Trump border visit latest: Donald tours 'unfinished wall' and trolls Kamala after demanding Biden take a cognitive test
DONALD Trump is touring an unfinished section of the border wall alongside Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on Wednesday afternoon.
In remarks issued during a security briefing earlier this afternoon, the former president mocked Vice President Kamala Harris over her visit to Texas last week and demanded that Biden take a cognitive test.
“So with that, we’re going over to the border right now, but we’re going to the real part of the border where there are real problems, not a part where you look around and don’t see anybody,” he said.
Harris was widely blasted by Trump and other senior GOP officials for opting to visit El Paso, which is some 800 miles away from the so-called epicenter of the migrant crisis in the Rio Grande Valley.
In an op-ed published in the Washington Times ahead of his visit, Trump called for his immigration policies to be reinstated by Biden, insisting: “I built a wall – Biden built a humanitarian catastrophe.”
“Our nation is being destroyed by Biden’s border crisis," Trump wrote. “The United States must immediately restore the entire set of border security and immigration enforcement measures we put into place — and critically, we must finish the wall.”
Read our Donald Trump live blog for the latest news and updates…
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP: 'I STOPPED WUHAN LAB FUNDING'
Elsewhere in his address, Trump also took credit for stopping funding to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a lab in China where some believe the Covid-19 virus may have leaked from.
Trump said he stopped the funding "innocently" at first, believing China didn't need the US' money.
"We pay money to China, you saw that with the Wuhan lab, we give money to the Wuhan lab, by the way do you notice who stopped it, I stopped it, when I heard,” Trump said.
“It wasn’t about virus at that time, I stopped it because I said why the hell are we giving money to China, it was very simple.”
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP CALLS ON MARK MILLEY TO RESIGN OVER CRITICAL RACE THEORY
Donald Trump ramped up his attacks on Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley in a statement on Wednesday, calling on him to resign for "bowing to the woke mob."
“When Black Lives Matter rioters were threatening to destroy Washington, DC, he practically begged me not to send in the military to stop the riots,” Trump began in a statement.
“To further ingratiate himself with Biden, progressive Media, and the Radical Left, Milley went to Congress and actually defended Critical Race Theory being shoved down the throats of our soldiers. This Marxist, racist anti-American propaganda has no place in our Military.”
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP: 'BORDER WALL WOULD'VE BEEN FINISHED IN TWO MONTHS HAD I WON ELECTION'
Trump claimed that had he won the November vote, the border wall would've been completely finished by January.
"It wouldn't be rusting and rotting," he said. "It would be perfecto."
Trump also accused his presidential successor of "destroying" the country which "all started with a fake election."
"We produced the safest, best border we've ever had and now in a short time it's over," Trump said.
"Biden is destroying our country and it all started with the fake election. The big one [the 2020 presidential election] was won by a different person."
- Luke Kenton
TEXAS DEMS SLAM TRUMP VISIT (PART 2)
Vela and Gonzales were both critical of Abbott.
"Inviting the former president, who incited the January 6th insurrection in an effort to overthrow the government and prevent the peaceful transition of power, is nothing short of a slap in the face to South Texans," Gonzales said.
"And wasting taxpayer dollars to promote the construction of a border wall instead of correcting the failed electrical grid is bad leadership that is further putting Texans’ lives at risk."
He continued: "Instead of coming down to try and divide people by misrepresenting the border community on the national stage, I urge the Governor to work together to enact meaningful policy solutions that will bring real border security."
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP TELLS BIDEN TO PAINT WALL BLACK 'SO MIGRANTS CAN'T CLIMB IT'
DONALD Trump called for President Joe Biden to resume building his border wall on Wednesday and ordered him to paint it black.
"I'm looking and it has to be painted," he said turning round to face an unfinished stretch of the wall. "And the best color to paint it is black. Because if you paint it black, it's so hot, nobody can even try to climb it."
Trump is set to tour portions of the border in Lubbock with Texas Gov. Gregg Abbott and a cohort of Republican lawmakers across the afternoon.
