I’ve seen quite a few posts thus far about the increase in Asian immigration to the US, and how it contributes to our society as a whole. A recent story found on Albuquerque Journal depicts an Indian woman who legally immigrated to America just a few years ago, and it reminds me of a story I’ve heard before. These stories draw a sharp contrast between authentic, personal accounts, and Donald Trump’s generality rhetoric aimed at immigration.

Not all immigrants are ‘bad’

My younger sister’s closest friend left India for America nearly a decade ago because her father wanted to provide a better life for their family. The family did things right — applied for citizenship and got their green cards, even if it meant a long, grueling process. The parents came over here with college educations, and hold steady jobs to contribute to our nation. Much similar is the story of Manasi Gopala, who legally immigrated from Bangalore, and currently works as a software developer in southeastern USA (Boak). Each of these narratives contribute to the “melting pot” known as America, and create powerful emotions surrounding them.

 

Trump’s take on immigration

While Donald Trump has been absolutely clear in his vision for illegal immigration, he hasn’t necessarily spoken about the legal immigrants in our country. In fact, his harsh anti-illegal immigration rhetoric has frightened those immigrants who are here legally. It’s far too late now, but I wish Trump would have mentioned narratives earlier on in his campaign about immigrants he has met on the campaign trail. Trump’s rhetoric never really mentions the average person, and he never shares any detailed evidence about people he’s helped, or simply come into contact with. Had Trump not spoken in generalities about immigration, maybe he could have reached out to the Asian or Pacific Islander voters. Rather, his communication strategy solely focused on making generalizations, which has made a majority of immigrants fearful of his plans. I truly do not believe Trump hates immigrants — he’s married to one — but he should have shifted his message to fit these facts, and possibly receive more votes.

Closing Thoughts

The election is wrapping up, and there’s really nothing else Trump can do to reach more voters. If he had spoken less in generalities, and detailed more narratives, maybe he would’ve had a better chance at reaching across the political spectrum. In the case of legal immigrants, Trump should have shifted his message in ways to capture their vote, rather than incite fear in them.

 

Work Cited

Boak, Josh. “The other side of immigration.” abqjournal.com. Associated Press, 6 Nov. 2016. Web. 6 Nov. 2016.

A recent video published by CBS News narrates how the immigration rhetoric of both Clinton and Trump is affecting those across the Mexican border. While the two have taken extremely different approaches on immigration, illegal immigrants are pouring across the border before the election because of the candidates’ way of framing their message, and how the messages elicit specific emotions.

Let’s begin with Trump.

As Trump has promised to build a wall across our southern border, he has framed this message to activate desirable emotional associations of those infuriated with our immigration policies. Unfortunately, he has done just the opposite to those who are either in our country illegally, or support open borders. These people view him as racist and ignorant, as nothing in his immigration message appeals to them. According to CBS’s news story, several people are illegally crossing the southern border near McAllen, Texas, before Trump is possibly elected and builds the wall. Trump’s message has elicited fearful emotions, and people are scrambling across the border for safety before it is too late.

Moving on to Clinton.

Hillary, on the other hand, has taken a much softer approach to illegal immigration, as she has incorporated the value of being inclusive in framing her message. While much of her stance may be fueled by Trump’s positions of not being inclusive, it is still part of the Democratic platform to frame messages with equality. For this reason, Hillary has elicited desirable emotions of illegal immigrants, encouraging them to come to America because she will grant them some type of amnesty. In this case, these people want to come before she is elected President, so they can receive this amnesty.

Different positions; similar outcome

Although Trump and Clinton view immigration at opposite ends of the spectrum, people are coming across the southern border because of both of their messages. With Trump framing his message in an exclusive, divisive way, illegal immigrants fear this is their last chance to come to America before the wall is built. And with Hillary framing her message to include these illegal immigrants, they are crossing the border before the election to receive her form of amnesty. It is ironic that both of these candidates’ messages have elicited different emotions, yet have received similar outcomes of immigrants coming to America.

 

We are down to nearly two weeks until the general election and Donald Trump is at his wits’ ends trying to grab votes before Hillary becomes our next President. By looking at Trump’s first advertisement of the general election, voters can see how his immigration rhetoric made inferences to Clinton, and created subcultural myths, which may take votes away from him.

