Andrew Sullivan:
There is nothing illegal or illegitimate about ICE enforcing immigration laws. There is plenty to criticize in how Trump is enforcing those laws — violating the Constitution, ignoring courts, commandeering the National Guard, sending in troops — but not the enforcement itself. But the Democrats still can’t make that distinction. Worse, their opposition is in acute danger of giving us BLM-style riots and rallies across the country, attended by the usual suspects, flying foreign flags, that will only rekindle memories of 2020 and remind many of us why we despise the Democratic left’s racism, contempt for law enforcement, and endorsement of looting.
By far the best policy is to let the Trump goons do their hideous, authoritarian worst (they won the election on the promises, after all), watch them fail to match the deportation numbers of Obama or even Biden, and then run hard against their authoritarian incompetence in 2026. The last thing we need is an excuse for Trump to ramp up the repression even further.
So expose the departure from American norms and values, spread the word about the abuse, defend the Constitution and the rule of law, and keep arguing for American values against this deeply anti-American president. But don’t defend illegal immigrants. And don’t give Trump a way to distract from his flailing on the debt, tariffs, and foreign policy. And if the Democrats really want to beat him, unveil your own program of legal, humane, expeditious, and constitutional mass deportation as a foil to this authoritarian mess. Show you can deport millions the right way.
And never, ever forget again that if liberals and conservatives don’t enforce borders, fascists will. Which is why fascists like Miller now are doing exactly that — and may do far, far worse in the near future.
Let's start by stating the obvious: we have no control over where we're born. Like everything else in our lives, it's pure stochastic chance (well, it's not actually chance, but rather the product of infinite causality, but that's a framing only a philosopher would appreciate) that we are born where and when we were. I am an American citizen because I was born here, and I had no say in the matter.
But I can't travel anywhere and stay as long as I want. That's just a fact of life. Believe me, if I could go back to Palestine or New Zealand and stay, I just might. But neither allow it.
And why should the United States? Why should anyone come here without respect to our borders and stay, merely because they want to?
I'm not a fascist for thinking that should not be allowed.
Of course there should be exceptions for extenuating circumstances. War, genocide, violence. And let's also acknowledge that our immigration system is broken and has been left broken for decades, used as a political football, always kicked down the field (I don’t sport, so does that analogy work?) ahead of each upcoming election. It's inhumane that people have to wait upwards of a decade for their day in immigration court, but unfortunately, that's how much our ineffectual immigration system is backlogged. This needs to be fixed.
But I must admit, I'm confused by the Left's defense of illegal immigration. It just doesn't…make any sense. These people came here illegally, plain and simple. They had to have known that deportation was on the table, and just because they've been lulled into many years of complacency from a lack of immigration enforcement doesn't mean that it's any less legal to deport them now than it was the day they arrived.
I'll admit it's so often done in cruel and inhumane ways, but c'mon Liberals… These people broke the law. And if there are no consequences for people who break laws, what's the point of having them?
That's it. It's that simple. The law says what they've done is illegal, and unless we change the law, they should be deported.
And we should change the law. This country is a melting pot, and we are better off for it. We want people coming to this country, no matter the color of their skin or their religious convictions. But until we change the laws, the Republicans have a point, and any opposition to that point only makes the Democrats seem out-of-touch and nonsensical.
This has been a strange thing to watch over the last ten years, since Trump was first elected. The Left is so convinced that a majority of Americans share their political opinions, and I just don't think that's true. It doesn't feel true, nor does the polling data seem to back it up. (Don't forget, Trump won the popular vote in 2024.) This is what confuses me about Liberals: they seem so insistent that their point-of-view is the only right one, and anyone that comes to any conclusions other than theirs must be a fascist or fascist-sympathizer. They sanctimoniously lecture anyone that isn't in lock-step, yet wonder why they lose elections.
Sanctimony doesn't win elections. All it does is push people away. The Left has become hopelessly sanctimonious and comically unable to perform any public introspection. The Right has used this to their advantage, pushing culture war issues like transgender sports or Biden's mental capacity — issues on which Democrats seem pathologically unable to admit any wrongdoing — to the forefront. Some of these are fringe issues. (Who really cares about transgender athletes? A vanishingly small minority.) But by highlighting the Left's complete inability to make a lick of common sense on any one of these issues, they highlight the yawning chasm between public sentiment and Liberal ideology. And it’s painfully effective.