- Luke Kenton
'MAYBE DEMS WANT OPEN BORDERS'
Having claimed for several years that Democrats want the US border abolished, Trump said on Wednesday: “The real question is, do they really want open borders or are they incompetent?”
“There’s only two things; you’re either incompetent or for some reason you have a screw loose and you want to have open borders.”
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP: 'US IS SICK IN ELECTIONS AND THE BORDER'
Donald Trump insisted that the US is in a "sick" state when it comes to the US-Mexico border and its election system in a speech from South Texas.
“We have a sick country,” the former president said, peddling unfounded claims of election fraud. “It’s sick in elections, and it’s sick on the border.”
He also warned that the US was on the verge of becoming a "Banana Republic" and a "third-world country."
Credit: Getty - Luke Kenton
TRUMP TAKES SHOTS AT VP HARRIS
Speaking from Texas on Wednesday, Trump mocked vice President President Kamala Harris' visit to El Paso last week.
“So with that we’re going over to the border right now, but we’re going to the real part of the border where there’s real problems, not a part where you look around and don’t see anybody,” he said.
Harris was widely blasted by Trump and other senior GOP officials for opting to visit El Paso, which is some 800 miles away from the so-called epicenter of the migrant crisis in the Rio Grande Valley.
Credit: The Mega Agency - Luke Kenton
TRUMP MOCKS BIDEN OVER COGNITIVE TEST
Pointing to someone sitting in the crowd during Wednesday's border briefing, Trump said: "There's my doctor right over there. He said, 'You know sir, if you're really smart you should you ought to take the cognitive test.
"Did I ace it?" he asked them, named only as Dr. Ronnie, who replied: "Yes, sir!"
"I aced it Trump continued. "I'd like to see Biden ace it. He's get the first few, there's 35 questions and the firs two or three are pretty easy."
"They're the animals [questions]," interjected the doctor.
"That's a lion, that's a giraffe," Trump joked. "I think he's gonna have a hard time with the first few actually."
Credit: Getty
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP ON WINNING TEXAS: "I LIKE GUNS, GOD AND OIL – THEY DON'T"
Speaking about the 2020 election on Wednesday, Trump reminisced how people had warned him that Texas was going to be closely contested between him and Biden during last year's vote.
"Well, I am in favor of oil, I am in favor of God, and I am in favor of guns, and they're not," Trump said.
"And if you're in Texas and you don't like guns, god and oil – I don't think you're going to do too well – and they didn't do too well."
Trump won the popular vote in Texas with 5,890,347 votes to Biden's 5,259,126.
Credit: Getty - Luke Kenton
TEXAS DEMS SLAM TRUMP VISIT (PART 1)
Two Texas Democrats representing districts Trump is set to visit on Wednesday have blasted former President Donald Trump and Gov. Gregg Abbott for creating a "distracting media circus."
Reps. Filemón Vela and Vicente González said the visit is a distraction both from the serious issues facing Texas and the positive stories of economic development in the region.
"Instead of prioritizing Texans and making sure we grow our economy and get people back to work, Governor Abbott is creating a distracting media circus with a failed former president," said Vela.
"Let’s make one thing clear: the narrative of a violent and insecure border region is blatantly false.
"The border is not a war zone, and the wall Abbott and Trump are trying to get Texans to pay for is not only a waste of their hard-earned money but also an un-American symbol of hatred that separates and intimidates our communities, harms our wildlife, and encroaches on landowner rights."
Credit: Getty - Luke Kenton
TRUMP CLAIMS MIGRANTS 'WEREN'T GETTING IN' – ONLY 'LEGALLY' – WHEN HE WAS IN OFFICE
Donald Trump insisted Wednesday that the US had the "best border" it has ever had during his four year in office.
He credited the apparent success to him ending chain migration, catch and release protocol and his building of the border wall.
"It was down to – really a science – it was down to a point where people just weren't getting in unless they came in legally.
"It got to a point were drugs had dropped to 60, 70, and 80 percent in some cases … because we were tough.
"All they [Democrats] had to do was go to the beach and do nothing. If they went to the beach and done nothing they would have been fine."
