Trump Hammers Immigration as Midterm Election Approaches

*By Conor White* Donald Trump may be looking to score points with his base ahead of midterm elections by turning the conversation back to immigration. With one week to go before Election Day, Trump proposed ending birthright immigration with an executive order during an interview for "Axios on HBO" [released Tuesday morning](https://www.axios.com/trump-birthright-citizenship-executive-order-0cf4285a-16c6-48f2-a933-bd71fd72ea82.html). "It was always told to me that you needed a constitutional amendment. Guess what? You don't," the president claimed in the video. Birthright citizenship is protected under the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and any effort to end it would come under immediate legal challenge. Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan broke with Trump to make a firm statement against his proposal shortly after the interview was released. "You cannot end birthright citizenship with an executive order," he said in an interview with Kentucky radio station WVLK. Trump's birthright proposal came one day after the Pentagon said it would send more than 5,000 U.S. troops to the southern border to prepare for what Trump has called an "invasion" of asylum-seeking migrants slowly making their way through Mexico. Some observers see the focus on immigration as politically-motivated. "One gets the sense that he hasn't thought through the details very strongly," David Graham, staff writer at The Atlantic, said about Trump's birthright proposal in an interview Tuesday on Cheddar. "What he's really concerned with is the rhetoric and how it plays politically." "He's remembering 2016 and seeing the magic he got talking about immigration," Graham continued, "Hoping he can recreate that and pull a win out." However, Shannon Vavra, a political reporter at Axios, noted that Trump has long railed against so-called "anchor babies" and other longstanding immigration policies such a "chain migration," which refers to immigrants sponsoring family members to come to the U.S. She said the timing may just be Trump being Trump. "The timing of it is definitely questionable at this point," she said, "but President Trump tends to do what he wants to do." For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/trump-says-hell-end-birthright-citizenship).

More In Politics

Amid COVID-19, Resident Under Italian Lockdown Has Warning for U.S.

Lenore Hawkins, chief macro strategist at Tematica Research, told Cheddar from Lake Como, Italy, that the local populace seems to be taking the directives to stay indoors seriously.

2019 Marked Second-Warmest Year on Record, 2010-19 Hottest Decade on Record

The Earth's average temperature last year was about 1.1 degrees Celsius higher than pre-industrial levels, second only to the record established in 2016.

Oil Price Crash Slams Into U.S. Shale Sector

Swaths of shale producers, many heavily in debt and still recovering from the price crash of 2015, have posted double-digit drops in stock prices in the past 48 hours, with some companies already announcing rounds of layoffs.

Biden Polling Ahead of Sanders in Michigan

Biden and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders will go head to head for the 352 delegates promised on what some are calling ‘Super Tuesday 2.0,’ with a focus on the battleground state of Michigan.

Need 2 Know: Italy Expands Lockdown, Markets Look to Recover

These are the headlines you Need 2 Know for Tuesday, March 10, 2020.

Ralph Nader Won't Fly on Boeing 737 Max Due to 'Excessive Automation'

Consumer advocate Ralph Nader, whose grandniece was killed in that disaster, said that even once the plane makes it back to the skies, he won't fly in it.

Dow Drops 7.8 Percent as Free-Fall in Oil, Virus Fears Slam Markets

The Dow Jones Industrial Average sank 7.8%, its steepest drop since the financial crisis of 2008, as a free-fall in oil prices and worsening fears of fallout from the spreading coronavirus outbreak seize markets. The sharp drops triggered the first automatic halts in trading in two decades.

Oil Prices Plummet Amid Coronavirus, Saudi-Russia Price War

Brent crude, the global benchmark for oil and for U.S. gasoline prices, hovered around $36 a barrel after opening Monday at about $33 -- down from $45 a barrel on Friday and nearly $70 in January.

WHO: 70 Percent of COVID-19 Patients in China Have Recovered

Officials at the World Health Organization said Monday that of about 80,000 people who have been sickened by COVID-19 in China, more than 70 percent have recovered and been discharged from hospitals.

Dow Loses More Than 1,200 Points, Bond Yields Tumble as Oil Crashes

Stocks are falling sharply Monday on Wall Street on a combination of coronavirus fears and plunging oil prices, triggering a brief, automatic halt in trading to let investors catch their breath.

Load More