 

Courtesy of NY Times

Trump v. Clinton

Without a doubt, illegal immigration has surrounded Trump’s campaign, so using this issue within his first ad was a strategic move. It plays right into Trump’s “vision for America” as it overlooks his entire immigration plan of deporting illegal aliens, securing the border, and keeping the country safe. Trump also hits Clinton right away in this ad by making inferences about her positions on illegal immigration. His advertisement team included clips of criminals and open borders while speaking of “Clinton’s America,” suggesting that he is the hero and she is the villain. Voters can fill in this gap from watching the ad, and in turn, may pay more attention to Trump if they are concerned about illegal immigration and security.

Myths in the making

Trump, however, also incorporates subcultural myths tied to race and culture in this advertisement. He shows a clip of a border patrol agent arresting/deporting an illegal immigrant as the words “Terrorists Kept Out” flash across the screen. This rhetoric could be seen as offensive to illegal immigrants and others who believe Trump is generalizing that all illegal aliens are terrorists. Trump also includes clips of immigrants at the Mexican border, suggesting that these people pose a threat to our security. While criminals do indeed cross our borders, not all illegal immigrants fall into that category; many of them come to find a better life. Trump should have been more careful about generalizing and creating this subcultural myth.

Audience and rhetoric

Overall, Trump’s ad catered primarily to his alt-right supporters — those who stand firmly with him on building a wall and deporting illegal aliens. His immigration rhetoric in this ad doesn’t veer from his original attacks of illegal immigrants “bringing drugs, bringing crime.” He doubled down on this rhetoric and included images and clips to make it come to life. The ad embraces Trump’s harsh immigration rhetoric to create subcultural myths and implications of Hillary’s Clinton plan for immigration.

 

Hillary Clinton’s WikiLeaks just keep coming. Conservative website Breitbart.com has obtained a leaked transcript of Clinton speaking to Goldman Sachs about immigration, in which she calls those in favor of limiting immigration “fundamentally un-American.”  Two explanations for this story can be given: either the Democrats are becoming more liberal, or Breitbart is looking for its own angle to make it real news.

Center-left to extreme left

There’s no doubt that both major parties have veered to extremes this election cycle. In fact, this is one of the areas
that Dr. Adams wanted us to watch. In her speech, Clinton noted that “obstructionists…have such a narrow view of America,” and their views on immigration “have to be rejected because they are fundamentally un-American” (Hahn). In using this type of rhetoric, Clinton could have been trying to attract the extreme left voters — those who supported Bernie Sanders’ positions of open borders and citizenship for illegal immigrants. She also could have been making this statement to lead into more inclusive and progressive policies of the Democratic party on illegal immigration.

 

Conservative news media

Perhaps, Breitbart News is spinning this story in a way to make it real news, and to discourage voters from electing Hillary Clinton. The outlet gathered data from Pew Research Center, saying that “83% of the American electorate would like to see immigration levels frozen or reduced” (Hahn). In this case, Breitbart could be stating that Clinton called 83% of Americans “un-American.” This rhetorical strategy is aimed at the voters with an underlying message of “don’t vote for Clinton” because of her comments regarding immigration. While Clinton’s immigration rhetoric is meant to be inclusive, Breitbart is trying to make the rhetoric backfire on her.

Clinton’s immigration rhetoric

Compared to Trump’s immigration policy rhetoric, Clinton’s has not gained nearly as much attention. However, with a conservative media outlet like Breitbart obtaining this leak to create a story, her immigration rhetoric could be viewed as generalized and even offensive. On the other hand, this leak could just be revealing Clinton’s attempt to play to the radical left with this type of rhetoric. As we know, the evaluation of political communication is an interpretive act, and Clinton’s immigration rhetoric means different things to different people. Conservatives may take offense, while liberals may applaud and agree with her.

Work Cited

Hahn, Julia. “Wikileaks Reveals — Hillary Clinton to Goldman Sachs: Americans Who Want to Limit Immigration are ‘Fundamentally UnAmerican’.” breitbart.com. Breitbart, 15 Oct. 2016. Web. 16 Oct. 2016.

In Sunday night’s presidential debate, a Muslim woman from the audience asked both Trump and Clinton about addressing Islamophobia. Through inherently ambiguous language and a slight shift in message, Donald Trump answered the question signaling his immigration policy, but in a less blunt way than before.

