The White House has rejected Rep. Maria Salazar’s (R-FL) suggestion President Donald Trump owes God a favor and should repay the debt by signing her amnesty and migration bill.
“The same God who saved you from death in Pennsylvania one year ago and who put you back in the Oval Office, against all odds, is the same God Almighty who millions and millions [of illegal migrants] are begging to for some type of dignity,” Salazar (R-FL) declared at a July 15 press conference on Capitol Hill.
“It’s in your hands, Mr. President. May the Lord guide you,” Salazar declared.
On Thursday, Trump’s press secretary Karoline Leavitt replied: “The president made it clear he will not support amnesty for illegal aliens in any way.”
“From my understanding, neither the White House nor the President has actually read through this legislation,” she said.
Salazar’s theocratic pitch for amnesty and cheap labor is “insulting,” said Jessica Vaughan, policy director at the Center for Immigration Studies. Vaughan added:
She thinks that that’s what he’s a sucker for, [and for] flattery, and [her] promises that he will be loved more by the people she’s advocating on behalf of … [But] he doesn’t need these people — they’re never going to agree with him on any of his immigration policy goals.
Salazar made her pitch to Trump alongside her allies in the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, and multiple GOP legislators, including Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), who delayed Trump’s signature spending bill to win a real estate tax break that helps Democratic-run countries.
Salazar said:
Now I went to speak directly to the President of the United States, President Trump. Sir, the same God who saved you from death in Pennsylvania one year ago and who put you back in the Oval Office, against all odds, is the same God Almighty who millions and millions are begging to for some type of dignity … You have been called to do this, to fix this 40-year mess with just one signature: Yours … It’s in your hands, Mr. President.
May the Lord guide you.
From Capitol Hill, Salazar also claimed to offer Trump a historic role akin to President Abraham Lincoln, who won the Civil War against slavery, and President Ronald Reagan, who won the Cold War against communism. But the historic role she offered him is President of a war against decent wages, saying:
I believe that you could be for immigration, what Lincoln was for slavery and Reagan was for communism. You are a businessman who understands our economy needs a reliable working force in areas where other Americans don’t participate.
However, Trump promised repeatedly during the campaign that he would revive the American Dream, not replay the Great Depression’s damage to employment and wages.
“We will make housing much more affordable… [and] we will get [mortgage rates] back down to 3 percent … [so] young people will be able to buy a home again and be part of the American dream,” Trump said in September 2024, adding:
Millions of people will take part … [in] reviving the American Dream. It’s about the American Dream. It’s all about the American Dream. We don’t talk [about the] American Dream with these [Democratic] people in office. they don’t want to talk about the American dream because they are the exact opposite.
In August, Trump said:
We want to have a safe country. We want to have a strong military. We want low interest rates, and we want to be able to have the American Dream. We want to be able to have our youth be able to buy homes, housing, get good jobs, and we’re really just at the opposite right now. So it’s so sad to see … [Harris has] been the worst border czar in history … [and] 20 million people came over the border during the Biden-Harris administration … Now you have people dying financially because they can’t buy bacon, they can’t buy food, they can’t buy groceries, they can’t do anything, and they’re living horribly in our country right now.
The vision of productivity and prosperity is increasingly being supported by a growing number of GOP-affiliated elites.
They are calling for cuts to legalized migration to help promote productivity, prosperity, innovation, and fairness for all Americans. For example, that productivity perspective is also backed by Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), the chairman of the House judiciary committee, who is pushing for passage of a bill that would reduce the legalization of migrants.
In contrast, Salazar’s bill is backed by “the unholy alliance of immigrant advocates … and big business employer interests who profit from illegal immigration,” said Vaughan. “An amnesty for illegal workers is an amnesty for them too, and a way for them to avoid having to compete to hire American workers,” she added.
Her bill would dramatically raise the inflow of blue-collar and white-collar migrnats above the current annual inflow of one million migrants and one million temporary workers. For example, Salazar’s description of the bill lists multiple sections that would dramatically grow the inflow of wage-cutting, rent-spiking foreign workers into the white-collar and blue-collar jobs needed by young Americans:
Authorizes [migration] centers in Latin America, to prevent individuals from making a long land journey and to disrupt human trafficking and smuggling operations that are profiting from sending individuals to our southern border. These facilities will offer asylum pre-screening, family reunification services for children, and regional employment consultation services.
…
[IIlegal migrants get] a 7-year program that provides work authorization and protection from removal proceedings, if conditions and requirements are being met … If they remain in good standing with the law, they can remain in this status as long as they want.
…
[Double the annual inflow of] “high-skilled Employment Visas [workers] … by only counting the principal applicant (worker), and not a child or spouse that is not working, towards [the limit of 140,000] annual employment visas.
Allows STEM PHD Graduates from American Universities to receive an O Visa for Individuals with Extraordinary Ability or Achievement, allowing them to stay and work in the U.S.
…Allows [chain migration] individuals that have been waiting 10 years or more in the [capped] legal immigration line to pay a premium processing fee of $20,000 to move up in the line [of 4 million people]. Doubles the per-country cap set in the Immigration Act of 1990, from 7% to 15%. This will reduce backlogs from [India].
…
Modernizes student visas to streamline the process for students to stay and work after their education is complete, if they would like to.
Ten GOP legislators back the Salazar plan.
They include Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-WA), who owns orchards that rely on farm labor, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), who voted against the Trump-backed reconciliation bill, migration supporter Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY), and retiring Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE).
Her pro-poverty bill is also backed by Rep. Mario Rafael Diaz-Balart (R-FL), Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA), Rep. Gabe Evans (R-CO), Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-IN), Rep. Young Kim (R-CA), and Rep. David Valadao (R-CA). “In the [Central] Vall,ey there are many people who have lived and worked peacefully for years, and they deserve a fair opportunity to earn legal status,” said a statement from Valadao.
Salazar and her allies “are clueless about what is important to Trump’s core supporters,” said Vaughan. “This [bill] is going nowhere, but they’re willing to go along with it so that they can tell some of their donors that they tried.”
Read the full article here