CHRIS WALLACE
Good evening from the Thomas and Mack Center from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. I’m Chris Wallace of Fox News. I welcome you to the third and final of the 2016 presidential debates between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump. This debate is sponsored by the Commission on Presidential Debates. The commission has designed the format, six roughly fifteen minute segments with two minute answers to the first question, then open discussion for the rest of the segment. Both campaigns have agreed to those rules.
For the record, I decided the topics and the questions in each topic. None of the questions have been shared with the commission or candidates. The audience here in the hall has agreed to remain silent, no cheers, boos, or other interruptions, so we and you can focus on what the candidates have to say.
(APPLAUSE)
CHRIS WALLACE
No noise except right now as we welcome the Democratic nominee for president, Secretary Clinton, and the Republican nominee for president, Mr. Trump.
(APPLAUSE)
CHRIS WALLACE
Secretary Clinton, Mr. Trump, welcome. Let’s get right to it. The first topic is the Supreme Court. We -- you both talk briefly about the court in the last debate, but I want to drill down on this because the next president will almost certainly have at least one appointment and likely -- or possibly - two or three appointments which means that you will in effect determine the balance of the court for what could be the next quarter century. First of all, where do you want to see the court take the country? And secondly, what's your view on how the Constitution should be interpreted? Is -- do the founders words mean what they say, or is it a living document to be applied flexibly according to changing circumstances? In this segment, Secretary Clinton, you go first. You have two minutes.
HILLARY CLINTON
Thank you very much, Chris. And thank you UNLV for hosting us. You know, at the goings on about the Supreme Court, it really raises the central issue in this election. Namely, what kind of country are we going to be? What kind of opportunities will we provide for our citizens? What kind of rights will Americans have? And I feel strongly that the Supreme Court needs to stand on the side of the American people, not on the side of the powerful corporations and the wealthy. For me, that means that we need a Supreme Court that will stand up on behalf of of women's rights, on behalf of the rights of the LGBT community, that will stand up and say no to Citizens United, a decision that has undermined the election system in our country because of the way it permits dark, unaccountable money to come into our electoral system.
Citizens United gets a lot of attention, but it’s not the only case that loosened campaign finance restrictions. In 2014, the decision in McCutcheon v. FEC“struck down the aggregate limits on the amount an individual may contribute during a two-year period to all federal candidates, parties and political action committees combined,” as the FEC explains here.
When Hillary Clinton launched her presidential campaign one of the first promises she made was to support a constitutional amendment to overturn theCitizens United decision. Later in the primary, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders said he would have a litmus test for Supreme Court justices. Later, in an interview with NPR’s Ari Shapiro, Clinton committed to nominating justices who would overturn Citizens United.
I have major disagreements with my opponent about these issues and others that will be before the Supreme Court. But I feel that at this point in our country's history, it is important that we not reverse marriage equality, that we not reverse Roe v. Wade, that we stand up against Citizens United -- we stand up for the rights of people in the workplace. That we stand up and basically say -- the Supreme Court should represent all of us. That's how I see the court. And the kind of people that I would be looking to nominate to the court would be in the great tradition of standing up to the powerful, standing on behalf of our rights as Americans. And I look forward to having the opportunity. I would hope that the Senate would do its job and confirm the nominee that President Obama has sent to them. That's the way the Constitution fundamentally should operate. The president nominates, and then the Senate advises and consents or not.
President Obama nominated Merrick Garland, the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, in March. Garland has been waiting 217 days for the Senate to act. But Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has vowed to take no action until at least after the inauguration of the next president.
But they go forward with the process.
CHRIS WALLACE
Secretary Clinton, thank you. Mr. Trump, same question. Where do you want to see the court take the country and how do you believe the Constitution should be interpreted?
DONALD TRUMP
Well, first of all it’s great to be with you and thank you everybody. The Supreme Court - it’s what it's all about. Our country is so, just so imperative that we have the right justices. Something happened recently where Justice Ginsburg made some very, very inappropriate statements toward me and toward a tremendous number of people, many many millions of people that I represent. And she was forced to apologize. And apologize, she did. But these were statements that should have never, ever been made.