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP BLASTS BIDEN FOR ROLLING BACK HIS BORDER POLICIES (PART 4)
Also striking the former president's ire in his Washington Post op-ed was Biden's reinstating the catch and release program.
Trump said his administration “achieved an incredible 90% reduction in illegal crossings.”
However, he accused Biden of undoing that work, noting that illegal border crossings were up nearly 700 percent from last year.
“Joe Biden has restored catch-and-release, torn up our hard-earned asylum agreements with Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador, and announced that anyone on the planet who lives in a crime-afflicted area now qualifies for asylum in the United States,” he continued.
“Meanwhile, ICE is effectively shut down, senior border security officials have been fired, and criminals are being released in record numbers.
Trump added that "walls work" and said as a result of "Biden’s abdication of his sworn duties, Texas now says they will ‘build the wall.’
"This should not be necessary and is at best a band-aid over the gaping wound Biden created,” Trump said.
“Governors and state legislatures should certainly do what they can — but there is no substitute for federal action."
Credit: AFP - Luke Kenton
TRUMP CLAIMS DEMS ARE BLAMING COPS FOR BORDER SURGE
In remarks delivered at a border briefing on Wednesday, Trump blasted what he called a "disinformation campaign" orchestrated by the Democrats to blame his administration and law enforcement for the migrant crisis.
"They're saying that the unsafe borders are your fault," Trump said, gesturing around the room to gathered officials and police officers.
"Can you believe this?" he said. "Because they're getting killed with the border they're now say, 'Oh we've got a problem. So let's blame the sheriffs, let's blame the governors, let's blame everybody else' but them."
Trump then went on to mock calls from some Democrats to "defund the police."
"Look at AOC, look at [Rep. Ilhan] Omar. How's she doing? How's her country doing? And they're telling us how to run our country."
Credit: Getty - Luke Kenton
TRUMP CLAIMS HE DID "HELL OF A JOB" ON BORDER
Delivering remarks during a border security briefing with Gov. Greg Abbott, Trump celebrated the "hell of a job" he did on border security during his one term in office.
"We went from best border every had in our country," Trump said. He claimed it was not just the best in two decades, as is widely reported, but "the best ever."
Trump said Democrats are spreading a "disinformation campaign" blaming Republican governors and sheriffs for the issues on the border.
He claimed that fentanyl was a "nonfactor" when he was in office but now now "it's pouring into our country."
Trump also added that "human trafficking was almost stopped" under his watch.
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP INSISTS BORDER IS 'WORST ITS BEEN IN ITS HISTORY'
Speaking in Texas on Wednesday, Trump said the US-Mexico border is more dangerous than it has been in the country's entire history.
The former president also blasted what he called a "disinformation campaign" from Democrats blaming his administration for causing "unsafe" border conditions and the wider crisis unfolding at the division.
Name-dropping AOC and Ilhan Omar, Trump then went on to peddle claims the election was rigged and that it was the Democrats, not him, who were in cahoots with Russia.
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP BLASTS BIDEN FOR ROLLING BACK HIS BORDER POLICIES (PART 3)
Also in his op-ed, Trump affirmed that he made good on his key 2016 campaign pledge to build a wall, "all Joe Biden had to do was paint it."
”Instead, Biden has enacted the most radical open borders agenda imaginable," Trump fumed.
"This is perhaps the first time in world history a nation has purposely and systematically dismantled its own defenses to invite millions of foreign migrants to enter its territory and break its laws.
“To say that Biden has provoked a national security disaster does not even begin to do justice to the calamity.”
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP BLASTS BIDEN FOR ROLLING BACK HIS BORDER POLICIES (PART 2)
In his op-ed for the Washington Times, Trump continued that a "nation without borders is not a nation at all."
"For the sake of our country, Joe Biden must finish sealing the border immediately, or the American People must elect a Congress that will," Trump wrote.
He continued by listing all of his policies Biden rolled back.
"Of all the vindictive, shocking, and self-defeating border security actions Joe Biden has taken, none surpasses his decision to stop the final completion of the wall,” Trump said.