Trump’s Original Message 

Donald Trump’s original proposed Muslim ban has effectively created a scenario in which Americans, Republicans and Democrats alike, fear the man on the top of the GOP ticket. Trump’s crude rhetoric directed towards illegal immigrants has continued to also target Muslims immigrating to our beloved country. Not only did Trump originally want to ban those coming in illegally, but he wanted to ban an entire religious group of people because of recent terrorist attacks.

Trump calls for Muslim Ban, Dec. 2015.

Sunday’s Debate

When asked about Islamophobia on Sunday, Trump answered by calling for extreme vetting from Syria and “certain areas of the world” because we do not have any documentation of who these people are, and what their feelings are towards America. This answer reveals the rhetorical concept of language being inherently ambiguous because many political issues involve events that take place in the future. In this case, Trump cannot name countries, other than Syria, banned from immigrating to the US because these countries could change. He may know good and well about the Syrian refugee crisis, but left his answer ambiguous because of what may change.

Trump also dodged the question of whether or not his Muslim ban still exists. While his website still includes the original proposal, his debate answer slightly shifted to “extreme vetting.” He did not mention his original immigration policy based on religion, and instead said he wants to look at different areas of the world where many Muslims are coming from. While it is late in the game to shift his message, Trump realizes he needs to do so to expand his audience; perhaps to an audience of moderate voters, and maybe even Muslim voters.

What we know now

The debate begged the question by moderator Martha Raddatz: “if it was a mistake to advocate blocking Muslims from entering the country” (Strauss). As Trump answered by shifting his message slightly and using ambiguous language, he may have confirmed that this initial immigration policy was not in his best intentions. Trump introduced this proposal with ambiguous language, and is now adhering to a shift in policy to both expand his audience and reshape his character before Election Day. With less than a month to go, Trump has to somehow win over the votes of those who have called him a racist or demagogue following his tough immigration rhetoric.

 

 

Work Cited

Strauss, Daniel. “Trump defends proposal for Muslim ban as call for ‘extreme vetting'”. Politico.com. Politico, 9 Oct. 2016. Web. 9 Oct. 2016.

We all remember those infamous words from June 16, 2015, from now Republican Presidential Nominee Donald Trump. When Trump declared his candidacy, he said: “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best,” and proceeded to call them drug lords, criminals, and rapists. This harsh, angry rhetoric played to the emotions of millions of American voters — especially those fed up with our immigration policies. These voters attached their emotional support to Trump, hoping for change from the GOP days of the Bushes’ “compassionate conservatism.”

Trump’s Plans:

In a recently released deposition regarding these comments and his new hotel, Trump revealed that he believes he won the Republican nomination because of his stance on immigration. His 10 point plan calls for building a wall on the Mexican border, ending catch-and-release, and terminating Obama’s executive amnesties. These policies have led to massive crowds at Trump’s rallies and even campaign merchandise supporting the wall:

Rhetorical Approaches: 

So, what does all of this aggressive rhetoric and crazed support mean for the GOP and immigration? Well, first off, we can look at the symbolic world view of politics. As the only constant in political life is change, it shouldn’t be all too surprising that the GOP is changing its views on immigration. While George W. Bush stood for immigration reform to include Latino support within the party, Trump is driving out that support. He has taken the party from a moderate approach on immigration to a hard right approach on the topic.

Secondly, as noted in Westen’s Political Brain, emotions can distort facts. Those hardcore Trump supporters who believe all 11 million illegal immigrants should be deported are riding on fear and anger. They might not necessarily be looking at all the facts tied to illegal immigrants — that the majority of them are not criminals or rapists. Instead, these voters have attached their feelings of fear and angry to Trump and his vision.

Lastly, Trump does a fairly decent job of persuading. As a major persuasive communication principle, Trump appeals to the whole brain with images, sounds, and words. The perfect example of this matter occurred early on in his campaign when he visited the border near Laredo, Texas. He visited a place where people experience illegal immigration firsthand, and he eventually won the endorsement of the National Border Patrol Council. Naturally, this endorsement persuaded others to believe Trump is correct on illegal immigration.

All of these factors combined show us that Trump has indeed struck a chord on illegal immigration, and has gained momentous support because of his change in symbolic world view, play to emotions, and persuasion to the entire brain.