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg did apologize for negative remarks she made about Donald Trump, which she called “ill-advised.” An NPR story on that here.
We need a Supreme Court that in my opinion is going to uphold the Second Amendment and all amendments. But the Second Amendment, which is under absolute siege. I believe if my opponent should win this race, which I truly don't think will happen, we will have a second amendment which will be a very, very small replica of what it is right now.
Trump has repeatedly falsely claimed that Clinton would like to abolish the Second Amendment or “take your guns away.” This is not Clinton’s position, though she does favor stricter gun regulations.
But I feel that it's absolutely important that we uphold because of the fact that it is under such trauma. I feel that the justices that I am going to appoint-- and I've named 20 of them. The justices that I'm going to appoint will be pro-life. They will have a conservative bent. They will be protecting the Second Amendment. They are great scholars in all cases, and they are people of tremendous respect. They will interpret the Constitution the way the founders wanted it interpreted. And I believe that's very, very important. I don't think we should have justices appointed that decide what they want to hear It's all about the Constitution of -- and so important -- the Constitution, the way it was meant to be. And those are the people that I will appoint.
Trump has proposed more than 20 candidates for the high court, including current federal appeals court Judges William Pryor and Diane Sykes. Another person on the list is a state supreme court justice and the brother of Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee. Trump appears to be talking about judges who consider the text of the Constitution and an idea called “originalism,” supported for decades by the late Justice Antonin Scalia.
CHRIS WALLACE
Mr. Trump, thank you. We now have about ten minutes for an open discussion. I want to focus on two issues that in fact, by the justices that you named, could end up changing the existing law of the land. First is one that you mentioned, Mr. Trump, and that is guns. Secretary Clinton, you said last year -- and let me quote, the Supreme Court is wrong on the second amendment. And now in fact, in the 2008 Heller case, the court ruled that there is a constitutional right to bear arms but a right that is reasonably limited. Those were the words of the judge Antonin Scalia who wrote the decision. What's wrong with that?
According to leaked audio from a fundraiser, Clinton did say that she felt the court was “wrong on the Second Amendment” in theHeller case. In context Clinton, as she said tonight and has said before, says she is in favor of “reasonable regulation.” She has also argued that “some of the earliest laws that were passed were about firearms.” Yet she has said “responsible gun owners have a right — I have no objection to that,” as PolitiFact has noted.
HILLARY CLINTON
Well, first of all, I support the Second Amendment. I lived in Arkansas for eighteen wonderful years. I represented upstate New York. I understand and respect the tradition of gun ownership. It goes back to the founding of our country. But I also believe that there can be and must be reasonable regulation. Because I support the Second Amendment doesn't mean that I want people who shouldn’t have guns to be able to threaten you, kill you or members of your family. And so when I think about what we need to do, we have thirty three thousand people a year who die from guns. I think we need comprehensive background checks, need to close the online loophole, close the gun show loophole. There's other matters that I think are sensible that are the kind of reforms that would make a difference that are not in any way conflicting with the Second Amendment. You mentioned the Heller decision and what I was saying that you referenced, Chris, was that I disagreed with the way the court applied the Second Amendment in that case because what the District of Columbia was trying to do was to protect toddlers from guns. And so they wanted people with guns to safely store them. And the court didn't accept that reasonable regulation, but they’ve accepted many others. So I see no conflict between saving people's lives and defending the Second Amendment.
CHRIS WALLACE
Let me bring Mr. Trump in here. The bipartisan open debate coalition got millions of votes on questions to ask here. And this was, in fact, one of the top questions that they got. How will you ensure the Second Amendment is protected? You just heard Secretary Clinton's answer. Does she persuade you, that while you may disagree on regulation, that in fact she supports the Second Amendment right to bear arms?
DONALD TRUMP
Well the D.C. versus Heller decision was very strongly and she was extremely angry about it I watched and she was very very angry when upheld and Justice Scalia was so involved and it was a well-crafted decision. But Hillary was extremely upset, extremely angry, and people that believe in the Second Amendment and believe in it very strongly were very upset with what she had to say.
