With the release of her 11th best-selling book, Ann Coulter has proven her timing to be excellent. The issue of immigration has exploded (as if it could become even bigger) largely due to Donald Trump’s inflammatory rhetoric. But no one holds a candle to Ms. Coulter in her new book Adios, America!
This is the fourth Coulter book I have read (sorry Ms. Coulter about the other seven). The reason I return to her books is, whether you like her or not, she is smart and knowledgeable and her books are well-researched. I always learn from her. This time I had a chance to interview Ms. Coulter and what one finds is that she is thoroughly authentic. What you see on TV is not a performance – Ann is Ann.
The first question I asked Ms. Coulter as I do with all authors is why she wrote this book. Her reply was “because when researching another book I found a massive cover-up by the government and media about immigrant crime.” The central tenet of the book is the junior senator from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy, in 1965 changed the nature of our legal immigration system which purposefully reduced the quality of our immigrants and changed the geographic source of most immigrants. The Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 over the next five decades greatly changed the demographic makeup of the American population. Immigrants entering the United States under the new legislation came increasingly from countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America, as opposed to Europe. Ms. Coulter believes these immigrants – legal or illegal – rip at the core of the country and have distinctly different cultural bases which not only don’t meet our historical standards, but have negative impact in regard to such issues as rape and crime.
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The book has a large focus on Hispanics. That puts Ms. Coulter in the danger zone of being branded a racist, especially considering the book’s title. That was at least partially alleviated when I asked her about the many people who are in the U.S. who are from other areas of the world, and are more educated than the people from Central America or Mexico who have overstayed their visas. Her reply: “They need to go, too.” Coulter does not want anyone here illegally -- no matter their background.
Which led to a discussion regarding immigrants’ legal status. You get a sense from the book that Coulter believes that the system has become so poisoned that it needs to be shut down and started all over from scratch. As she states on page 102, “Why exclude legal immigrants? Isn’t that worse. Only certain Republicans get excited about the difference between legal and illegal immigrants. The rest of America is trying to understand the point of the last thirty years of legal immigration. Why was this necessary? To paraphrase the line about families you can’t choose your native-born Americans – but you can choose your immigrants. Our immigration system will be working when the number of immigrants who commit crimes is zero.”
That goes for the favored programs which are set up to bring in people who are business- related immigrants. First, there is the well-known H1B visa program which brings in people with certain skills, especially used by tech firms. I have always questioned this program from one angle. If we need so many of these tech engineers for Google and Apple, why are we not channeling more of our college students into those degrees as opposed to some of the useless degrees they are obtaining? There is an argument to be made (whether it is right or wrong) that this program is being used to bring in cheap labor.
The second program that I asked Coulter about is the lesser known EB-5 visa program. The program requires a potential immigrant to invest a minimum amount of $500,000. They must create ten full-time jobs for U.S. citizens or legal workers, not relatives. They obtain a green card, not citizenship, but after five years as a permanent resident the investor may apply for citizenship. Coulter stated she is against both of these programs. I disagree with her on this one as I believe the EB-5 program makes a lot of sense.
If the level of rape and crime we are seeing has been created by this class of current immigrants I asked, why does the Left not take up a cause to stop this? Her reply was “The amnesty-pushers have beautiful homes, beachfront property, European vacations, Senate offices, vast portfolios, influence with the Harvard admissions committee, and powerful friends in the media and politics. What do they care about American citizenship? But for most Americans, our most precious possession is citizenship in this amazing country. That endowment is being bartered away by our elites in exchange for votes, for profits, or for campaign dollars.”
“It’s as if Ted Bundy designed our immigration policies to ensure that the most misogynist cultures go to the head of the line. American employers get the cheap labor, Democrats get the votes, and American girls get the rapes.”
Reading Coulter anytime is enlightening and provocative. Our immigration system has been broken for ages and we have a president who lawlessly attempted to legalize many people, but has been shut down for now by the courts. As defined in a prior column, the court system for immigration is a total disaster. Adios, America! will at a minimum focus you on some of the elements of the struggle we all face.
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