Media Hides Story of Obama’s Careless Treatment of Migrants at the Border

The mainstream media continues to attack President Trump for praising border security’s use of tear gas to enforce border security. What CNN and others don’t mention is that Barack Obama used similar measures when the stakes were far lower.

This past Sunday hundreds of illegals tried to storm the border, hurling rocks and debris at border patrol agents. When the mob continued to assault the agents, they deployed tear gas in response.

Senator Brian Schatz (Dem-HI) was quick to tweet: “Is this legal? Is this moral? Is this accurate? What is happening here?” He later deleted another tweet that suggested the use of tear gas broke the Conventions on Chemical Weapons because he said he just doesn’t know enough about what happened. Schatz resumed his questioning of the tactic adding, “Does this not strike you as excessive?”

The chief of the U.S. Border Patrol, Carla L. Provost, told Fox News that agents used tear gas only when forced to defend themselves.

“Our agents were being assaulted,” said Provost. “A large group rushed the area, and they were throwing rocks and bottles at my men and women, putting them in harm’s way as well as other members of the caravan.”

CNN’s Chris Cuomo questioned Commissioner of US Customs and Border Protection Kevin McKenna about the use of tear gas used against women and children. McAleeanan reminded Cuomo that the people facing agents were “adult males throwing rocks” and it was unfortunate they used women and children as shields for their destructive actions.

Though he questions the need for such actions, Alex Nowrasteh, an immigration policy analyst at the Cato Institute acknowledges that “Border Patrol agents have fired gas on the southwest border before and there doesn’t appear to be any law against it.”

While best practices for enforcing our borders is a legitimate discussion, it is the height of hypocrisy for Democrats and former President Obama to use the events of this past Sunday as a backdrop for attacking President Trump.

As a junior Senator of Illinois, Obama said, “We all agree on the need to better secure the borders and to punish employers that choose to hire illegal immigrants.” To call those attempting to force their way across the border “illegal” is derided by progressives and by an ever-more vocal Obama, but he is the one that used the term at least six times in one Senate speech in December 2005.

In that speech, Obama called for “strong border protection at the borders” along with America’s need to institute “a virtual border.”

“We need strong border security at the borders,” said Obama, “but we also need a virtual border – that is created by employers having to check to see if these people genuinely are legally in this country and should be working.”

As president, he had no problem repeating these words and later sanctioning border patrol to use not only tear gas but pepper spray to deter illegals.

Border authorities used pepper spray, rather frequently — including a ten-year high record 151 instances in 2013. Again, the question is not whether such deterrents are required but why the media and Democrats only have a problem with it and the president, now and not then.

Even FactCheck.org notes that the use of tear gas in a mob situation is both legal  and often the only recourse. After the Ferguson protests in 2014, Fact Check noted:

“There are few immediate alternatives to tear gas for riot control. There are strategies to prevent riots, including better community relations, a less militaristic appearance, and improved training, all of which have been raised in relation to Ferguson. But once rioting is under way, police need tools to control it.”

David A. Koplow, a Georgetown University law professor agreed at the time saying, “even though tear gas is far from perfect, it continues to be used in that role because there’s nothing else better.”

During his 1995 State of the Union address, President said citizens are “disturbed by the large numbers of illegal aliens entering our country… It is wrong and self-defeating for a nation of immigrants to permit the kind of abuse of our immigration laws we have seen in recent years, and we must do more to stop it.”

The real difference in both Democrat presidents and Donald Trump is transparency. Both hope the public forgets their actions while Trump refuses to apologize for keeping his promises.


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