Senator Bernie Sanders has shocked everyone by supporting President Trump’s efforts to secure the border and curb illegal immigration. Sen. Sanders was responding to a question by This Week’s host Jonathan Karl, who asked him if Trump had, so far, done anything right.
“I think cracking down on fentanyl, making sure our borders are stronger,” Sanders replied.
“Look, nobody thinks illegal immigration is appropriate, and I happen to think we need comprehensive immigration reform, but I don’t think it’s appropriate for people to be coming across the border illegally.”
Sanders’ change of tune is surprising considering that he proposed giving taxpayer-funded health insurance for illegal immigrants.
Nonetheless, he opposed mass deportations, which he said would destroy the country. Trump has so far focused on removing dangerous criminals, including Tren de Aragua gang members and illegal aliens with a criminal history.
“He wants to deport 20 million people who are in this country who are undocumented,” Sanders said.
“Well, you do that, you destroy the entire country.”
“Because I got news for you, Trump’s billionaire friends are not going to pick the crops in California that feed us.”
“They’re not going to work in meatpacking houses,” he continued. “That’s what undocumented people are doing.”
Ironically, Democrats did not believe former President Obama’s deportations would affect crop picking. Hillary Clinton also ran on a secure border platform, which the Democrats did not believe (or pretend to believe) would affect food security at the time.
Recently, vocal anti-Trump Texas Democrat Rep. Jasmine Crockett said Trump’s deportations were an attempt to bring back slavery by sending black people back to the fields.
“As they have decided to go after immigrants and these — and things like that, and they’ve said, ‘Oh, they’ve taken your black job, they’ve taken your black jobs,'” she said.
“Not really, they are obviously jobs that they want us to go back to, such as work in the fields, alright?”
“Those immigrants that come into our country, they work the fields, something that we ain’t done in a long time,” added Crockett. “And clearly, he is trying to make us go back to the fields.”
Another Democrat, Rep. Hank Johnson (GA) said Trump’s deportations return black Americans to the slavery and cotton-picking era.
“It puts us back to when America was ‘great,’ and we were picking cotton and doing the productivity that they’re putting my Latino brothers and sisters who migrate here to do that work because we are not suited intellectually to do it anymore.”
Meanwhile, while Sanders only approved Trump’s effort to secure the border, most Americans believe he was fulfilling his campaign promises.
According to a February 2025 CBS News/YouGov poll, more than two-thirds (70%) of Americans believe the president has kept his word.
On border security, 59 percent of Americans approved his deportation efforts, while 41 percent opposed it. Similarly, 64 percent of Americans supported the deployment of U.S. Troops to the southern border to curb illegal immigration and drug smuggling, compared to 36% who opposed the deployment.
Trump’s handling of the Israel-Hamas war also received the support of most Americans (54 percent), while 46 percent disapproved.
Other promises that Trump has delivered include banning men out of women’s sports, which 79 percent of Americans support, by signing the “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports” executive order.
