All illegal immigrants may not be deported from the USA if Donald Trump is elected as the next president of the country, a top aide of Republican presidential candidate said on Sunday.
Advertisement
Their comments follow Donald Trump’s Wednesday speech where he returned to his hard-line stance against undocumented immigrants after criticism for appearing to “soften” his platform on the issue.
“You know, if everybody apologized for all the things they said in politics, all we would be doing on television shows is apologizing”, Giuliani said on CNN’s “State of the Union”.
“There are other options too”.
“It depends on the person”, he said.
Giuliani deferred and said if everyone apologized for everything they’ve ever said, no one would talk about anything else.
Reconciling what he was saying with the NY businessman’s actual prepared speech delivered from a teleprompter, Mr Giuliani explained that the message “got lost to some extent in the emotion of the moment”. Arizona Senator Jeff Flake, as well as Trump’s running-mate, Mike Pence, and campaign manager Kellyanne Conway claim that he will stick to his initial plan for immigrants.
He said: ‘Look, we do it in a very humane way, and we’re going to see with the people that are in the country. “His position has never changed, on this side of the border or that side of the border”.
The timing of Giuliani’s quotes is a curious one, as they come just days after Trump made a key pre-election appearance in Phoenix, pledging to deport about two million immigrants whom he believes may have criminal records.
“And finally it was resolved after Donald Trump raised it”, Giuliani said.
“Our message to the world will be this: You can not obtain legal status or become a citizen of the United States by illegally entering our country”, Trump said at one point.
Mr Trump’s definition of criminality is muddy, however, as he highlighted a number of violent crimes allegedly committed by undocumented immigrants in the US. Great standing ovation. “This is a great president!”
Mr Trump launched his campaign with a now infamous speech accusing Mexico of sending “criminals” and “rapists” into the US. “As such, Mexicans deserve everybody’s respect”.
Advertisement
Giuliani argued that Trump had indeed softened his stance on immigration, and pointed to an Associated Press headline written after a Trump campaign speech in Arizona that proclaimed “Trump retreats from vow to deport all living in USA illegally”. The number is a stark contrast to the 27 per cent received by 2012 candidate Mitt Romney.