CHRIS WALLACE
Let me bring in Secretary Clinton, were you extremely upset?
HILLARY CLINTON
Well, I was upset because unfortunately dozens of toddlers injure themselves, even kill people, with guns because, unfortunately, not everyone who has loaded guns in their homes takes appropriate precautions.
This story from May 2016 reported that 23 young children had shot people so far this year. Most of the time, children accidentally shoot themselves, but not always.
But there's no doubt that I respect the Second Amendment, that I also believe there is individual right to bear arms. That is not in conflict with sensible commonsense regulation and, you know, look, I understand that Donald's been strongly supported by the NRA; the gun lobby is on his side. They’re running millions of dollars of ads against me and I regret that, because what I would like to see is for people to come together and say, of course we're going to protect and defend the Second Amendment. But we're going to do it in a way that tries to save some of these thirty three thousand lives that we lose every year.
there is individual right to bear arms. That is not in conflict with sensible commonsense regulation and, you know, look, I understand that Donald's been strongly supported by the NRA; the gun lobby is on his side. They’re running millions of dollars of ads against me and I regret that, because what I would like to see is for people to come together and say, of course we're going to protect and defend the Second Amendment. But we're going to do it in a way that tries to save some of these thirty three thousand lives that we lose every year.
CHRIS WALLACE
Let me bring in Mr. Trump back into it because, in fact, you oppose any limits on on assault weapons, any limits on high-capacity magazines, you support a national right to carry law, why sir?
DONALD TRUMP
Well, let me just tell you before we go any further in Chicago, which has the toughest gun laws in the United States, probably you could say by far, they have more gun violence than any other city. So we have the toughest laws and you have tremendous gun violence.
Chicago has been an epicenter of gun violence and according to FBI data, homicides in that city account for a substantial proportion of a rise in violent crime. Scholars say that violence there is largely concentrated in a few neighborhoods. While Chicago does have strong gun regulations on the books, many weapons flow from other places, including Indiana, according tothis report in the Chicago Tribune.
I am a very strong supporter of the Second Amendment and I am - I don't know if Hillary was sayin g it in a sarcastic manner - but I'm very proud to have the endorsement of the NRA and it’s the earliest endorsement they’ve ever given to anybody who ran for president. So I'm very honored by all of that. We are going to appoint justices, this is the best way to help the Second Amendment. We are going to appoint justices that will feel very strongly about the Second Amendment, that will not do damage to the Second Amendment.
CHRIS WALLACE
Well, let's pick up on another issue which divides you and the justices that whoever ends up winning this election appoints can have a dramatic effect there and that's the issue of abortion. Mr. Trump you are pro-life. I would ask you specifically, do you want the court, including the justices that you will name, to overturn Roe v. Wade which includes, in fact states, a woman's right to abortion.
DONALD TRUMP
Well, if that would happen because I am pro-life, and I will be appointing pro-life judges, I would think that that will go back to the individual states.
This has been a major reason many evangelicals and other social conservatives have cited for supporting Trump, despite the misgivings many express about his character, language and temperament. Trump has set up an advisory council of anti-abortion-rights groups in an apparent effort to reassure these voters. In the past, Trump had described himself as “pro-choice.”
CHRIS WALLACE
But I'm asking specifically would you like to -
DONALD TRUMP
If they overturned it, it will go back to the states.
CHRIS WALLACE
But what I’m asking you sir is do you want to see the court overturn? You just said you want to the court protect the Second Amendment, do you want to see the court overturn Roe v. Wade?
DONALD TRUMP
Well, if we put another two or perhaps three justices on that’s really what’s going to be -- that will happen. That will happen automatically in my opinion because I am putting pro-life justices on the court. I will say this it will go back to the states and the states will then make a determination.
CHRIS WALLACE
Secretary Clinton.
HILLARY CLINTON
I strongly support Roe v. Wade which guarantees a constitutional right to a woman to make the most intimate, most difficult in many cases, decisions about her health care that one can imagine. And in this case is not only about Roe v. Wade. It is about what's happening right now in America. So many states are putting very stringent regulations on women that block them from exercising that choice to the extent that they are defunding Planned Parenthood, which of course, provides all kinds of cancer screenings and other benefits for women in our country.
