Trump at border: Violent crime committed by foreign nationals is ‘nation-wrecking border invasion’

By BETHANY BLANKLEY | THE CENTER SQUARE

Former President Donald Trump accused Vice President Kamala Harris of overseeing an invasion at the southern border during a news conference in southern Arizona alongside the families of murder victims allegedly killed at the hands of foreign nationals in the U.S. illegally.

Harris “has overseen a nation-wrecking border invasion,” Trump said at the Arizona-Mexico border.

Harris officially accepted the Democratic nomination for president Thursday night at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. She did so after “a coup” forcing out President Joe Biden, Trump said at his news conference.

“For nearly four years, Comrade Kamala … has allowed at least 20 million people, all illegal aliens, into our country, including millions and millions of unvetted fighting age men from over 158 different countries,” Trump said. The Center Square has reported the number of illegal border crossings is more than 12.5 million.

Because of Biden-Harris policies, Border Patrol agents “are being forced to free tens of thousands of illegal aliens from custody week after week. These are the most violent criminals that you’ll ever see. Every day brings another story about innocent Americans being tortured, raped murdered and massacred by illegal aliens that Kamala Harris has set free in our country.”

Trump described the criminals released into the country and the types of crimes they committed in their home countries or in the U.S. They include a Peruvian gang leader wanted for 23 murders; “an illegal alien who approached two 13-year-olds with a machete in New York in broad daylight in front of other people and forced them into the woods, tied them together by the wrist, and raped them over and over again.”

Migrants were just arrested “for the rape of a 46-year-old woman in Coney Island who threw her to the ground and raped her with a knife to her throat,” he said. “One of them had previously been arrested for raping another woman but instead of being deported he was released into our country and told to enjoy your life.”

In Fort Wayne, Indiana, “a woman who was offered a ride home by two illegal aliens was instead kidnapped, held down and raped then driven around while the illegals discussed how they planned to kill her. They didn’t want to have a witness,” Trump said. She escaped by throwing herself out of the moving car.

Trump also described a crime in the Bronx, allegedly committed by “an illegal alien who Kamala set loose into the country, [who] approached a 36-year-old woman while pretending to ask for directions, before he wrapped his arms around her throat, pinned her down on a park bench, and raped her publicly. She said, he wasn’t trying to rape me, he was trying to kill me.’”

The former president also described the sexual assault of two young girls in Michigan by an illegal border crosser; the murder of a 54-year-old mother of four in Virginia who was killed by “an illegal alien trying to steal her car” and who “ran her down, ran her over and left her dead on the ground;” and a Venezuelan “illegal alien criminal let in by Comrade Kamala [who] shot a female police officer multiple times with a rifle” in Texas.

Trump described the murder of University of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, who was “assaulted, beaten and horrifically murdered. Kamala Harris let in the illegal alien animal who murdered Laken. This monster was in Border Patrol custody. They didn’t want to let him go but under Kamala’s policies, he was set free to kill and that’s what he did.

“Kamala let this bloodthirsty killer go free and then he murdered beautiful Laken.”

Trump also described “the heartbreaking story of Rachel Moran,” whose family members joined him at the news conference and spoke. Rachel was “brutally raped and murdered by an illegal alien who was let into America by Kamala Harris and her policies of stupidity. The savage person who committed this heinous crime first killed another woman in El Salvador before walking across our open border” before allegedly committing a home invasion in Los Angeles.

“Biden-Harris unleashed a deadly plague of migrant crime on our country” that “shattered so many families’ lives and stole so many incredible young lives,” Trump said.

“We can’t let it happen to other people. We can’t let what you’re going through happen to other families,” he said to the Angel families joining him. One was 12-year-old Houston murder victim Jocelyn Nungaray’s mother, who endorsed Trump. The victims’ lives were taken “all for no reason whatsoever” by “hardened, hardened criminals pouring into our country,” he said.

Trump refuted the claims made by some Democrats and news outlets that illegal foreign nationals “don’t commit crimes like people that live here.”

The Center Square has reported for years on Immigrations and Customs Enforcement officers pursuing, arresting and removing criminals and fugitives illegally in the country. From fiscal years 2021 through 2023 alone, ICE agents arrested more than 387,000 criminal noncitizens, breaking records in fiscal 2023. The majority were from Mexico, Nicaragua, Columbia and Venezuela.

“They make our criminals look like babies,” Trump said. “Our criminals all of a sudden don’t look so tough. These are the roughest people from all over the world.”