Although the Wall Street Journal is very conservative in some ways, that doesn’t mean that they are big Donald Trump fans, or that they support all of the president’s policies.
Lately the Journal has differed with Trump on his key issues of trade tariffs and immigration since they, like many “establishment” Republicans, support both free trade and a compromise on immigration reform.
On Thursday, the editors of the Journal seemed especially unhappy with Trump’s latest actions on immigration. After creating a crisis that he said he could not solve, he issued an executive order supposedly solving it. And then he bragged about what a great accomplishment it was for him.
In a harshly critical opinion piece, the Journal’s editors bashed Trump for bragging about his reversal of his own administration’s family separation policy, and trying to make it seem like one of his greatest achievements.
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“In classic Trumpian fashion, the President took credit for reversing a policy he had previously said he couldn’t reverse,†the editors wrote. “But this was a problem of his own creation, and ‘zero tolerance’ is part of it.â€
The editors give a small amount of credit to Trump, saying that the new executive order “will at least temporarily get the traumatized toddlers out of the headlines.â€
They go on to say:
“The president’s reprieve from the crisis will be short lived if the Republican-led House of Representatives fails to pass a compromise immigration measure that would fund his border wall while at the same time granting a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children.â€
“The leadership’s bill has a shot if Mr. Trump would offer some full-throated protection to Members against the restrictionists. The President huddled with Republicans on Tuesday and endorsed both bills, but that is a cop-out. It’s an excuse for conservatives to vote for Goodlatte, though they know it will fail.â€
As the Wall Street Journal editors point out, the Republicans in charge of Congress cannot agree on an immigration compromise, and they are receiving no guidance or leadership from the president. There are two bills being considered by Republicans in the House, one favored by moderates and one (Goodlatte) favored by the conservative Freedom Caucus who are not willing to compromise.
What is frustrating for almost everyone of both parties is that we have a President of the United States who is more interested in boasting than he is in solving problems of the country. He offers simplistic proposed solutions to his ignorant base of supporters, like building a “great big beautiful wall.” But these proposals won’t solve anything, and everyone in Washington seems to know that but him.
I am a lifelong Democrat with a passion for social justice and progressive issues. I have degrees in writing, economics and law from the University of Iowa.
