During one of her morning press conferences, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum contended that deportations of Mexicans were higher during Bill Clinton's presidency between 1993 and 2001 than they are now under President Donald Trump.
“The largest period of deportations from the United States to Mexico was with Bill Clinton, from 1993 to 2001,” she said. “There was one year, 2000, with 1,150,906 Mexicans deported.”
Another former President, Barack Obama, deported 601,356 Mexicans during his first year in office.
So far, Trump has only deported 86,017 in the roughly seven and a half months of his second term.
Sheinbaum attributed the lower number of deportees to a sharp decline in attempted border crossings after Trump ended asylum when he took office.
“We have to say that there are fewer migrants entering,” she said. “There was a very important reduction in persons from Mexico and other nationalities after President Trump’s decision to close … to close the asylums.”
Admittedly, it is much easier to deport migrants when they are caught trying to cross the border than rounding them up and sending them back months or years later, as Trump is trying to do.
Surely there are many more Mexican illegal immigrants in the U.S. than that 80,000, but the process of deporting them will be slower and much more labor intensive, if the administration chooses to go after all or most of them rather than just those who have committed crimes.
For her part, Sheinbaum had not been Trump's biggest fan before he took office and even condemned his immigration raids as recently as June.
“We did not agree with the use of raids to detain people who work honestly in the United States,” she said at the time.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem blamed Sheinbaum's comments in part for the violent protests in California that targeted ICE agents, Breitbart Texas reported at the time.
Sheinbaum seems to have come around in part because she's trying to negotiate a new agreement with Trump on trade and tariffs. She can't afford to look too hostile if she hopes to get favorable terms from Trump.
But her admission that Trump's border policies are working far better than those of his predecessors should resound throughout the world.
Unfortunately, it was only mentioned by Breitbart and a few copycats.
