White House chief of staff John Kelly came under attack after remarks made Tuesday that some undocumented immigrants were “too afraid” or “too lazy” to sign up for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. The media and activists raced to attacks without adding the full context and praise for the Trump administration’s actions to include 1.8 million recipients, despite the reason for NOT signing up.
“There are 690,000 official DACA registrants and the President sent over what amounts to be two and a half times that number, to 1.8 million,” he said on Capitol Hill after meeting with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, according to audio posted by The Washington Post.
photo/ Gerd Altmann via pixabay
“The difference between 690 and 1.8 million were the people that some would say were too afraid to sign up, others would say were too lazy to get off their asses, but they didn’t sign up,” Kelly added.
Later Tuesday, after another meeting on Capitol Hill, Kelly said some people who were DACA eligible but didn’t sign up had reasons but most probably “needed to get off the couch.”
Media headlines lit up with partial quotes and absence of the context. Kelly stated “others would say were too lazy to get off their asses” and later referenced the couch in the same manner. At the end of the day, the Trump plan ignores ALL of that. Kelly gave multiple reasons why they didn’t sign up for DACA and the media reports on ONE example, out of context….fake news.
Critics called the statement “ignorant,” “discriminatory” and “cruel.” There are many barriers to applying to DACA, advocates say, including fear, cost and misinformation. — all were included in the general statements by Kelly.
Ann Navarro
tweeted: “Trump bashing immigrants…again. Kelly joined the fun. War of the Memos getting tiresome. No deal in sight for Dreamers. Gvt shutdown looming…again. The Dow’s giving me motion sickness. I’m out of points. Only thing to do’s watch , wait for ’s “
“From ‘sh*thouses’ to ‘lazy asses,’ the White House seems to be only concerned with degrading the very people they claim to want to save,” Sen. Bob Menendez, D-New Jersey, who is a member of the bipartisan Gang of Six,
wrote. “Shame on those who insist on demonizing hardworking immigrants for political purposes.”
Arizona Rep. Ruben Gallego, who is part of Congressional Hispanic Caucus’ leadership, argued, “Dreamers are some of the hardest workers I know. Donald ‘Executive Time’ Trump could actually stand to learn something from them.”
Joy Reid
tweeted: “Dear John Kelly: undocumented immigrants are anything but lazy. They work hard every day with no promise of citizenship or a return on their taxes when they get old. If they were afraid to sign up for DACA, perhaps it’s bc many feared that one day someone like you would run DHS.”
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders responded to questions about Kelly’s comments by blaming Democrats for the immigration impasse and the pending government shutdown.
“We’re focused on actually getting a solution and, frankly, I think if anybody’s lazy, it’s probably Democrats who aren’t showing up to work and aren’t actually getting to the table to make a deal on this,” Sanders said during her daily briefing.
