President Donald Trump on Immigration

INTRODUCTION

I. GAIN ATTENTION: What makes America great? Is it our ideals of freedom, equality, and self-government? Is it our fast-evolving technology or military? Or is it in the foundational principles we teach our children in school and at home? Our values, beliefs, or cultural diversity and the openly encouraged ideas of individualism and self-expression? Is America actually great? Were we ever truly?

II. SPEECH THESIS: President Donald Trump's view of immigration is not synonymous to the foundations of America, or what is best for our country.

III. ESTABLISH CREDIBILITY: Robert F. Kennedy stated, Our attitude towards immigration reflects our faith in the American ideal. We have always believed it possible for men and women who start at the bottom to rise as far as the talent and energy allow. Neither race nor place of birth should affect their chances.

BODY

IV. Past

A. Our Founding Fathers did not declare independence based on English nationalism, but simply to establish a people's republic an equal standing ground. What brought the 13 colonies together into a nation was the united commitment to a moral principle, said by Thomas Jefferson that is this:

• We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

B. This is the heart of the culture of America and synonymous to why we were founded. This idea also forms our national culture and is what makes the United States a seemingly approachable and accessible dream of not just an American citizenship, but an American identity.

C. In 1858, Abraham Lincoln stated that anyone who believed in the principles laid by our Founding Fathers, who felt that the moral sentiment taught in that day evidences their relation to those mens have a right to claim it as though they were blood of the blood, and flesh of the flesh of the men who wrote that Declaration, and so they are.

D. Throughout human history, blood relation has always defined belonging and not belonging. The idea that all one needed to belong was commitment to political ideals and an oath of citizenship was something unheard of in all of history, and a completely revolutionary but foreign concept.

V. Present

A. Immigration policy, specifically illegal immigration to the United States, was the signature point of focus for President Donald Trump's 2016 presidential campaign. Donald Trump promised that if he was elected President of the United States, he would end all illegal immigrant access to our country, specifically by building a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, and he still stands by that promise today.

• The problem with this is, instead of solely focusing on illegal immigration, President Donald Trump is trying to tackle immigration as a whole. According to an article written by The New York Times, the President has regularly smeared [all] immigrants as terrorists and criminals. (Trump's Backward View of Immigration. The New York Times. 2018)
• This stereotype could not be any farther from the truth. While this is true for few immigrants, most do not have a negative impact on our country or its economy. They are denied citizenship simply for trying to seek a better life. Those that achieve their dream of something greater than where they come from end up being entrepreneurs and small business owners that help our economy rather than hurt it.

B. During an October rally, Donald Trump stated, You know what I am? I'm a nationalist.

• When discerning President Trump's brand of nationalism, we see that there is nothing truly American about it. He never speaks on the ideals expressed in the language of our Founding Fathers liberty, rights, equality, freedom, democracy, justice and he clearly never speaks on fulfilling what our Founders promised would ultimately make American great for all.
• His idea is derived from one thing alone the power of winning. He chooses to blame foreigners for our country's problems and insists that removing them is the only solution and ultimate win for America.

C. This has led to the worrying reality that he has not offered any reliable solutions to America's real issues, and his desire to defeat has resulted in dismissal of our country's foundational values.

• His focus, solutions, and resources disproportionately remain on protectionism of foreign imports, corporate outsourcing, and immigrant labor by using strategies that have negatively impacted our country in the past.
• He disregards our American principles, and stirs only hatred, anger, and ill-driven passion. As a result of this, many hate groups and white nationalists, who see themselves as the only ones with the right background to be real Americans, have gravitated towards President Donald Trump's campaign.
• A number of controversial policies have been put into place during President Trump's presidency so far, and he has targeted programs to better the immigration process, including asylum protections overturned, separating families at the border, phasing out Temporary Protected Status (TPS), H-1B visa restrictions, the lowest level of extended family visa restrictions in more than 10 years, rescinding Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), the border wall, and his process of moving forward to revoke President Barack Obama's Dream Act.
• An article written for The New York Times states that President Donald Trump has a nativist, zero-sum view that what is good for immigrants is bad for America. That view runs counter not just to the best of American tradition and principles, but to evidence of what's best for the country. (Trump's Backward View of Immigration. The New York Times. 2018)

VI. Future

A. According to President Donald Trump in a 2009 speech, They say all men are created equal. [But] it's not true. Some people are born very smart, and some people are born not so smart. Tangibly he is correct, but ultimately, he is missing the true meaning of the Declaration of Independence: that all people have the same moral worth, natural rights, and are entitled to equal citizenship and treatment under America's law.

B. The President's nationalist program will not achieve its long-term security, and it throws away America's dearest ideals in favor of gaining power by beating everyone on the world scale, particularly immigrants, foreigners, and partners of abroad trade instead of finding a common ground and working together.

C. There are several ways to improve and update the immigration process in order to better protect our country, and to make the process easier for people who are simply searching for a better life:

• More visas.
• Better monitoring of immigration to ensure the safety of our country and also to improve the economy.

D. America is great for many reasons: freedom, opportunity, democratic process, celebration of expression, cultural diversity, technological advances, and much more.

E. In our history, America was great for many reasons: when we gave back all the lands we liberated in World War 2, and when we spent billions of dollars to save Europe from Soviet communism and rebuild it. We were great before becoming the rich and powerful nation we are today: when we declared equality for all people in 1776 and made steps in 1865 to the ending of slavery and guarantee of complete civil rights in the 1960s.

F. As a continuation of that, we will need a leader who does not base his thoughts solely on victories, defeats, and humiliations. We will need a leader who is smart. Realistic. Strategic. Diplomatic but bold. Someone who has a true love for this country and who recognizes our founding principles and moral ideals, as well as their central importance in allowing us a national pride that is uniquely our own in the world. A pride that is for everyone, regardless of race, color, ethnicity, gender, background, religion, political standpoint, or any other differences.

G. If our nation were to stop believing in those founding principles, we would cease to truly be America.

CONCLUSION

A. If you believe in our country's foundation, in celebrating a world of pride in diversity and culture, and that America was already great before President Donald Trump's immigration reform, the steps you take toward action will be what drastically reshapes our country into what it was always meant to be. George Washington once said, I had always hoped that this land might become a safe and agreeable asylum to the virtuous and persecuted part of mankind, to whatever nation they might belong.

1. I encourage all of you to go out and vote. Educate yourselves on policies and real facts, and research them for yourselves instead of relying on the news or other people to do it for you. If you know someone who is an immigrant, talk to them and hear their story, because it may change some of your opinions.
2. I agree with views from both the Republican and Democratic party. I believe there are things that need to be changed regarding our immigration process. That is why I urge all of you to vote, not for a specific party because that is what you have grown up identifying with, but for the person. Listen to each individual person running and vote for what you feel is right. You may not think that your voice matters, but it does. Your one vote could be what turns the tables of our government.

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