entry to the United States is, for starters, a boon to immigrants and to the family members back home to whom they send money. It should be valued on these moral grounds alone. But immigration benefits the economy, too. Because immigrants are more likely than native-born Americans to be of working age, they improve the ratio of workers to retirees, which helps keep programs like Social Security and Medicare solvent. Immigration has also been found to boost productivity, and the National Academies report finds that “natives’ incomes rise in aggregate as a result of immigration.”

The problem is that, although economists differ about the extent of the damage, immigration hurts the Americans with whom immigrants compete. And since more than a quarter of America’s recent immigrants lack even a high-school diploma or its equivalent, immigration particularly hurts the least-educated native workers, the very people who are already struggling the most. America’s immigration system, in other words, pits two of the groups liberals care about most—the native-born poor and the immigrant poor—against each other.​

One way of mitigating this problem would be to scrap the current system, which allows immigrants living in the U.S. to bring certain close relatives to the country, in efavor of what Donald Trump in February called a “merit based” approach that prioritizes highly skilled and educated workers. The problem with this idea, from a liberal perspective, is its cruelty. It denies many immigrants who are already here the ability to reunite with their loved ones. And it flouts the country’s best traditions. Would we remove from the Statue of Liberty the poem welcoming the “poor,” the “wretched,” and the “homeless”?​

What this doesn't address is the pressure placed on housing prices, schools flooded by non-English speakers, health care systems, transportation, judicial system and other infrastructure. All in conflict with lower skilled CITIZENS and the price paid by taxpayers.

If you folks want to be these big fantastic humanitarians, go down and change their countries on your own dime, don't try to change our country on our dime. BTW the heat index in Honduras in March and April reaches about 125 degrees by about 10 AM.


.

 

[irosie91]

[QUOTE="Coyote, post: 20209943, member:

THE ONES WHO DON'T COUNT ANYWAY--as per coyote----the ones impacted by immigrant cheap labor___

.>>>>>>>>

From the research I heard, and I will have to find the source, illegal immigration’s impact on wages is minimal to non-exhistent but for one group of Americans, those without a high school diploma working in low wage jobs, and they are the ones in competition with illegals for the same jobs who have seen their wages go down some.

so true----it is only the low class slobs that suffer from immigration regarding JOBS---
coyote insists -- "THAT TRASH DON'T COUNT"

coyote ain't touched at all

 

[xyz]

The really scary part is the way he is demonizing immigrants is really similar to how the Nazis demonized Jews.

Now Trump is certainly not Hitler and history does not repeat itself in exactly the same way, but there are parallels which can lead to similar courses of events.

 

[irosie91]

The really scary part is the way he is demonizing immigrants is really similar to how the Nazis demonized Jews.

Now Trump is certainly not Hitler and history does not repeat itself in exactly the same way, but there are parallels which can lead to similar courses of events.

there are always "parallels"--------like----it rained that day-------and most people got wet. And now for reality-----Trump did not INVENT the refugee issue. Anyone who has played with Arizonians and/or Texans over the years know that MEXICAN refugees are a BANE (in their eyes) Anyone who has been
conscious over the past few years knows that the Islamic mess thruout the world is a crisis in LOTS OF PLACES There have been refugee issues way back. In the late 1800s---
there were people who LYNCHED blacks in New York City------why? most impoverished Irish refuges who saw their low paying jobs disappearing as black fled the segregated south -----REMEMBER?

 

[Muhammed]

Think about who is going to empty you bed pan in twenty years.....some multi generation failed white trash who justify their existence by proclaiming they are superior to Muslims and Mexicans, or an immigrant who is willing to work for the American dream....... Median age 38.

You're a disgusting bigot.

I love it when you anti-white racist jackass party of slavery supporters let your anti-white bigotry show because it motivates white people to vote. You helped put Trump in the White House.

 

[Muhammed]

The really scary part is the way he is demonizing immigrants is really similar to how the Nazis demonized Jews.

Now Trump is certainly not Hitler and history does not repeat itself in exactly the same way, but there are parallels which can lead to similar courses of events.

Trump does not demonize immigrants. He marries them.

 

[Vandalshandle]

The really scary part is the way he is demonizing immigrants is really similar to how the Nazis demonized Jews.

Now Trump is certainly not Hitler and history does not repeat itself in exactly the same way, but there are parallels which can lead to similar courses of events.

Absolutely correct. One of the first steps is to dehumanize the scapegoats. Trump has done this by calling Mexicans "rapists" and "murderers", and "animals" who
"infest" our society.

 

[Olde Europe]

The really scary part is the way he is demonizing immigrants is really similar to how the Nazis demonized Jews.

Now Trump is certainly not Hitler and history does not repeat itself in exactly the same way, but there are parallels which can lead to similar courses of events.

Absolutely correct. One of the first steps is to dehumanize the scapegoats. Trump has done this by calling Mexicans "rapists" and "murderers", and "animals" who "infest" our society.

The even scarier part is that Trump probably didn't do this because he actually believes it. He did it to scare the shit out of his base, to fan the flames of xenophobia, and then present himself as the savior - by way of inflicting brutality on kids. He took the kids hostage to squeeze as much political capital out of them as possible.

It is always the same way to justify brutality, that is, present yourself, America, poor Americans in particular, and his marks, as victims. Being a victim obviates the demands of humanity, contributes to the dehumanization of the perpetrator, and garners consent to pretty much all kinds of strikes "back". As we've seen on this thread, being a victim also trumps well-documented facts, particularly those demonstrating that, well, there is not all that much to the loudly proclaimed victim status.

Once you've assigned to the Other the status of perpetrator, you no longer even have to consider their suffering, the ordeal they went through, the pains of losing their home, the fears that drove them to leave, the threats that made their lives unbearable. Nothing, not a peep, from the xenophobic crowd on any of that. Nothing about the suffering of "separated" kids. It doesn't seem to pop up on their radar. And even the monumental incompetence of the current mal-administration that added to the gratuitously inflicted brutality is easily forgiven:

Nobody in a position of authority in the Republican Party seems to have the faintest idea how to govern the country. And, on the border, children who once were hostages to political gamesmanship have traded that status for being hostages to political incompetence. Cruelty has many faces. This one is the one wearing a clown nose.​