According to Planned Parenthood’s own numbers, about 9 percent of its services are cancer screenings. An additional 42 percent of its services go to treating sexually transmitted diseases and infections and 34 percent are contraceptive services. The organization says only 3 percent of its services are abortion-related. However, these numbers only reflect the proportion of services, not how much money is spent on those services.
Donald has said he is in favor of defunding Planned Parenthood. He even supported shutting the government down to defund Planned Parenthood. I will defend Planned Parenthood. I will defend Roe v. Wade and I will defend women's rights to make their own healthcare decisions. We have come too far to have that turn back now and indeed he said women should be punished; that there should be some form of punishment for women who obtain abortions. And I could just not be more opposed to that kind of thinking.
CHRIS WALLACE
I'm going to give you a chance respond but I want to ask you Secretary Clinton, I want to explore how far you believe the right to abortion goes. You have been quoted as saying that the fetus has no constitutional rights. You also voted against a ban on late-term partial-birth abortions. Why?
HILLARY CLINTON
Because Roe v. Wade very clearly sets out that there can be regulations on abortion so long as the life and health of the mother are taken into account. And when I voted as a senator, I did not think that that was the case. The kinds of cases that fall at the end of pregnancy are often the most heartbreaking, painful decisions for families to make. I have met with women who, toward the end of their pregnancy, get the worst news one could get that their health is in jeopardy if they continue to carry to term or that something terrible has happened or just been discovered about the pregnancy. I do not think the United States government should be stepping in and making those most personal of decisions. So you can regulate if you are doing so with the life and health of the mother taken into account.
CHRIS WALLACE
Mr. Trump your reaction and particularly on this issue of life term partial-birth abortion.
Trump’s views on this have changed with time. In a 1999 interview, Trump said that he “hates abortion” but that he didn’t want to ban late abortion.
DONALD TRUMP
I think it's terrible if you go with what Hillary is saying in the ninth month you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb of the mother just prior to the birth of the baby. Now you can say that that's okay and Hillary can say that that's okay, but it's not okay with me. Because based on what she's saying and based on where she's going and where she's been, you can take the baby and rip the baby out of the womb on the ninth month on the final day. And that's not acceptable.
Very few of the millions of abortions performed each year involve dilation and extraction, which is called "partial-birth abortion" by opponents. These are abortions performed after 20 weeks. It would be extremely unusual, if it is done at all, for this kind of abortion to be done only a few days before a nine-month term is reached. Very few providers in the country still perform D&X; abortions. For more background on this type of abortion, click here.
HILLARY CLINTON
Well, that is not what happens in these cases and using that kind of scare rhetoric is just terribly unfortunate. You should meet with some of the women that I've met with - women I've known over the course of my life. This is one of the worst possible choices that any woman and her family has to make. And I do not believe the government should be making it. You know, I've had a great honor of traveling across the world on behalf of our country. I've been to countries where governments either forced women to have abortions like they used to do in China or forced women to bear children like they used to do in Romania. And I can tell you the government has no business in the decisions that women make with their families in accordance with their faith with medical advice and I will stand up for that right.
CHRIS WALLACE
All right just briefly, I want to move on to another section.
DONALD TRUMP
Honestly, nobody it has business doing what I just said, doing that as late as one or two or three or four days prior to birth. Nobody has that.
CHRIS WALLACE
All right, let's move on to the subject of immigration and there is almost no issue that separates the two of you more than the issue of immigration. Actually ,there are a lot of issues separate the two of you. Mr. Trump, you want to build a wall.Secretary Clinton you have offered no specific plan or how you want to secure our southern border.
NPR-dk-clinton-immigration Here is what Clinton proposes on immigration.
Mr. Trump, you're calling for major deportations. Secretary Clinton, you say that within your first one hundred days as president you want to offer a package that includes a pathway to citizenship. The question really is why are you right and your opponent wrong? Mr. Trump you go first in this segment you have two minutes.
