Sen. Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III is claiming that Donald Trump will attract Latinos and African-Americans in the upcoming general election — on which planet exactly, Senator?
“Donald Trump is going to do better with Hispanics and African Americans,” Sessions claimed. “I am convinced, because he’s talking about things that will really make their wages go up.”
“There is no doubt that the current immigration policy is a significant economic detriment to working Americans. And that includes particularly immigrants and minority groups because the flow of labor is so large, it floods the labor market and depresses wages.”
Nevermind that the claims from Sessions are a bunch of baloney — the “research shows that immigration will positively affect U.S. workers’ wages and employment,” according to the Center for American Progress.
What’s truly laughable is not only the claim that Donald Trump will improve his standing with Latinos and African-Americans, but that the claim is coming from Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III himself.
Sessions is one of the most virulently anti-immigrant figures in the Senate, picked by his colleagues to chair the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Immigration (he’s also the anti-immigrant voice over at @ImmigrationGOP).
Sessions’s anti-immigrant and anti-Latino agenda in the Senate has been Trumpesque, to say the least. From pushing votes end the President’s executive actions on immigration, to voting against immigration reform, to objecting to a resolution honoring the late Latino civil rights leader Cesar Chavez, Sessions has had his finger in every pie.
Sessions entered the Senate under a heap of racially-tinged baggage, having tanked his own federal judge nomination in 1986 “amidst accusations of racial insensitivity” after “joking” that he “used to think [the KKK] were OK” until he found out some of them were “pot smokers”.
Yeah, real funny.
So, forgive us if we’re a bit incredulous about Sessions’s claims about attracting Latinos, considering trusted polling has told us that 87% of Latino voters have either a “very” or “somewhat” unfavorable opinion of Trump, and Latino and immigrant citizenship and voter registrations are skyrocketing — so they can vote against him.
And with Trump continuing to take shots at New Mexico’s Latina Governor and the Latino judge overseeing his “Trump University” lawsuit, don’t expect the relationship to get any warmer between Trump and “the Hispanics.” Sorry to dissapoint, Senator Sessions.
