There are rational claims made against allowing the current immigration system in the US to continue.  Not all objections are racist or bigoted.  For example, as an immigration lawyer said the day after the election on CNN,  in some small towns in America,  they are overwhelmed by thousands of immigrants who have been flown in to make “asylum” claims that amount really to desires to pursue the American dream. These people are not real asylum seekers at all and they are jumping the queue  when there are already millions of legitimate claims for asylum in America that should have their case heard before these.

This could have been debated in the presidential debate. Instead, Trump claimed immigrants are eating cats and dogs without evidence to back up his claims. He does this to rile up his base.  Fox News does the same thing. Trump does not care about evidence, or even truth. Neither does Fox News. Trump just wants to make his anti-immigrant statements as pumped up as possible. He wants to throw raw meat to his base. He does not want a rational debate. Rational debate is being obfuscated by Trump’s electioneering and “firehose of lies.’

As Laura Coates said on CNN, “such false claims lead to fear mongering and ‘otherism’ and someone purportedly eating pets.” Such lies trigger hate and make rational debate and discussion impossible. That is exactly what Trump wants to do.  The last thing he wants is to have a rational debate since he knows in a rational debate his arguments crumble like stale cookies on a hot September night.

Such lying can have serious consequences. As Chuck Rocha a political commentator said on CNN the day after the presidential debate, “This is dangerous by the way when you say this in front of 68 million people on TV, for such lies can trigger crazy people to do what they did in El Paso, and take a gun to a Walmart.”

We must demand more from our political candidates. We must not let them get away with such nonsense.