DONALD TRUMP
Well, first of all she wants to give amnesty, which is a disaster and very unfair to all the people that are waiting on line for many many years.
Hillary Clinton has not proposed offering amnesty to immigrants in the U.S. illegally. Her immigration platform says she would defend and expand President Obama’s executive action of November 2014. His actions, thwarted by federal courts, would protect an estimated 5 million such immigrants and parents from deportation and offer them renewable work permits, not citizenship. Amnesty is different. Ronald Reagan’s 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act legalized and ultimately granted citizenship to immigrants in the country illegally who met certain criteria.
We need strong borders. In the audience tonight we have four mothers of, I mean these are unbelievable people that I’ve gotten to know over a period of years, whose children have been killed, brutally killed, by people that came into the country illegally. You have thousands of mothers and fathers and relatives all over the country. They are coming in illegally. Drugs are pouring in through the border. We have no country if we have no border. Hillary wants to give amnesty she wants to have open borders. The border secure as you know the border patrol agents sixteen thousand five hundred plus, ICE endorsed me. First time they've ever endorsed a candidate.
A union of immigration and customs enforcement officersendorsed Trump in September, not the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau.
And it means their job is tougher. But they know what's going on they know it today than anybody. They want strong borders. They feel we have to have strong borders. I was up in New Hampshire the other day the biggest complaint they have with all of the problems going on in the world, many of the problems caused by Hillary Clinton and by Barack Obama, all of the problems their single biggest problem, is heroine that pours across our southern borders just pouring and destroying their youth.
The Drug Enforcement Administration says the threat posed by heroin in the United States has increased since 2007. Heroin is available in larger quantities, used by a larger number of people, and is causing an increasing number of overdose deaths. In 2014, 10,574 Americansdied from heroin-related overdoses, more than triple the number in 2010.
It's poisoning the blood of their youth and plenty of other people.
We have to have strong borders. We have to keep the drugs out of our country. We are right now we’re getting the drugs, they're getting the cash we need strong borders. We need absolute - we cannot give amnesty. Now, I want to build a wall. We need the wall the border patrol, ICE, they all want the wall.
The National Border Patrol Council and the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council have both endorsed Trump, but neither union publicly agrees with his plan to build “an impenetrable and beautiful wall” separating the U.S. and Mexico. As noted above, the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council is a union, not the federal bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Jon Anfinsen, Border Patrol union steward in Del Rio, Texas, told NPR: “I know the union has expressed to him that there are places where it [a border wall] absolutely is necessary. But there are other places where it's just not feasible. A lot of the area, it's hilly or the terrain just would not support it. We have a lot of private land."
We stopped the drugs we shore up the border. One of my first acts will be to get all of the drug lords, all of the bad ones, we have some bad bad people in this country that have to go out. Were going to get them out we're going to secure the border and once the border is secure at a later date we will make its determination as to the rest.But we have some bad hombres here that were going to get them out.
Border Patrol apprehensions along the Southwest border with Mexico rose 23 percent in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 but remain lower than the two previous years and are 75 percent below the level in 2000. Apprehensions are considered a rough proxy for attempted border crossings. Immigrants from Central America — including families and unaccompanied children — now outnumber Mexicans in attempting to cross the border without authorization. The Pew Research Center reports more Mexicans left the U.S. than entered between 2009 and 2014.
Deportations increased during Obama’s first four years in office, peaking in 2012 at nearly 410,000. Since then, deportations have been dropping, reaching a low of 235,000 last year. Since 2014, the administration has focused on deporting recent arrivals and criminals, with fewer deportations of longtime residents whose only crime was crossing the border. In all, about 2.8 million people have been deported under Obama.
CHRIS WALLACE
Mr. Trump thank you, same question to you Secretary Clinton, basically why are you right and Mr. Trump is wrong?
HILLARY CLINTON
As he was talking I was thinking about it young girl he met here in Las Vegas, Carla, who was very worried that her parents might he be deported because she was born in this country but they were not. They work hard, they do everything they can to get give her a good life. And you're right. I don't want to rip families apart. I don't want to be sending parents away from children. I don't want to see the deportation force that Donald has talked about in action in our country. We have eleven million undocumented people. They have four million American citizen children. Fifteen million people. He said as recently as a few weeks ago in Phoenix that every undocumented person will be subject to deportation.
