Former President Donald Trump said the surge of illegal immigrants crossing the border could “destroy our country,” saying all the Biden administration “had to do [was] leave it alone.”
Trump’s remarks to Fox News’ “Hannity” Monday evening came in his first on-camera interview since leaving the White House in January, although he has spoken three times to Newsmax.
The interview was recorded at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, over the weekend, according to Fox News.
Trump also condemned most news media outlets’ coverage of the border crisis, claiming they would have expressed outrage if the same situation had occurred in his administration.
“They would not stand for it and they’re playing it down as much as they can play it down,” Trump said. “It’s a horrible situation, [it] could destroy our country. People are pouring in, but you’ll see something as the months go by like you’ve never seen before already.
“It’s like you’ve never seen before. There’s never been anything like what’s happened at our border, and people are coming in by the tens of thousands. They’re walking in. They – we had – all they had to do was leave it alone.”
Customs and Border Protection on April 8 announced that more than 172,000 migrants were caught attempting to illegally enter the country over the southern border with Mexico in March, a 71% increase over February’s tally.
Trump would not address rumblings that President Joe Biden was suffering from physical or mental ailments, but suggested the perception appeared to be emboldening the United States’ enemies, particularly Russia, Iran and China.
“Well something’s going on,” Trump said. “Because they never did this with me, that I can tell you. Nobody was tougher on Russia, and frankly, getting along with Vladimir Putin is a good thing. And I got along with them very well. The relationship was very good, very strong, but they never encircled Ukraine and they never in Taiwan, China, and they never sent warships all over the place like they’re doing now.
“It looks very serious what’s going on with Taiwan.”
On another subject, Trump suggested any Republican wishing to win his or her congressional seat in 2022 needs to run on his “America First” platform.
“If they want to win, yes,” Trump said. “We’ve expanded the Republican Party. I mean the Texas border. We have the biggest Hispanic vote since – as the governor [Greg Abbott] said to me, he called me up, great governor – he said since reconstruction. And I said, ‘You’re talking about Civil War, right?’ He said ‘Since the Civil War.’ If you want to win and win big, you have to do that.”
Trump received 26% of the non-white vote, according to exit polls in November, the largest share of any Republican presidential candidate since 1960.
The former president also questioned the federal government’s “pause” in distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine made by Johnson & Johnson. This occurred amid reports tying the vaccine to rare instances of blot clots.
“I think it’s very suspect as what they did with Johnson & Johnson, because the only people that are happy about that are Pfizer and Moderna,” Trump said, referring to the other two vaccine manufacturers that were given emergency approval.
Source: Newmax
