Trump's Remarks in Roundtable on Border Security, Yuma, AZ IMMIGRATION; June 23, 2020

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Deputy Chief Lundrum wins the prize. He said the word four times.

REMARKS

Remarks by President Trump in Roundtable on Border Security | Yuma, AZ
IMMIGRATION

Issued on: June 23, 2020

Yuma Border Patrol Station
Yuma, Arizona

11:34 A.M. MST

THE PRESIDENT: Well, thank you very much. Great to be here. Beautiful runway. A little warmer than I’m used to, but that’s okay, Doug, right? We have a — I was just given a beautiful picture of the wall. That’s before and after. And that’s quite a difference: one area you walk over, you drive over, you do whatever you want, and other one you say, “Well, I guess we don’t get in.” Here’s another one — just given. That’s great. That’s a different section. Pretty amazing.

{snip}

So with that, I’d like to just introduce Chad Wolf to say a few words about the border — the job we’ve done on general security, not just the southern border. The southern border has been a primary focus, as everyone knows, because tremendous amounts of drugs and other things come down. Human trafficking, we have that down to the lowest number we’ve had in many years. And again, being helped a lot by the length of our wall, which is going to be complete very soon.

So, Chad, say a few words, please.

ACTING SECRETARY WOLF: Well, thank you, Mr. President. And we’re here today as a testament to your leadership and determination to secure our nation’s borders.

{snip}

ACTING COMMISSIONER MORGAN:

{snip}

Our ability to impede, deny, and stop the vast threats that we have have increased because of your leadership and providing us the tools, like the wall system.

{snip}

Stopping infectious disease, like COVID-19, at the border has saved countless lives, and that is due to your leadership.

{snip}

OVERNOR DUCEY:

{snip}

And it’s been your leadership that has allowed there to be real action.

{snip}

SENATOR MCSALLY:

{snip}

So thanks for your leadership and your partnership on this. Welcome back to Arizona.

{snip}

DEPUTY CHIEF LUNDRUM:

{snip}

And it takes a while for the government — for leadership represented here today, for the members, the elected officials here today — it takes a while for those resources to flow in.

{snip}

But now — you know, thank you for your leadership, because now those resources have arrived.

{snip}

And I thank you for the leadership. I thank everybody at the table today for leadership around the room, in order to take on this particular effort and help Yuma Sector Border Patrol in doing what we need to do to help secure the United States.

So thank you very much, Mr. President.

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. Those are incredible numbers.

And I just want to say: This was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to do because we had to raise, you know, large amounts of money. As you were saying, this was one of the biggest projects you’ve ever worked on.

LIEUTENANT GENERAL SEMONITE: Yes, sir.

THE PRESIDENT: It’s a tremendous — you know, you hear it’s a wall, but it’s a wall that’s very big and very long and very powerful. And the Democrats didn’t want to do it. They just didn’t want to do it, Doug, no matter what. It didn’t matter. And these are people that voted in favor of it 10 years ago, but they never got it built because they didn’t know how to build it — because building it is tough, too. But I do that, and we know how to build.

But they tried to block it. They did everything in their power to block it. And it’s very interesting because, in the end, it sort of just went through and the military helped us and we’re getting it built regardless. But they don’t like bringing it up and it’s never mentioned anymore; the wall is never mentioned anymore.

The reason it’s not mentioned: It’s not that we won the battle. It’s that it’s such a compelling thing to have done. Because you see the numbers, and where that wall is going, as you’re saying, it’s like — it’s like magic. You don’t have to do — it saves tremendous manpower and womanpower. It saves tremendous human resources and saves lives.

But they want open borders and they don’t want walls. And they fought harder than anybody I’ve ever seen. And in the end, they quit. They gave up. The reason they gave up: Because, politically, it’s unacceptable to say — especially with this new disease coming in, the pandemic. The new disease coming in, a gift from China. Especially when that happened, and they say, “How can we be putting this…” So they don’t want to talk about the wall anymore. They opposed it. They were strongly opposed to it.

And it was interesting because — you said about the wall — they’d say, “No, no, we don’t need a wall. We can have airplanes flying above. We can have pic- — people taking pictures. We can have drones.” They wanted drones. I say, “What are you going to do? Take pictures of everyone flowing across?” They didn’t want to say. They said, “No, no. Walls — that’s old technology.” No, walls are the greatest technology. They work.

I said — I sort of came up with this; I’m sure somebody did, before — I said there’s two things — because everything changes in the world. They change fast. Change is so fast. You do a computer, and it’s obsolete in two weeks. But two things that have never changed: a wall and a wheel. We’re going to always have wheels, and we’re going to always have walls. And we have the best security wall ever built. And we’ll have it a completed very soon.

And the way you said that was very nice. I appreciated the big difference that it’s made. It’s — it’s really great. Thank you very much. Thank you.

So we’re going to the wall now. And we’re going to see a piece of the wall. We’re not going to be able to cover 500 miles of view, but we’ll be able to cover about 10 yards. But we’ll see a piece of a long — of a long wall that we’re building. And you’ll see — you’ll see what we’re talking about.

We’ll see you over there. Thank you, media. Thank you.

END

12:11 P.M. MST