In his Phoenix speech of Aug. 31, Trump said: “Day one, my first hour in office, those people are gone. And you can call it deported if you want. … They're gone.” But he wasn’t referring to the estimated 11 million immigrants in the country illegally. He has dropped mass deportations from his recent speeches. Trump vowed to aggressively remove the “2 million criminal aliens inside of our country.”
Now here's what that means -- it needs you would have to have a massive law enforcement presence where law enforcement officers would be going school to school, home to home, business to business rounding up people who are undocumented and we would then have to put them on trains, on buses to get them out of our country.
ICE issued a letter in 2011 laying out the “sensitive locations” where federal immigration officers are not supposed to round up immigrants. These include schools, hospitals and churches.
If Trump becomes president, he will have to change ICE guidelines to send them into schools.
I think that is an idea that is not in keeping with who we are as a nation. I think it's an idea that would rip our country apart. I have been for border security for years. I voted for border security in the United States Senate and my comprehensive immigration reform plan of course include border security. But I want to put our resources where I think they're most needed. Getting rid of any violent person, anybody who should be deported, we should deport them. When it comes to the wall that Donald talks about building, he went to Mexico, he had a meeting with Mexican President - didn't even raise it, he choked, and then he got into a Twitter war because the Mexican president said we’re not paying for that wall. So I think we are both a nation of immigrants and we are a nation of laws and that we can act accordingly and that's why I am introducing comprehensive immigration reform within the first hundred days with a path to citizenship.
CHRIS WALLACE
Thank you Secretary Clinton, I want to follow-up -
DONALD TRUMP
Chris, I think it, I think I should respond. First of all I had a very good meeting with the president of Mexico, very nice man, we will be doing very much better with Mexico on trade deals believe me. TheNAFTA deal signed by her husband is one of the worst deals ever made of any kind of signed by anybody.
NAFTA was not signed by President Clinton. It was signed by his predecessor, the first President Bush.
It's a disaster.
Most studies show NAFTA had a relatively small impact on the economy. "NAFTA did not cause the huge job losses feared by the critics or the large economic gains predicted by supporters. The net overall effect of NAFTA on the U.S. economy appears to have been relatively modest,”according to the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.
Hillary Clinton wanted the wall. Hillary Clinton fought for the wall. In 2006 or thereabouts. Now she never gets anything done so naturally the wall wasn't built, but Hillary Clinton wanted the wall.
CHRIS WALLACE
But let me, wait. Sir, let me -
(CROSSTALK)
CHRIS WALLACE
No wait, I'd like to hear from Secretary Clinton.
HILLARY CLINTON
I voted for border security and there are some limited places where that was appropriate there also is necessarily going to be a technology and how best to deploy that.
When Hillary Clinton was a senator she voted for the Secure Fence Act of 2006. The goal was to decrease illegal immigration and illegal drugs by erecting 700 miles of fencing along the 2,000-mile Southern border. The Congressional Research Service reported in April 2015 that more than 650 miles of the border wall had been completed, including pedestrian fencing and vehicle barriers.
But it is clear when you look at what Donald has been proposing he started his campaign bashing immigrants, calling Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals and drug dealers, that he has a very different view about what we should do to deal with immigrants. Now what I am also arguing is that bringing undocumented immigrants out from the shadows, putting them into the formal economy will be good because employers can’t exploit them and undercut Americans wages and Donald knows a lot about this. He's undocumented labor to build the Trump Tower. He underpaid undocumented workers and when they complained, he basically said what a lot of employers do - you complain I’ll get you deported.
In 1980, a contractor working for Trump hired Polish workers in the country illegally to clear the site on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan where Trump Tower would later be built. The contractor was later fined $570,000 by federal regulators. Trump has repeatedly claimed he was unaware the workers were in the country illegally, and the truth remains somewhat murky. But some published reports have suggested Trump not only knew about the workers’ status but instigated their hiring. There were also reports that he threatened to turn the workers in to immigration authorities after some complained about work conditions.