"By stopping construction, Joe Biden purposely and deliberately left gaps in the wall, creating unsealed channels right in the middle of the border to be exploited by human traffickers and drug smugglers,” he added.
“I built a wall – Biden built a humanitarian catastrophe.”
Credit: AFP - Luke Kenton
TRUMP ARRIVES IN TEXAS
Donald Trump arrived has arrived in Texas and is currently sitting in on a press conference at Weslaco Department of Public Safety Headquarters.
- Luke Kenton
TRUMP BLASTS BIDEN FOR ROLLING BACK HIS BORDER POLICIES
Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday called for his immigration policies to be reinstated by Biden, insisting: "I built a wall – Biden built a humanitarian catastrophe."
In an op-ed published in the Washington Times ahead of his border visit, Trump wrote: "Our nation is being destroyed by Biden’s border crisis.
"The United States must immediately restore the entire set of border security and immigration enforcement measures we put into place — and critically, we must finish the wall."
Credit: Getty Images – Getty - Luke Kenton
TRUMP SAYS BORDER HAS 'NEVER BEEN WORSE'
In a statement issued through his Save America PAC ahead of his arrival in Texas on Wednesday, Trump said the Southern Border has "never, in our Country's long history, been worse."
"We had the most successful Border policy in American history – and now we have, by far, the least successful policy," he wrote.
"People are coming in by the millions. They are destroying our Country! See you soon."
- Luke Kenton
HOUSE REPUBLICANS REACT TO BORDER VISIT: 'I WANT TO CRY'
A group of House Republicans visited the southern border on Wednesday ahead of Trump's arrival.
More than two dozen Republicans are taking part in the trip, which was organized by the Republican National Committee.
Illinois Rep. Mary Miller explained what she saw in an interview with The Hill.
“I want to cry,” Miller said. “How sad it is that we’ve created this humanitarian crisis. These desperate people think they can come in, which obviously our president has advertised this and facilitated this invasion.”
“The world wants to come to our great country, the land of freedom and opportunity. … True, we have warts, we’re not perfect, there’s no utopia … but we’re the most free and the most prosperous, and that’s why these people are here,” Miller added.
- Luke Kenton
REPUBLICAN ATTACKS ON DEMS OVER BORDER HAVING LITTLE EFFECT, POLL FINDS
Although Republicans have signaled that immigration will be a focal point of their campaign to retake control of Congress next year, Reuters/Ipsos polling of 4,420 adults suggests their attacks are having little effect.
About 10 percent of adults ranked immigration as the nation’s top priority in a June 11-17 poll, down 5 points from a similar survey in April.
Among Republicans, 19 percent listed immigration as a top priority, down 10 points from April.
Americans' approval of Biden’s handling of border issues is nearly unchanged over the past few months, with 47 percent saying they disapproved of his leadership on immigration, while 40 percent said they approved.
Democrats have called on Republicans in Congress to work on a bipartisan overhaul of the nation's immigration laws.
"Anything less is political theater," Democratic National Committee spokesperson Ammar Moussa said in a statement.
Credit: Reuters - Luke Kenton
TRUMP: 'BIDEN INCITED FLOOD OF ILLEGAL MIGRANTS'
During his first post-presidency rally on Saturday, Trump told a crowd of supporters in Ohio that Biden "dismantled America's border defenses and incited a flood of illegal migrants like this country has never seen."
Since taking office five months ago, Biden has reversed many of Trump's restrictive policies and pledged a more humane system.
He halted the construction of Trump's signature border wall and ended a program that forced tens of thousands of migrants to wait in Mexico pending resolution of their US asylum cases.
Credit: Reuters - Luke Kenton
'FINISH THE WALL'
Texas Congressman Ronny Jackson urged the White House to 'finish the wall' in a tweet ahead of his visit to the border with Donald Trump on Wednesday.
"I'm joining President Trump on a REAL visit to our southern border today!" he wrote, in an apparent slight to Vice President Kamala Harris, who visited a different stretch of the border last week.
"We need to get TOUGH and fix Biden’s Border Crisis! FINISH THE WALL!"
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