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.
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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.
This is a very interesting thought you had about how the candidate’s have such different rhetoric in their policies, but yet they are so similar at the same time. I have been wondering throughout the election if Hillary really wants for a lot more immigrants to cross the border or if she just wants to protect the ones that are here because it is the popular thing to do. I mentioned in one of my previous posts that she did not originally want immigrants to enter the country, but she flip flopped her view point when she was nominated for the presidency. That being said, it would be interesting to know how she feels about the flood of immigrants that are crossing the border before the election. I know it is making Trump mad that more immigrants are coming in, but he probably isn’t too concerned since he says he will simply remove all the illegal immigrants within the first 100 days of his presidency. Whether he likes it or not, he is definitely the main cause for the flood of immigrants who are motivated to get across the border before the election. Very interesting observation!
I had not thought about all of the immigrants fleeing into the country just because they are scared of a Trump Presidency because of his talk of a wall. This is a very interesting concept and I am glad you brought it up. I wonder if he realizes that his current rhetoric has created an up-tick in the about of illegal immigration, one of his top issues in the campaign. If he does realize this do you think he should cool down on the harshness in hopes that less illegal immigrants will cross the border?