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Sitting alone in a White House made emptier by his resentful government shutdown, President Trump took his frustrations over his inability to exercise authoritarian power and simply build his coveted border wall with an executive fiat by furiously and impotently tweeting delusionally deceptive entreaties to get his own way over the objections of the majority of the American people.
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Trump had a note of desperation in his tone as he practically begged Democrats to return to the negotiating table soiled by his impudent temper tantrums while asking them to end the crisis of his own making.
Democrats should come back to Washington and work to end the Shutdown, while at the same time ending the horrible humanitarian crisis at our Southern Border. I am in the White House waiting for you!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2019
The prospect of Trump waiting for them in the White House is hardly an attractive enticement for any intelligent human, much less the people he’s been trying to shovel the blame for his intransigence upon.
After waiting 14 minutes for the Democrats to capitulate to his demands, Trump upped the ante by trying to dazzle them with an array of crime statistics to justify his demands for his ineffective solution to border security. Unfortunately, as Axios pointed out in an article demolishing his misleading figures, the data he presents simply isn’t true.
23% of Federal inmates are illegal immigrants. Border arrests are up 240%. In the Great State of Texas, between 2011 & 2018, there were a total of 292,000 crimes by illegal aliens, 539 murders, 32,000 assaults, 3,426 sexual assaults and 3000 weapons charges. Democrats come back!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2019
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For the record, here are some real numbers.
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19.3% of federal inmates are citizens of other countries, not 23%, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons and only 13% are known to be in the country illegally. While there were 292,000 criminal charges filed in Texas against illegal aliens in the time period Trump cites, less than half, 120,000, resulted in convictions. The New York Times notes that, while 80% of America’s bloated prison population are U.S. citizens, the disproportionate number of immigrants in prison (noted for committing fewer crimes that U.S.-born citizens) is largely due to the fact that half of all immigrant arrests and 29% of convictions were for nothing more than immigration status.
Trump inflates the other statistics in the same manner, treating charges as convictions to make the numbers look more than twice as large as they actually are. Reality, come back!
Democrats could solve the Shutdown in 15 minutes! Call your Dem Senator or Congresswoman/man. Tell them to get it done! Humanitarian Crisis.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2019
Another complete lie. Democrats in both the House and Senate have already voted for bills to reopen the government, just without the border wall funding that Trump desires.
The only thing preventing the funding of federal agencies at this point is Trump’s refusal to sign any legislation that doesn’t include five billion dollars for his ineffectual border wall. He also neglects to point out that the “Humanitarian Crisis” is of his own making.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has refused to even allow the already passed House legislation to restart government operations to come to a vote in the Senate, fearful of defections by politically vulnerable Republicans afraid of rightfully accepting the blame for causing such financial pain for furloughed federal workers and contractors.
I just watched a Fake reporter from the Amazon Washington Post say the White House is “chaotic, there does not seem to be a strategy for this Shutdown. There is no plan.” The Fakes always like talking Chaos, there is NONE. In fact, there’s almost nobody in the W.H. but me, and…
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2019
The faux president returns to calling any journalist who reports the displeasing truth to the public rather than Trump’s delusions as “Fake,” yet his only argument against accusations of “Chaos” in the White House is that he’s alone, as if the departure by firing or resignations of a large portion of his senior staff is business as usual.
….I do have a plan on the Shutdown. But to understand that plan you would have to understand the fact that I won the election, and I promised safety and security for the American people. Part of that promise was a Wall at the Southern Border. Elections have consequences!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2019
Here Trump admits that his plan for the shutdown consists of America submitting to his will. He pretends that the election he “won” — with a small minority of registered voters actually casting ballots for him in an electoral process still under investigation for foreign interference and campaign funding felonies — was a mandate for his wall. He claims that elections have consequences, yet refuses to accept the midterm election results that installed a Democratic-controlled House of Representatives which has represented the will of voters by rejecting his foolish border security solution.
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We have a massive Humanitarian Crisis at our Southern Border. We will be out for a long time unless the Democrats come back from their “vacations” and get back to work. I am in the White House ready to sign!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 12, 2019
Trump concluded this round of tweets with another refusal to recognize that the only “Humanitarian Crisis at our Southern Border” is of his own making, a threat of a lengthy period of intransigence, more blame foolishly flung at the Democrats he needs to negotiate with, and another note of desperation.
President Trump may want gullible followers to believe that he is in the White House ready to sign, but all he is really saying is “Give me what I demand and I’ll sign, but otherwise, I’ll hold the livelihoods and well-being of federal workers, their families, and the people they serve hostage until I get what I want.”
Follow Vinnie Longobardo on Twitter.
Original reporting by Haley Britzky at Axios.