I want to get everybody out of the shadows get the economy working and not let employers like Donald exploit undocumented workers, which hurts them but also hurts American workers.
CHRIS WALLACE
Mr. Trump.
DONALD TRUMP
President Obama has moved millions of people out. Nobody knows about it, nobody talks about it, but under Obama, millions of people have been moved out of this country they’ve been deported she does want to say that but that's what happened. And that's what's happened big-league.
Trump is correct that deportations have increased under the Obama administration, which has brought Obama criticism from within his own party. While Trump has attacked the Obama administration’s immigration policy as “weak,” some of his own ideas mirror the current policy, including an emphasis on deporting immigrants in the country illegally who’ve committed crimes.
As far as moving these people out and moving we either have a country or we don't. We’re a country of laws, we either have a border or we don't. Now, you could come back in and you can become a citizen but it's very unfair. We have millions of people that did the right way they’re online they’re waiting we’re going to speed up the process big league because it's very inefficient. But they're online and they’re waiting to become citizens. Very unfair that somebody runs across the border becomes a citizen under her plan you have open borders you would have a disaster on trade and you will have a disaster with your open borders. But what she doesn't say is that President Obama has deported millions and millions of people just the way it is.
Deportations increased during Obama’s first four years in office, peaking in 2012 at nearly 410,000. Since then, deportations have been dropping, reaching a low of 235,000 last year. Since 2014, the administration has focused on deporting recent arrivals and criminals, with fewer deportations of longtime residents whose only crime was crossing the border. In all, about 2.8 million people have been deported under Obama.
CHRIS WALLACE
Secretary Clinton -
HILLARY CLINTON
We will not have open borders. That is a rank mischaracterization. We will have secure borders but we will also have reform and this used to be a bipartisan issue. Ronald Reagan was the last president to sign immigration reform and George W. Bush supported it as well.
CHRIS WALLACE
Secretary Clinton, I want to clear up your position on this issue because in a speech you gave to a Brazilian bank, for which you were paid $225,000, we’ve learned from the Wikileaks that you said this, and I want to quote “My dream is a hemispheric common market with open trade and open borders,” so that is the question.
DONALD TRUMP
Thank you.
CHRIS WALLACE
That is the question, please quiet everybody. Is that your dream, open borders?
HILLARY CLINTON
Well, if you went on to read the rest of the sentence, I was talking about energy.
Here is what she said, per WikiLeaks: “My dream is a hemispheric common market, with open trade and open borders, sometime in the future with energy that is as green and sustainable as we can get it, powering growth and opportunity for every person in the hemisphere.” Fact-checks have debated what exactly this means. While Clinton’s campaign says it’s about energy, reasonable people have disagreed. PolitiFact cited people who said they believed it referred to both trade and immigration. FactCheck.org, meanwhile, believed it “was related to trade, not immigration.” However one interprets this, it is also true that Clinton has not called for “open borders” as a policy during this campaign.
You know, we trade more energy with our neighbors then we trade with rest of the world combined and I do want us to have an electric grid, an energy system that crosses borders, I think I would be a great benefit to us. But you are very clearly quoting from Wikileaks and what is important about that is that the Russian government has engaged in espionage against Americans. They have hacked American websites, American accounts of private people, of institutions, then they have given that information to WikiLeaks for the purpose of putting it on the Internet. This has come from the highest levels of the Russian government clearly from Putin himself.
U.S. intelligence agencies have not called out Russian President Vladimir Putin by name. But an Oct. 7 statement issued by the director of national intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security said this: “We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia's senior-most officials could have authorized these activities.”
In an effort, as seventeen of our intelligence agencies have confirmed, to influence our election. I actually think the most important question of this evening, Chris, is finally, will Donald Trump admit and condemn that the Russians are doing this and make it clear that he will not have the help of Putin in this election, that he rejects Russian espionage against Americans, which he actually encouraged in the past. Those are the questions we need answered. We had never had anything like this happen in any of our elections before.
Source: NPR Politics
