On the heels of illegal immigration recently becoming, by far, the most prevalent issue on the minds of voters heading into the 2024 election cycle, President John Pudner returned to the airwaves to discuss the impacts of illegal immigration - an issue that has been a foremost focus for Pudner over the last decade - not only in communities across our Republic, but more pertinently, how the approaches and views of the presumptive presidential candidates on this issue, among other factors, will weigh heavily on how candidates up and down the ticket will perform this year.
Returning to this issue after President Biden rescinded Title 42 last May, with polling by a liberal-leaning firm at that time showing 58% of voters in key swing states disapproving of Biden's handling of the border, with 50% believing he was ignoring the situation entirely and 47% trusting Republicans more on this issue, a newly-released Monmouth University poll found, for the first time, a majority of voters supporting the construction of President Trump's border wall, with 53% of voters for and 46% still against. Additionally, more voters than ever (80%) see illegal immigration as a serious issue, and 60% saying those seeking asylum should be made to stay in Mexico, with Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute, also stating, “Illegal immigration has taken center stage as a defining issue this presidential election year. Other Monmouth polling found this to be Biden’s weakest policy area, including among his fellow Democrats."
These results have also been corroborated by the over 50,000 doors recently knocked by Pudner and Take Back Our Republic Action team members, with illegal immigration being consistently cited as the top issue on the minds of voters, more so than all others combined. In addition, voters at the door have shown to be tying this to tangible events in their life, whether it be someone affected by the fentanyl or opioid crises, the rise in violent crime, or one of many recent stories on this issue, including and especially the recent death of Laken Riley, who was murdered by an illegal immigrant while jogging at the University of Georgia. As Pudner put it, when voters now think of this when going out for a jog, and you even have liberal progressives, like New York City's mayor, saying he and the city can't handle this, it's evident that illegal immigration has finally come home as the main-stay issue for voters.
Continuing his commentary which began last year, Pudner traveled to McAllen, Texas, located just fifteen miles from the southern border, to discuss this issue with former Hidalgo County GOP Chair Sergio Sanchez, who ran in 2014 to, “rebuild and unite the GOP”, in his home county, on not only the dereliction of leadership from the Biden Administration and Congressional Leaders on this issue, but more notably, the lack of leadership from the RNC towards utilizing this newfound advantage, and how new leadership, including and especially Chris LaCavita, President Trump's campaign manager and longtime friend and associate of President John Pudner, could provide the much-needed spark and refocus to finally, and fully, address this all-important issue.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Illegal immigration, Biden, Trump, leadership, RNC, advertising, swing, election year, voters.
SPEAKERS
Sergio Sanchez and TBOR Action President John Pudner.
Sergio Sanchez 00:00
So, today's a big day, Joe Biden is around here, he'll be at Brownsville, and former President Trump is 270 miles upriver at Eagle Pass, which is ground zero for the Texas fight on the illegal immigration issue with the federal government. John Pudner, want to welcome him back, he's with Take Back Our Republic Action. I'm looking at all these headlines, and I'm thinking over and over, John, this has much to do, leading to, nothing, because the fix needs to happen up in DC. Congress is not going to address this, we have no leadership in Washington, in the White House, addressing illegal immigration, Joe Biden would not be here today at Brownsville if it wasn't this messy, this crazy, this scandalous, in an election year, and that is just beyond pathetic. There is no solution coming to this illegal immigration mess unless America stops voting stupidly, especially for the White House, and Donald Trump goes back to Washington, and then by Executive Order - having to improvise solutions, making threats to Mexico City, and whoever the President is going to be down there at that time, as far as USMCA, and trade issues, and sanctions in order to get Mexico to do its job, and then Central America, then everybody else - that's the only hope and that's still more than a year away.
John Pudner 01:27
That's right, and what Biden can't blame anyone else for is rescinding Title 42. It's interesting, even Nate Silver, who is a number cruncher, but liberal, warned a year ago that this would be a disaster for Biden if he did this, just him crunching numbers, not even taking into account any moral imperative that this would be rejected. The interesting thing is the American public took a little while to catch up to Trump on this. On polling, the wall was actually not that popular until this last year, so when the crisis got bad, now it is by a wide margin, 50-some percent of all Americans want it built, and now only 46% don't. The first few Trump years kind of got mocked on the wall by a lot of the country, whether or not they're on the border, like you are, but the American public has come around. You have this student killed jogging at the University of Georgia by an illegal immigrant, you have the New York City mayor saying we can't handle this, it's come home to everyone in the rest of the country finally.
