TRUMP ADVISER SPENT A DECADE USING STREET GANG MS-13 TO JUSTIFY ANTI-IMMIGRANT AGENDA. NOW ITS HAPP
TRUMP ADVISER SPENT A DECADE USING STREET GANG MS-13 TO JUSTIFY ANTI-IMMIGRANT AGENDA. NOW IT’S HAPPENING
Lee Fang
September 15 2017, 8:00 a.m.
IN PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP’S push to restrict immigration to the United States, MS-13 has become the perfect villain. Trump has focused obsessively on the violent street gang tied to immigrants from El Salvador, appearing at events across the country to highlight brutal murders committed by the group, focusing on two teenagers who gang members allegedly hacked to death with machetes.
There’s a political angle to the singular focus on MS-13. The Trump administration has made its strident demands to wipe out the gang in explicit conjunction with sweeping calls to unravel so-called sanctuary city protections, to promote laws to ramp up deportation proceedings and expand the detention of immigrants, to broaden immigrant gang-tracking databases and special gang task forces, to deputize local law enforcement for immigration enforcement, and in recent days, even to justify the repeal of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.
In short, Trump is harnessing the horrors of MS-13 in an attempt to enact much of his immigration agenda.
There is nothing new about Trump’s demonization of immigrants, but his focus on MS-13 does not appear to have a long legacy. The Intercept searched in vain through his speeches and statements during the campaign for a single reference to MS-13 and came up blank. He seems to have discovered the decades-old gang in April, and since then has tweeted about them nine times.
More:
https://theintercept.com/2017/09/15/trump-adviser-spent-a-decade-using-street-gang-ms-13-to-justify-anti-immigrant-agenda-now-its-happening/
Editorials and other articles:
https://www.democraticunderground.com/1016193217
