Ecuadorian migrants walk across treacherous jungle to reach the United States.Credit: AP
When he launches into an immigration tirade, Trump gets animated, florid, dark and tribal. And there is a difference in how the audience and the news media responds, compared with the response he gets when he talks about grocery prices, taxes or tariffs. It gets more attention, and it always has.
Trump has told allies that he thinks crowds get “bored” when he talks too much about the economy, according to a person close to him.
And Trump has a new reason for focusing on the issue: He has told rally audiences and people close to him that his opposition to illegal immigration saved his life.
In Butler, Pennsylvania, in July, Trump turned his head to look at a chart of illegal border crossings on a screen at the very moment a would-be assassin’s bullet missed his skull by less than an inch and grazed his ear. He has given the chart, and the issue it illustrated, an almost mythical status. “If you think about it, illegal immigration saved my life; I’m the only one,” Trump told a crowd in Aurora, Colorado. “Usually, it’s the opposite.”
“If you think about it, illegal immigration saved my life; I’m the only one. Usually, it’s the opposite.”
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump
Some in Trump’s orbit, like his influential adviser Stephen Miller, fully support his instinct to emphasise immigration as the top issue for voters. Other allies worry that some of his more extreme immigration rhetoric – like his baseless claim that Haitian migrants are eating cats and dogs – risks turning off moderate voters whose support he needs.
Trump has been pushing advisers to get more immigration content, and they are obliging. Miller – the hardest of immigration hardliners – has been flying more often on Trump’s plane since the summer and playing a big role in shaping his closing message. Miller declined to comment for this article.
Last month, Trump was intent on visiting Springfield, Ohio, after spreading unfounded rumours that Haitian migrants there were eating the pets of the city’s residents. He declared publicly that he would soon travel to Springfield.
Ohio is not considered a battleground state, but Trump thought it would be politically powerful to show up to highlight the perils of undocumented immigration. (The immigrants in question were in the country legally, including many who qualified for Temporary Protected Status after fleeing violence and chaos in Haiti.) But after bomb threats closed Springfield schools and threats against Haitians spiked, local Republican officials pleaded with Trump to stay away to avoid bringing further chaos to a city already under severe strain. Ohio’s Republican governor, Mike DeWine, added his voice, condemning Trump for smearing hardworking Haitians.
Many on Trump’s team privately thought a visit to Springfield could do more political harm than good. At a Univision town hall broadcast on Wednesday, Trump continued to insist he would visit Springfield. But no date has been announced.
Instead of going to Springfield, the compromise within the former president’s campaign was for Trump to give the speech in Aurora, a city he has used to exaggerate the harms inflicted by migrant gangs. Like Ohio, Colorado is not a battleground state, but Trump was determined to make the visit to highlight his personal top issue.
Speaking there on October 11, Trump highlighted his desire to use the Alien Enemies Act – last used during World War II to place people of Japanese descent, among others, in internment camps – to deport gang leaders. The law lets officials make sweeping deportations of people from countries that have invaded or are at war with the United States, or that have made “predatory incursions”. While the Supreme Court has upheld past uses of the law, it is not clear whether the justices would allow a president to stretch it to encompass drug cartel activity as opposed to the actions of a foreign government.
Even when Trump does talk about the economy, he tends to bring his points back to immigration. When The New York Times asked the Trump campaign for its plan to lower the cost of housing, the campaign’s response was that mass deportations would increase the supply of housing and therefore reduce costs.
Asked to explain Trump’s focus in the closing days of the race, a Trump spokesperson, Brian Hughes, said, “President Trump rightfully recognises that Kamala Harris’ porous border is at the heart of so many issues, whether it is high housing prices, low wages or overwhelmed hospitals and schools. An open border means that taxpayer dollars are wasted on illegal immigrants instead of benefiting citizens. President Trump’s closing message is all about putting Americans first and restoring prosperity.”
Chuck Rocha, a Democratic strategist who has looked extensively at voting patterns, said Trump was taking a gamble that playing to fear would win him more votes than it costs him. He said some of Trump’s rhetoric might appeal to white suburban women troubled by the end of Roe v Wade but also fearful of the influx of migrants, while at the same time possibly turning off other voters.
“He’s got a calculated risk option,” Rocha said.
Trump’s views on immigration, and the country’s, have evolved over time.
Immigration was not an issue Trump lingered on in 2011 when he considered running for president. Three years later, as illegal border crossings of unaccompanied children increased under President Barack Obama, the issue dominated conservative news media and became a focal point of Trump’s kickoff campaign speech in June 2015.
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Now immigration is a powerful motivating issue in a general election, the second-most important for many voters. And one of Trump’s signature policy proposals – building a border wall – is now broadly popular, expanding beyond Trump’s base.
Trump already dominates among the voters who care most about immigration, so it remains unclear how much room he has to grow his vote share by hammering on the issue.
Voters have very clearly and steadily ranked the economy as their top issue this election, far ahead of abortion and immigration. Even Republicans were nearly twice as likely to list the economy as the most important issue to their vote over immigration in the latest New York Times/Siena College poll.
Trump is favoured over Harris on both the economy and immigration. But while Trump’s lead on the economy has narrowed in some polls, his lead on immigration remains wide and consistent.
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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
