{"id":178958,"date":"2016-08-23T16:48:44","date_gmt":"2016-08-23T22:48:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=178958"},"modified":"2016-08-23T16:48:44","modified_gmt":"2016-08-23T22:48:44","slug":"now-trump-says-hes-open-to-softening-in-immigration-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2016\/08\/now-trump-says-hes-open-to-softening-in-immigration-laws\/","title":{"rendered":"Now Trump says he&#8217;s open to &#8216;softening&#8217; in immigration laws"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_178962\"  class=\"wp-caption module image alignnone\" style=\"max-width: 771px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-178962\" src=\"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/ScottBall_DonaldTrumpLaredoTX7232015-2707_jpg_800x1000_q100-771x515.jpg\" alt=\"Donald Trump\" width=\"771\" height=\"515\" srcset=\"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/ScottBall_DonaldTrumpLaredoTX7232015-2707_jpg_800x1000_q100-771x515.jpg 771w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/ScottBall_DonaldTrumpLaredoTX7232015-2707_jpg_800x1000_q100-336x224.jpg 336w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/ScottBall_DonaldTrumpLaredoTX7232015-2707_jpg_800x1000_q100-768x513.jpg 768w, https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/ScottBall_DonaldTrumpLaredoTX7232015-2707_jpg_800x1000_q100.jpg 800w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 771px) 100vw, 771px\" \/><p class=\"wp-media-credit\">Scott Ball \/ The Texas Tribune<\/p><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">Donald Trump responds to questions during a 2015 trip to Laredo, Texas.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>AUSTIN, Texas &#8212; Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump says he is open to a &#8220;softening&#8221; in laws dealing with people who are in the country illegally, offering a pivot away from the hardline immigration views he espoused throughout the primaries.<\/p>\n<p>Trump made the remarks during a taping Tuesday afternoon of a town hall in Austin with Fox News host Sean Hannity.<\/p>\n<aside class=\"module align-left half type-aside\">\n<h3>About this article<\/h3>\n<p>This article originally appeared in <a href=\"https:\/\/www.texastribune.org\/2016\/08\/23\/trump-open-softening-immigration-laws\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Texas Tribune<\/a>,\u00a0a nonpartisan, nonprofit media organization that informs Texans and engages with them about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.<\/p>\n<\/aside>\n<p>&#8220;Is there any part of the law that you might be able to change that would accommodate those people that contribute to society, have been law-abiding, have kids here?&#8221; Hannity asked. &#8220;Would there be any rule in your mind?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;There certainly can be a softening because we&#8217;re not looking to hurt people,&#8221; Trump said in his response. &#8220;We want people \u2014 we have some great people in this country.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are going to follow the laws of this country,&#8221; Trump added.<\/p>\n<p>Throughout the Republican primaries, Trump campaigned on a restrictive immigration reform, advocating mass deportation of the millions of people in the country unlawfully. In recent days, Trump and his advisers had signaled he may be willing to tone down those views, especially after a meeting Saturday with Hispanic leaders.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier in the exchange, Hannity asked Trump if people \u201cwho have worked hard, who have been here a long time,\u201d would be sent back to the country they came from or if he would \u201creconsider them.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are going to follow the laws,\u201d Trump said. &#8220;We\u2019re going to see where people are, we\u2019re going to see how they\u2019ve done.\u201d<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Trump then brought up the idea of a \u201cmerit system\u201d and expressed sympathy for \u201creally great people\u201d who have been waiting a long time to become citizens.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;You have years and years of people waiting in line. They\u2019ve gone through a process,\u201d Trump said, emphasizing he\u2019s referring to people who have done so legally.<\/p>\n<p>Trump continued: &#8220;They\u2019re great people in some cases, and I guess in some cases, maybe not. But you have really great people wanting and so proudly wanting to come into our country and now what you\u2019re doing is you take people away from that line.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The Hannity taping was closed to the press but a number of people who attended provided live video. Trump&#8217;s remarks about &#8220;a softening&#8221; were also confirmed by a person there.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump says he is open to a &#8220;softening&#8221; in laws dealing with people who are in the country illegally, offering a pivot away from the hardline immigration views he espoused throughout the primaries.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":178962,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[708,140,226,116],"class_list":["post-178958","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-2016-election","tag-border-and-immigration","tag-presidential-race","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178958","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=178958"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/178958\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/178962"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=178958"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=178958"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=178958"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}