Trump is Playing Xenophobic Political Games With America's Troops

For perspective, here's a table showing the number of people Customs and Border Patrol arrested illegally crossing the border each year since the turn of the century:

Fiscal Year	Illegal Crossings
2000	1,676,438
2001	1,266,214
2002	955,310
2003	931,557
2004	1,160,395
2005	1,189,075
2006	1,089,092
2007	876,704
2008	723,825
2009	556,041
2010	463,382
2011	340,252
2012	364,768
2013	420,789
2014	486,651
2015	337,117
2016	415,816
2017	310,531

Trump recently announced that he is sending 5,200 military troops to respond to a caravan of refugees heading our way from Central America --- a caravan with a current estimated size of about 4,000.

Note that by law, the American military is prohibited from engaging in immigration enforcement, or indeed, ANY kind of law enforcement, without the explicit authorization of Congress.  So it's not clear what Trump expects the troops to do.

Also note that 4,000 refugees --- assuming they all make it here --- is just about 1% of the total number of people CBP routinely deal with on a yearly basis.

Also note that Trump is sending more troops than the estimated number of refugees.  Does he think that every single refugee needs their own personal military escort (and that some of them need two)?

Finally, and most damningly, note that in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, the number of illegal border crossings was more than three times what it is today --- yet George W. Bush never saw a need to send our military to the Mexican border.

So is Trump just a coward, afraid of a moderate-sized group of unarmed, tired and hungry refugees?  Is he completely unqualified for his job, and doesn't know the difference between typical immigration and an actual threat to the country?  Or is he just using our troops like toy soldiers to stir up fear and xenophobia in an attempt to scare people into electing Republicans?

There's no reason it can't be all three.  And all of them are reasons to vote out Trump's Republican enablers and replace them with Democrats who aren't scared, clueless and craven.

So vote for all the Democrats on the ballot.  And contribute what you can in the campaign's closing days.