At an event in Storm Lake, Iowa on Wednesday, Ted Cruz proved that he has a sociopathic lack of compassion when he told a woman that he would absolutely deport her if elected president.
During the event, Ofelia Valdez, 30, told Cruz that she was brought to the country illegally, but was able to remain here as part of Barack Obamas Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
As a DACA holder myself, I am worried about whoever comes next in the presidency and whats gonna happen to people like us? she said in a video taken by the Democratic National Committee. I think of myself as a part of this community and, you know, first day in presidency you decide to deport, you know, people like myselfits just very difficult to process it.
I would note, if youre a DACA recipient it means that you were brought here illegally, and violating the laws has consequences. And one of the problems with our broken immigration system is that it is creating human tragedies and there are human tragedies when people break the law, Cruz responded in the whisper of a true sociopath.
If I illegally emigrate to England or Germany or France or China or Mexico, and they catch me, they will deport me. Thats what every other country on Earth does, and theres no reason that Americas laws should have less respect than the laws of every other country on Earth, he continued. We should welcome people who come following the laws, but there are consequences for breaking the laws, and that is part of what makes America the nation that we are.
His comments were met with a hearty round of applause from natural-born Americans.
On Monday, Cruz differentiated himself from his radical white extremist opponent Donald Trump by clarifying that he is actually more extreme when it comes to immigration.
[Trump has] advocated allowing folks to come back in and become citizens, Cruz said after affirming that he would deport all undocumented immigrants. I oppose that.
And one of the problems with our broken immigration system is that it is creating human tragedies and there are human tragedies when people break the law,
...and I intend to reform the immigration system so that it doesn't produce such human tragedies. Straddeling the issue may work with hicks in Iowa, but it won't work with me and I was raised in Iowa.
A 2000 mile wall was built a total of one other time in human history . That took many years ,and many forced laborers ....and the Chinese did not have to deal with issues like environmental impact statements and law suits ; land acquisition (I can see all the eminent domain land grabs already );as well as geological reviews ,soil tests and excavations to set the foundations .
This would be without question the largest public works project in US history . Assuming he would use concrete to build it ,he would need enough concrete to build an interstate highway across the country ,and perhaps 5 billion pounds of steel for rebar . All of this would have to be constructed off site (the desert is too hot for pouring concrete in place ) and transported to the wall site. The premade pieces would have to be transported to parts of the country that do not have roads suitable for heavy construction vehicles (much of the border area has no roads ;or maybe dirt roads suitable for 4 wheel and off road driving ).
It would have to be as min of 20 feet tall to discourage scaling the wall, and a least 6 feet deep to discourage tunneling (maybe more ...how deep was El Chapo's tunnel ?).
Where would he house the construction workers ? Who would provide them with the basic necessities to live and work in a sparsely populated desert (food ,shelter ,medical care ,basic quality of life ) ? Who would do the jobs ? Mexicans ? Makes sense since he claims Mexico will pay for it . I have no idea what the cost would be (did not include the price of those big doors he promised ). One can guess that it will be much more than the Boston Big Dig. The Berlin Wall was less than 100 miles and it cost $25 million in 1960s dollars .Adjusted for inflation that is about $ 200 million ,and that wall was not a "great wall" .It was easily breached with sledge hammers once the Germans didn't have to fear the machine gun nests . GW Bush built about 670 miles of fencing at the border ,and that cost $2.4 billion .Trump says fencing is insufficient . Does anyone have even a rough estimate of the cost per mile ? It costs $2.8 million to $3.9 million per mile to install the least expensive urban fencing, according to a 2009 GAO report that researched the of the Secure Border Initiative (SBI).
Then after it is built ;will the Mexicans maintain the wall for us too ?
Like most of Trump's campaign .His wall is a whole lot of bluster with little substance .
The wall would not be much more expensive than an interstate highway.
I provided GAO estimates for building inexpensive fencing . Do you have figures to support your assertion ?
never mind ... I looked it up. Based on figures from the American Road & Transportation Builders Association ,it costs about $7 million per mile in rural areas to build a 6 lane highway . So for 2,000 miles it would cost $14 billion.... about the cost of 7 new super aircraft carriers .
"So for 2,000 miles it would cost $14 billion ..."
"Most calculations of the projected cost of a U.S. fence cite the Israeli model: "[B]ased on the price of the Israeli security barrier," the National Journal estimated that 2,000 miles of fence will cost the United States $6.4 billion."
But who cares? Mexico is going to pay for it. We'll take it out of their foreign aid or we'll impose an import tariff.
Most calculations of the projected cost of a U.S. fence cite the Israeli model: "[B]ased on the price of the Israeli security barrier," the National Journal estimated that 2,000 miles of fence will cost the United States $6.4 billion."
Maybe the Israelis are more efficient at it . But we spent $7 billion on border fencing already ;(not a tall impenetrable wall) ,and haven't come close to sealing the border .