DONALD TRUMP HAS been undeterred by widespread backlash over his previous comments on illegal Mexican immigrants, taking another pop at them in his latest speech.
Last month he accused the immigrants of ‘bringing drugs, crime, and rapists’ into the United States, prompting NBC to cut all ties with the businessman.
In a speech yesterday at a gathering of Libertarians in Las Vegas, Trump again accused Mexico of deliberately sending criminals across the border.
But later in Phoenix, he took a different approach:
I love the Mexican people. I love ‘em. Many, many people from Mexico are legal. They came in the old-fashioned way. Legally
The wannabe presidential candidate went on to lambaste Univision for cancelling its broadcast of the Miss USA pageant, one of his many business enterprises, suggesting that it was done under the influence of the Mexican government.
At this point a group of protesters unfurled a banner and chant insults. They were quickly drowned out by the crowd, and nearby Trump supporters began to grab at them, tearing at the banner and pulling and pushing at the protesters.
Security staff managed to get to the group and escorted them out as Trump resumed speaking, accusing the Mexican government of planting the protesters.
Trump said United States officials were being “dumb” in dealing with immigrants in the country illegally.
“I respect Mexico greatly as a country,” he said, “but the problem we have is their leaders are much sharper than ours, and they’re killing us at the border and they’re killing us on trade.”
He also touched on the future of relations between the United States and Russia if he is successful in nabbing the Republican ticket in the upcoming election and going on to to become president.
Trump said the current problem is that Putin doesn’t respect Obama:
I think we would get along very, very well.
Trump has turned to victims of crime to bolster his argument that immigrants in the US illegally have killed and raped.
In Las Vegas and at the main event in Phoenix, he brought on stage Jamiel Shaw Sr., a Southern California man whose 17-year-old son was shot and killed in 2008 by a man in the country illegally. Shaw vividly described how his son was shot — in the head, stomach and hands while trying to block his face — and how he heard the gunshots as he talked to his son on the phone.
Shaw said he trusted Trump, and encouraged the crowds in both cities to do the same.
Additional reporting by The Associated Press
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