The president, Donald Trump, staged his vision on the frontier with Mexico and showed his preferences to build a wall as a tool to stop irregular immigration and drug trafficking.
Since June 2015 when he announced his candidacy for the elections, the border wall has been a promise and an emblem of the controversial nationalist and immigration ideas of Trump, which today scored a symbolic victory by personally knowing and inspecting the eight prototypes that They have built on a plot between Otay Mesa (California) and Tijuana (Mexico).
The president also took advantage of his visit to attack the migratory policies of California, a state that has become a symbol of the resistance against Trump, and extended a hand to Mexico, country with which maintains a delicate bilateral relations mainly for the payment of the hypothetical wall.
“We have looked at the different prototypes (of the wall) and it has been fascinating, and we have two or three that really work,” Trump said before hundreds of soldiers at the Miramar Marine Corps Air Station.
He also showed some of his preferences for its construction, such as having concrete or steel in its upper part and allowing some visibility of the Mexican side of the border.
“The bigger it is, the better,” defended Trump, who said that they have counted on climbers to test the different prototypes.
The latest information from the Office of Customs and Border Protection (CBP) maintain that the wall will be the result of the union of a series of characteristics of the different prototypes.
“We do not have a choice, we need it, we need it for drugs, we need it for gangs, we need it for many reasons,” said Trump, who said the wall will be successful “by 99.5%.”
In addition, he urged Congress to provide the necessary financing for its construction, since this project is stalled before the blockade in the Legislature to approve the $ 18,000 million estimated to cost.
“The border wall is truly our first line of defense, and it is probably, if you think about it, the first and the last, beyond the great agents of ICE (the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Service) and other people,” he said. .
“(The wall) will save thousands and thousands of lives, and will save hundreds of billions of dollars to taxpayers, reducing crime, drug trafficking, social assistance fraud and the problems of schools and hospitals,” he added.
Trump also referred to the president of Mexico, Enrique Peña Nieto, with whom he said he had a “great relationship”, although differences over the wall have led Mexican authorities to cancel two meetings in Washington.
“We are trying to fix things, we will see if it happens or not,” Trump said, admitting that there are “disagreements” with his southern neighbors, so he said that next month they will know if they can reach some kind of understanding.
Peña Nieto will conclude his term on November 30, and the winner of the general elections scheduled for next July 1 in Mexico will follow.
“I think they have some candidates who are very good people, and they have some who may not be so good, in any case, we will deal with it” regardless of who won, said Trump.
The president also did not miss his first visit to California since he arrived at the White House to throw darts at this state, which has been openly critical of the actions of the White House on issues such as immigration, health or climate change.
“California’s ‘sanctuary’ policies are endangering the entire nation,” Trump said in reference to measures taken by cities or counties to not collaborate with federal immigration authorities.
“They are the criminal’s best friend, that’s exactly what’s happening, criminals are taking refuge in these ‘sanctuary’ cities,” said Trump, who also said that the governor of California, Jerry Brown, is making “an terrible work “at the head of the” golden state “.
After the inspection of the preliminary models of the wall and his intervention at the Marines station, where he delivered a largely patriotic and institutional speech, Trump boarded the Air Force One presidential plane to fly to Los Angeles, where he will end his visit to California with a fundraising event for the Republican Party.
