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The Case for Open Borders
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The Case for Open Borders

Why Trump and Harris Both Fail on Immigration, with John Washington
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Eight years ago, people were shocked at the insanity of the Trump campaign and his xenophobic border policies, pining for a more civil age where debates were proper and kids weren’t kept in cages.

In 2024, those days seem simpler.

John Washington, staff writer at Arizona Luminaria and author of The Case for Open Borders, joins Useful and reports something that may seem hard to believe: Trump’s campaign promises in 2016 are actually more progressive than either of the candidates’ we saw in this week’s debate.

“Kamala Harris,” he says, “has wholeheartedly embraced policies that are to the right of where Trump was when he took office in 2016.”

And it was all there in the debate. When Trump attacked her for being soft on the border, she didn’t argue that America is a nation of immigrants, built by immigrants. In fact, she didn’t talk about immigrants at all. “She talked about drug smugglers, human traffickers, and people who illegally crossed the border. But she didn't really give any idea of America as a nation of immigrants, which is the most boilerplate standard go-to on the left.”

But in the past three years, what the US considers ‘left’ has shifted drastically. “It's also important to remember where we started,” Washington says. “At the beginning of the Biden-Harris administration, they were asking for a hundred-day moratorium on deportations. Now they've gone way past the center and are at the right.”

The Biden administration in a single term has already deported or expelled over three million people. “He's taken the mantle of Deporter in Chief,” a title that was previously held by Barack Obama.

And as we heard in the debate, Kamala Harris is following in his footsteps. “The policies that she is fighting for are vehemently anti-immigrant. They would raise the asylum threshold, build more wall. They would put more surveillance technology on the U.S.-Mexico border. They would detain people for longer.”

Tell us, Democrats, which of those things counts as a lesser evil than Donald Trump?

Subscribe for the full interview with John Washington, where he describes the real danger of the “they’re eating the pets” hoax, violent reality at the border, how the media is spinning it to protect Biden and Harris, and how borders affect what is happening today in Gaza.

Plus, catch this week’s Thursday Throwdown: We found the WORST moment of the debate (and it’s not about pets)

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Useful Idiots
Useful Idiots with Katie Halper and Aaron Maté
Useful Idiots is an informative and irreverent politics podcast with journalist Aaron Maté and podcaster/writer Katie Halper. Episodes feature on-the-road coverage of the 2020 campaign and exclusive interviews, with humor, commentary and dissection of the politics news of the week. Join Katie and Aaron as they examine important stories that have slipped through the cracks and what the media got wrong – and laugh about whatever is left to laugh about.