Promoting White Nationalism?
Starting almost immediately the White House on Thursday announced new immigration regulations and restrictions against pregnant women seeking tourist visas to travel into the United States. The Trump administration’s White House press secretary, Stephanie Grisham, described the new rules which go into effect Friday, as necessary to protect the “integrity of American citizenship.”
The new restrictions “push consular officers abroad to reject women they believe are entering the United States specifically to gain citizenship for their child by giving birth,” The New York Times reports.
The Trump administration’s new regulations “will also defend American taxpayers from having their hard-earned dollars siphoned away to finance the direct and downstream costs associated with birth tourism,” Grisham said, not offering any specifics.
“Birth tourism poses risks to national security,” Carl C. Risch, assistant secretary for consular affairs at the State Department, said, offering no proof.
The White House offered no data to support its newest assault against those looking to visit what was once seen as a beacon of liberty around the world. But Republicans, conservatives, and white nationalists for a decade have railed against what some GOP lawmakers have called “anchor babies.” Those are infants, born in the United States to immigrant parents, and possibly parents in the U.S. illegally, for the purpose of helping to establish citizenship for their family members.
Some Republicans, like U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert, infamously have railed against what he, in an insane conspiracy theory, called “terror babies” – suggesting terrorists would come into the U.S., have children who would automatically become citizens, and then those U.S. citizens would become terrorists like their parents. There is no evidence this has ever happened.
Image by clappstar via Flickr and a CC license