Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Trump floats fictions about the border
President Donald Trump’s relationship with the truth tends to be borderline, at best, when it comes to the border.
So it was this past week when he made a flurry of false or unsupported statements about immigration. He said, with no evidence, that migrants are plagued with disease. He asserted that Mexico has in effect agreed to pay for his border wall, even as he threatens a partial government shutdown if Congress doesn’t approve billions of dollars to build it. He twisted federal statistics to claim the recent arrest of 10 terrorists who don’t exist.
On another front, Trump tried to cast doubt on whether his former national security adviser had lied to the FBI even after the aide pleaded guilty to doing just that.
A look at recent rhetoric and the reality: Commission on Migration and Health called scares about contagion one of the most pervasive myths about migrants. The study found no evidence that migrants pose a significant public health risk to countries such as the U.S. that have good health systems. In fact, migrants themselves face health threats from arduous journeys, violence along the way, or overcrowding in shelters or camps, the Lancet commission said. While some may come from regions where certain diseases are common, the report noted that international tourism and movement of animals spread illness, too.
As for the caravan and other migrants from the south, World Bank statistics show Mexico and Central America vaccinate most children against measles, sometimes at a bit higher rate than the U.S. Along the border between Mexico and California, public health departments have long had a system in place to watch for signs of outbreaks of a variety of illnesses, whether they’re immigration-related or not. Flynn. It’s not clear from Sullivan’s order whether he considers there to be a dispute to resolve or if he just wants to see the underlying documents as he decides Flynn’s sentence.