MSNBC’s Kumar Says Trump Using Deportations to Test U.S. Resistance Against Plan to ‘Tear Down’ Democracy
MSNBC contributor María Teresa Kumar said President Donald Trump and his administration are using Kilmar Abrego Garcia and other deportees as “canaries in the coal mine” to test American resistance to their goal of “eradicate” the Constitution and “tear down” the entirety of American democracy.
The MSNBC contributor and president of Voto Latino appeared on The Saturday Show and spoke to host Jonathan Capehart on the subject of the deportations and other Trump administration policies on immigration and the border, including birthright citizenship.
Capehart brought up the Supreme Court announcement that it will hear arguments next month on Trump’s birthright citizenship executive order, and asked Kumar for comment on the case.
“It’s the othering of America,” Kumar replied, saying that he’s “meddling” with the 14th Amendment and would need, but won’t get, a majority of states to sign a new Amendment in order to change birthright citizenship.
“But here’s the rub,” she said. “He is talking about individuals that are undocumented. But he’s also floating this whole idea that he can start incarcerating U.S. Citizens without due process and sending them abroad to a maximum security prison.”
She added that the administration is using illegal immigrants as “the canary in the coal mine” and “proxies to see how much the American people are going to fight back.”
The “canary in the coal mine” description was also used on another MSNBC show earlier in the day, to make the same essential argument.
“This is all part of the exact same game that they’re playing and it’s trying to eradicate not only our constitutional rights as individuals, but it’s actually trying to tear down the whole system of what our democracy actually means to everybody,” Kumar said.
CAPEHART: This week, the Supreme Court announced that it’s going to hear arguments on May 15th on the president’s move to — his questioning of birthright citizenship. You see the headline there. Supreme Court to hear argument on whether Trump can implement plan banning birthright citizenship. Maria Teresa, what’s that about?
KUMAR: Well, again, it’s the othering of America. And he is meddling every single day with the Constitution, in this case, directly with the 14th Amendment. And the only way to ratify the fourtee– you know, a new amendment is to get the majority of the states to agree to this. And that’s never going to happen.
But here’s the rub. He is talking about individuals that are undocumented. But he’s also floating this whole idea that he can start incarcerating U.S. Citizens without due process and sending them abroad to a maximum security prison.
We have to make sure that we are paying close attention to everything this administration is doing, because he’s starting with undocumented immigrants as the canary in the coal mine, but it’s starting to actually use them as proxies to see how much the American people are going to fight back.
In this instance, imagine all of a sudden, if you are someone that, you know, you’re a married woman and you go ahead and you, I’m thinking of the SAVE Act, right? You’re a a married women, you wanna go and you wanna register to vote. But because you don’t have your birth certificate, you’re completely disenfranchised.
This is all part of the exact same game that they’re playing and it’s trying to eradicate not only our constitutional rights as individuals, but it’s actually trying to tear down the whole system of what our democracy actually means to everybody.
Watch the clip above via MSNBC.
