jules witcover

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump’s Easter basket of anti-immigration tweets was a particularly offensive greeting on the day Christianity celebrates the resurrection of Jesus. Eschewing the spirit of the holiday, he drove another nail into the hopes and aspirations of the undocumented immigrant “Dreamers.” These people, mostly young and fully assimilated as Americans, were brought to this country as children, and they await deliverance from deportation from the only home most of them have ever known.

From his Florida luxury resort Mar-a-Lago, the president unloaded a barrage in frustration against Democratic defenders of former President Barack Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which Trump rescinded.

His latest onslaught was in spite of an earlier explicit pledge that he would remove his objections for a deal on DACA, blaming the opposition party for what he declared a new surge of Latino immigrants from the south.

In one of his tweets, Trump wrote in his free-style, ungrammatical capitalization: “Must build Wall and secure our borders with proper Border legislation. Democrats want No Borders, hence drugs and crime!”

In another, he typed: “Honduras, Mexico and many other countries that the U.S. is very generous to, sends many of their people to our country through our WEAK IMMIGRATION POLICIES. Caravans are heading here. Must pass tough laws and build the WALL. Democrats allow open borders, drugs and crime!”

After first seeming to embrace the Dreamers issue, he then rejected a bipartisan congressional plan that would have provided $25 million for a border wall and used talk of “caravans” of illegal aliens walking toward the southern U.S. to fire up his anti-immigration voting base.

He has implied they are seeking to take advantage of DACA to obtain entry, when in fact only immigrants who have lived here for at least five years by June 2012 were eligible for Obama’s program.

One of Trump’s most fervent supporters in arch-conservative media, radio firebrand Ann Coulter, stirred the pot by saying in a New York Times interview of Trump’s failure to build the wall and make Mexico pay for it: “I don’t know what more horrible thing you could come up with than violating your central campaign promise that became the chant and theme of the campaign at every single rally.”

The president’s ire has been rising ever since Congress passed a $1.3 trillion spending bill that fell far short of what he wanted for a border wall or other security measures he has demanded. It does include $1.6 billion toward constructing some barriers, but that is insufficient for the 700 miles Trump has promised.

Public-opinion polls have indicated for some time strong support for allowing the Dreamers tor remain here, even among many Trump voters. The repeated reminder by defenders that these children and young adults are American in speech, culture and patriotism has been a very powerful argument for allowing them to stay.

To such defenders, the Dreamers exemplify a generation of immigrants historically as well as sentimentally, having enriched this country not only in its work force but in its patchwork ethnic and religious makeup.

Donald Trump, in the guise of protector of America and all it stands for, promotes hostile anti-immigration policies antithetical to the founding principles of this country, and to its huge growth and stature as the world’s greatest democratic, multi-ethnic state.

At a time when Russia and Vladimir Putin, Trump’s would-be best friend, are doing their best to undermine the United States, the American president ignores this external threat, which is just short of outright military aggression. He ludicrously insists that Russian-U.S. relations have never been better, once again relying on his overblown and oft-contradicted boasts that he is the greatest deal-maker on the planet. Meanwhile, Putin toys with him by swapping the deportation of diplomats and continuing to deny meddling in our elections, with all indications of more to come.

Given the level of anger and discontent among Trump enthusiasts in conservative states Trump caters to and arouses, the strategy may work again, as it narrowly did in 2016. But he will face a major test in November’s midterm congressional elections, where turnout will be decisive and the nation at large may begin to see through his deceptive bag of tricks.

Editor’s note: Jules Witcover’s latest book is “The American Vice Presidency: From Irrelevance to Power,” published by Smithsonian Books. You can respond to this column at juleswitcover@comcast.net.