Republicans ATTACK Steve King over ‘illegals being drug mules’ comment; King DOUBLES DOWN

Steve King was interviewed by Newsmax last week where he pointed out that a lot of the children here illegally have come here as drug mules, hauling marijuana across the desert:

Some of them are valedictorians — and their parents brought them in. It wasn’t their fault. It’s true in some cases, but they aren’t all valedictorians. They weren’t all brought in by their parents.

For everyone who’s a valedictorian, there’s another 100 out there that weigh 130 pounds and they’ve got calves the size of cantaloupes because they’re hauling 75 pounds of marijuana across the desert. Those people would be legalized with the same act.

Listen to his full comments on this issue:

Clearly he was dismantling the pro-amnesty merit-based argument about valedictorians by pointing out that not all children of illegals are valedictorians, that there are many who came here as drug mules. He’s defending his argument that the rule of law must not be broken.

But the Republican leadership jumped all over him for making these comments, as if they are trying to intentionally distance themselves so they won’t give fuel to their critics:

Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, who is working on legislation to offer a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children, called King’s comments inexcusable.

House Speaker John Boehner called them “hateful.”

“What he said is wrong,” Boehner said. “There can be honest disagreements about policy without using hateful language.”

Even Trey Gowdy jumped on King:

After the hearing, Gowdy, who chairs the Immigration and Border Security subcommittee, called King’s comments to Newsmax “reprehensible.”

When asked how Republicans, particularly those in leadership, can reach out to members like King and implore them to keep inflamatory rhetoric at bay, Gowdy said flatly, “You can’t.”
And while King has said he has the muscle to sink any piecemeal immigration bill, Gowdy scoffed.

“The number of people who have a Steve King precise ideology on immigration isn’t going to be sufficient to sink anything.”

There are many other House Republicans who have jumped on King as well, but I don’t have time to cite all of their comments.

My question is, what the heck is so ‘hateful’ about his comments? Is it really that hateful to say that some children, who are here illegally, are drug mules? Or is it simply the truth:

CBS NEWS – […] “Minors are cheap labor and expendable for organized crime in an area where there are few job opportunities or places for recreation, and where the distribution and consumption of drugs have grown fast,” Clark said.

Mexican authorities say they are aware of the problem, but there are no official figures on the number of adolescents detained for selling or distributing drugs because the law forbids keeping criminal records for minors.

The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement says that between 2008 and 2011, the number of youths aged 14 to 18 caught trying to cross the border between Tijuana and San Diego to sell drugs has grown tenfold. Lauren Mack, spokeswoman for ICE in San Diego, said 19 minors were arrested in 2008, 165 in 2009, 190 in 2010 and 190 again last year.

Most of them were high school students who carried drugs, usually methamphetamine or cocaine, hidden in their bodies or in their cars, Mack said.

Clark said similar things are being seen all along the border, at Mexican cities like Nogales, Ciudad Juarez and Reynosa. “It’s growing at a worrying pace,” he said. […]

Steve King responded to his Republican critics yesterday:

“It’s not something that I’m making up,” King told Radio Iowa’s O. Kay Henderson. “This is real. We have people that are mules, that are drug mules, that are hauling drugs across the border and you can tell by their physical characteristics what they’ve been doing for months, going through the desert with 75 pounds of drugs on their back and if those who advocate for the DREAM Act, if they choose to characterize this about valedictorians, I gave them a different image that we need to be thinking about because we just simply can’t be passing legislation looking only at one component of what would be millions of people.”

“There are valedictorians in this group and my heart goes out to them, but not to the point where I’d sacrifice the rule of law and legalize a lot of bad elements in the process,” King said.

“As much sympathy as I have for especially the valedictorians, but some of them are not capable of being valedictorians and they should have some of our sympathy, too. But as much sympathy as we have for them, we cannot sacrifice the rule of law,” he added. “Our sympathy should not outweigh the rule of law, so we should not deconstruct America because the way that some of these kids have been characterized pulls at our heartstrings.”

He’s exactly right, we can’t just bend the rule of law because these children pull at our heartstrings. And shame on Republicans using him to try and bolster their pro-amnesty cred.


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