Sergio Sanchez 02:29
Well, this needs to translate into actual votes, though, come November. We lack leadership right now - I say we as conservatives because I am, by vote, a Republican, but only because the Republican Party represents many of my values, traditional pro-America, America First, Make America Great Again, border security, pro-Capitalism, so on and so forth - we have no leadership at the Republican National Committee. There's literally no leadership, they need a new leader at the RNC, and as former Republican chair down here, I would think that, at the national level, people would have deep pockets and a much better, you know, the old school Rolodex, contact information, to call people for fundraising and help swing districts win on the...I mean, softball issues - illegal immigration, inflation, lack of security even within American cities, all those crazy things. We have no money at the RNC right now to win, to support those swing districts and swing states that, at this moment, armies of Republicans should be registering people to vote, guaranteeing that the swing states will go, and the swing districts will also go, and since we have a majority of Democrats running for re-election, that they be sent back home in the Senate as well...sigh...I want to hit my head against the wall right now so bad. It's so pathetic to see a lack of leadership within the Republican Party.
John Pudner 04:11
Well, to have a national party only have $8 million at the end of last year going into a presidential year...But, that's why Trump has gotten Chris LaCavita in to take over operations there. We go back, we started together with George Allen for Virginia Governor decades ago, and he's a pro, he knows how to budget, knows fundraising, and there have been some great public reports on things we already know, that he's just no-nonsense, he doesn't get into internal politics, like if Turning Point is doing too much or too little. He just gets stuff done, so I just want to tell you, I think there is a light at the end of that tunnel, and I think you're gonna see a much more effective RNC moving forward, but it'll take a while. I mean, you gotta recover...
Sergio Sanchez 04:54
Oh they better hurry, and thank God that they got rid of Ronald McDonald Ronna McDaniel, and got new leadership coming up at the RNC, because it seems really easy, from my perspective. I'm so far away from this, and I only have the benefit of grabbing a microphone, and talking with people like you, and every now and then to get the national mic with Dana, and complain on air about stuff like this, but...swing states, you only have a half-dozen you need to concentrate on, and swing districts, about 40 of them, to concentrate on, and the issues are GIVEN to you. They should be carpet bombing advertising online, on the radio, on whatever television they can buy right now, but they don't have money right now, and they should be concentrating on that, and they better hurry up and shift gears, because too late will be the Wednesday after the election, but right now, they've still got time to quickly change, fill up the piggy bank, and start carpet bombing the advertising to make sure working people get little bits of information through advertising, help them to concentrate on the issues, and vote issues, not traditional party that they vote for every November.
John Pudner 06:12
That's right, and let me say, we've been out knocking on doors in a swing state. This last month, we knocked on about 50,000 doors, but we all compared notes, and we just asked, open-ended, what's their biggest issue, and more people said immigration than every other issue combined. I mean, they're decent numbers say inflation too, but I'm talking just at the door, not polling, it is at the top of mind for people. This isn't something Ivy-league poll, it's right there, it's immediate, and just people will volunteer things like fentanyl making the connection, crime, again, this student who was killed in Georgia, one after the other, and they'll even say things to us just verbatim, like, "We need a President who cares more about our border than a border overseas and sending our money for endless wars." They're tying it to whatever other important issues , but it really is all immigration, and as you said, it's there for the taking. A good door-knocking operation, good TV advertising. Two years ago, the biggest issue became abortion because it was just so new, out of the blue, there was the Dobbs decision that became bigger than crime. Right now, the two big issues are immigration and inflation, neither of which are good for Biden.
Sergio Sanchez 07:26
10-4, and on the Donald Trump side, I'm looking forward to hearing information on him doing more Georgia rallies, doing more Illinois rallies, doing more New York rallies...you never know, don't give up on some of those states, especially Illinois and New York, where people are really mad and not going to take it anymore. John, as always, thank you for joining me from Take Back Our Republic Action.