Donald Trump is traveling to Arizona today to finally give an address on his signature issue, immigration. After vacillating between the extreme of deporting 11 million people and “softening” his stance to be more palatable to independent voters, we finally get to hear what Trump would do if elected President.
Here’s a few things you can expect Trump to touch on in the speech, provided, of course, he doesn’t just stand up there and talk about what a great person he thinks he is:
The Wall
In recent days, there’s been rumblings that the wall might just be a virtual wall which would somehow keep people from crossing the Southern border. So Trump may have to walk a fine line to placate both his most ardent supporters and the voters in the middle he knows he cannot win without.
The betting is that Trump will double down on building a physical wall because to not do so would be the ultimate flip-flop.
Mass Deportations
This is a very tough one, and Trump hinted recently that the idea of deporting millions of people who have been in the United States for decades is not only inhumane, it’s also expensive and probably impossible.
Should Trump continue his harsh rhetoric and say he will indeed move to kick millions of people out of the country, that would be a sign that he’s afraid of losing his base, which appeared likely last week when he hinted at not deporting illegal immigrants.
Then again, Trump might just dodge the question because he knows he screwed no matter what he says.
Hispanic Outreach
Trump has been attempting (quite badly) to reach out to African-American voters, but will he do the same to Hispanics?
Recent polling shows Trump losing by gigantic margins among both black and Latino voters. He needs at least as much support from these two groups as Mitt Romney received four years ago if he wants to avoid a landslide. But just announcing, “What have you got to lose?” isn’t gonna work.
If Trump does try to thread this needle, it seems doubtful to prove effective among a group of voters that wrote him off long ago.
Pandering to the Base
Let’s say Trump does indeed soften his position, back away from his insistence on the wall and deportations. How will his base react? Would they be so dispirited that they wouldn’t turn out to vote in November? That’s certainly a risk.
Will Trump try to appear more moderate, more Presidential, and then offer other red meat to his most fervent acolytes? And what might he use as the bait on such a bait and switch?
It appears that Trump is in a classic position for any politician: Damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t. But no matter what Trump actually says today, given his past history, it seems almost certain he’ll manage to screw it up.
Featured Image Via Gage Skidmore for Flickr available under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic License
