(This post may contain disputed claims. We make no assertions as to the validity of the information presented by our Opinion Columnist. We are an opinion blog, not a traditional news outlet, and this post should be treated as such. Enjoy.)During his speech to the American Farm Bureau Federation’s 100th Annual Convention in New Orleans on Monday, President Donald Trump called a salty old border rancher up on stage. The message he had for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) is one she won’t soon forget.
According to The Daily Caller, President Trump brought a border rancher on stage during a speech to the American Farm Bureau Federation’s 100th Annual Convention in New Orleans. The rancher, Jim Chilton, is the owner of a large Arizona ranch that shares miles of unguarded border with Mexico.
“Mr. President, we need a wall,” Chilton said to cheers from the audience. “I would say we need a wall all around all the length of the border.”
“We’ve got to stop the drug-packers bringing drugs in to poison our people, and I would say to Speaker Pelosi, walls are not ‘immoral.’ In fact, I have traveled around the world. The biggest wall I’ve ever seen is around the Vatican,” Chilton added.
“Now, you can’t tell me that the wonderful priests and officials of the Roman Catholic Church, including the Pope, are immoral. They have a wall. Why can’t we?” he asked.
Nancy Pelosi called a border wall “immoral, ineffective, and expensive” and promised it will not be funded. “Most of us, speaking for myself, consider the wall immoral, ineffective and expensive,” she said. “And the president said he promised it. He also promised Mexico would pay for it. So even if they did, it’s immoral still, and then they’re not going to pay for it.”
President Donald Trump noted the glaring hypocrisy of claims that a border wall is immoral, saying, “Look, when they say the wall is ‘immoral,’ then you better do something about the Vatican. The Vatican has the biggest wall of them all.”
“The wall is immoral? Look at all of the countries that have walls. They work 100 percent. Never going to change. A wall is a wall,” Trump added.
The president has received seemingly unanimous support for the wall from ranchers with properties on the border. During his trip to U.S. Border Patrol McAllen Station in McAllen, Texas, last Thursday, a local rancher found an unforgettable way to thank Trump for working so hard to build the wall.
Trump flew to McAllen on Thursday, where he attended a roundtable discussion on the current immigration crisis at the border and the need for an impenetrable wall to keep dangerous illegal immigrants out of the country. In attendance at the roundtable talk was rancher Monty Awbrey, who said, “The Border Patrol right now, their hands are tied, and these immigrants know it.”
Awbrey thanked Trump for working so diligently to get the border wall built and even gave the president a special token of his appreciation: his large belt buckle as a gift for Barron. “I want to gift you with my belt buckle,” he said. “You can give it to your son, Barron.”
Trump triumphantly raised the belt buckle up into the air and joked, “He’s bribing the president! I want this to be out in the open, everybody. I don’t know if this is worth ten cents or $50,000 but, anyway, that’s very nice.”
Texas landowner gives @realDonaldTrump his belt buckle after border security roundtable. "You can give it to your son Barron." pic.twitter.com/QvVUe43zEo
— Charlie Spiering (@charliespiering) January 10, 2019
As this rancher’s gesture suggests, the American people are overwhelmingly supportive of the president’s plan to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. By and large, it is only stubborn Democratic lawmakers who oppose it, and that’s only because they will stop at nothing to obstruct Trump. There was a time when they were all for border security, and it wasn’t so long ago.
Sadly, it appears that Democrats like Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer hate the president more than they love their country and will stop at nothing to stand in Trump’s way.
