5 MARCH 24
On Super Tuesday, A Look Back At Trump’s Cruel Record on Immigration
After decimating the nation’s immigration system in his first term, Trump is looking to double down on his most extreme plans in 2025
Washington, D.C. - Today, voters across fifteen states will participate in the Super Tuesday primaries. Former President Donald Trump is expected to carry the races, effectively formalizing him as the GOP’s presidential nominee and taking him one step closer to actualizing his cruel, anti-immigrant agenda.
“With Donald Trump likely to emerge victorious tonight, it is more critical than ever to continue spotlighting the cruel, anti-immigrant vision he and his loyalists have for the nation in 2025,” said Immigration Hub Deputy Director Beatriz Lopez. “Trump’s hateful rhetoric might work with his base, but it will not fool the American people. They rejected this agenda in 2020 and, if we continue to illustrate the stakes of this election, they will be ready to do it again this fall.”
See more on Trump’s immigration record and his intentions for 2025 below.
Trump’s Cruel Immigration Record:
Donald Trump declared his candidacy in 2015 by calling immigrants “rapists.”
He has continued to escalate his use of dehumanizing and racist rhetoric against immigrants, echoing xenophobic white nationalist theories.
Even with white supremacist Stephen Miller in charge of immigration policies, Trump failed to rally congressional Republicans around immigration legislation.
He ripped away vulnerable kids from their families and locked them in cages.
He instituted a sweeping travel ban blocking immigrants from majority Muslim countries from traveling to the U.S.
He baselessly enacted Title 42, an emergency public health authority, that turned away over 2.8 million immigrants at the border without due process.
He also instated the “Remain in Mexico” policy, sending asylum seekers to face risks of kidnapping, extortion, rape, and other abuses in Mexico.
Ultimately, Donald Trump enacted 472 administrative changes that decimated the immigration system: diminishing humanitarian protections, restricting asylum, and putting legal immigration out of reach for many.
Trump’s Ugly Agenda for 2025:
Trump is fully embracing white nationalist rhetoric to shape the contours of his 2025 agenda, suggesting that immigrants “poison the blood” of the nation.
If re-elected, Trump will bring white nationalist Stephen Miller and other loyalists back to the White House.
Trump killed a recent bipartisan effort to craft immigration legislation, proving he’s committed to a broken immigration system as long as it’s a valuable electoral issue.
He will revive the cruel policies of his first term–including the Muslim ban, Remain in Mexico, and Title 42– and look to enact new, harsher restrictions such as an end to birthright citizenship.
Trump is promising “sweeping raids and mass deportation camps” in 2025, modeled after a similar 1954 campaign called “Operation Wetback.”
He is even planning to send thousands of overseas-based troops to the U.S.-Mexico border to carry out an unprecedented assault against drug cartels.
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The Immigration Hub is a national organization dedicated to advancing fair and just immigration policies through strategic leadership, innovative communications strategies, legislative advocacy and collaborative partnerships.