While Democrat leaders called Trump’s border wall a “manufactured crisis,” Senator Lindsey Graham offered a strong rebuttal on Hannity minutes after the President addressed the nation from the oval office.
“This is the most presidential I’ve seen President Trump,” Graham said on Fox News immediately after Trump’s speech. “It was compelling and everything he said was true.”
Trump said “the border wall would very quickly pay for itself.”
“The cost of illegal drugs exceeds $500 billion a year — vastly more than the $5.7 billion we have requested from Congress,” Trump said from the Oval Office. “The wall will also be paid for, indirectly, by the great new trade deal we have made with Mexico.”
Over the last two years there have been:
266,000 — arrests of illegal aliens with criminal records
20,000 — migrant children brought into the U.S. illegally
30,000 — sex crimes by illegal immigrants
4,000 — violent killings
100,000 — assaults
“There are already walls along the barrier [between U.S. and Mexico], we just need to extend those walls where it makes sense,” Graham said.
“All the president is saying is, “I’d like to provide more security to the American people.”
In the past, Democrats have shown their willingness to spend money on a physical border wall, but now they would rather watch President Trump fail.
“I’m flabbergasted to hear from my Democratic colleagues that voted for billions of dollars in border security money, that this is manufactured,” Graham said. “Was it manufactured when Obama wanted the money? No. Why did you give the money to Obama and Bush if it was a manufactured crisis?”
Graham acknowledged Fox Hosts Sean Hannity’s sentiment of a human and drug trafficking problem across the southern border, and both seemed to agree that “98 percent” of the people crossing the border were people seeking a better life in America.
Then Hannity asked, “if we lose 4,000 lives, is that a manufactured crisis?”
Graham quickly said, “How many caravans do we have to have rush the border before we have a problem? … Every Democrat you’ve heard from tonight has voted for border security, but when it comes to Trump, they say “no.””