Gov. Ron DeSantis is addressing a meaningful semantic change between the Donald Trump and Joe Biden administrations.
WJXT’s Erik Avanier asked the Governor about “undocumented immigrants,” and the Governor corrected the euphemism that was swept out soon after the man from Mar-a-Lago took his oath.
“The federal government has made clear that the statutory term is not undocumented immigrants; they’re illegal aliens. That’s the statutory term and that’s what it is,” DeSantis said, rejecting the impulse to “water down” the phrasing before explaining the difference.
“Undocumented, it’s like if I get in my car and I forget my wallet. Oh, okay, I don’t have my document on me, my driver’s license. But I still have a right to drive. I just made a mistake. This is intentional to come in illegally, and it’s not just the question of missing a document. It’s a question of, you know, you violated the laws that were very clear, and knowingly, and with the help of the cartels in many cases,” DeSantis said.
An executive order from the White House uses the phrase “illegal aliens” five times, offering evidence of the shift in phrasing.
DeSantis wasn’t done talking about media, legal and illegal immigrants and their relative likelihood to commit crimes.
“The media will be like, they’ll say, ‘Immigrants commit crimes at lower rates,’ and they conflate legal with illegal immigrants. I would hope legal immigrants commit at less rates, because if they’re committing at higher rates, why would they have knowingly been led into this country? Illegal immigrants, the crime rate should be close to zero because we can choose who we’re bringing in,” DeSantis
“Obviously our native population, you know, it’s not like we can choose. ‘Oh, well, we’re going to send you to Chile or something,’” he added. “If you’re a natural-born American, it is what it is. But any crime committed by an illegal by definition was avoidable if you had been enforcing the law.”
The Governor made these comments Thursday at the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office.
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