The Washington Post reports that President Trump plans to double the number of guest workers allowed into the country:
DHS and the Labor Department plan to grant an additional 30,000 H-2B visas this summer on top of the 33,000 H-2B visas they had planned to give out, the agencies confirmed.
Trump says there is a national emergency at the southern border because too many people are trying to come to the United States. On Friday, he implored migrants to turn around and go home. “We can’t take you anymore,” Trump said Friday while standing at the border in California. “Our country is full.”
But his administration is giving a different message to some short-term workers. With the additional visas, the Trump administration is on track to grant 96,000 H-2B visas this fiscal year, the most since 2007, when George W. Bush was president.
Translation: we need more workers to clean our hotel rooms.
It’s a funny thing. Given who he is and the trust that his base puts in him, Trump could have negotiated a historic compromise on immigration. Back in late 2017, he was riding high enough that he could have gotten significant concessions from Democrats. It would have truly given him something to brag about.
The Ann Coulters of the world would have screamed, and the Freedom Caucus would have voted against it, but so what? He would have told his base that it was the toughest—but fairest!—immigration bill ever passed, and they would have believed him. Hell, they would have cheered him. And it would have been genuinely bipartisan.
Instead he listened to Stephen Miller and got nothing. His base is still loyal, but they would have stuck with him anyway. He’s gotten nothing out of this. What a moron.
