Amid the growing outcry surrounding the separation of immigrant families, President Trump threw out several different defensive tweets Tuesday morning in the hopes that something would stick.
The first thing on Trump's mind was the "rigged witch hunt" Russia investigation, but he quickly moved on to instead criticize an American ally. "Crime in Germany is up 10 percent plus (officials do not want to report these crimes) since migrants were accepted," said Trump, citing no evidence. Official data from Germany shows that crime actually dropped 10 percent last year. "Be smart America!" Trump nevertheless warned.
Trump also defended his administration's "zero tolerance" immigration policy, which has led to the separation of children and parents at the border. But his defense was contradictory: First, the president declared that strong borders are essential, but then he once again falsely blamed Democrats for harsh border policies and for allowing immigrants to "infest" the U.S.
But then Trump appeared to return to the argument that family separations are actually necessary. "We must always arrest people coming into our country illegally," he wrote. He then claimed without evidence that the vast majority of children who are being detained in cages didn't actually arrive with their parents, so there were no parents from whom they could be separated.
Trump wrapped it all up by putting the blame for the supposedly very necessary separations on Congress, calling to "change the laws."