In the course of accepting the Republican presidential nomination, ex-President Trump shared his devised strategy for steering the United States. He portrayed a worrisome scenario for the nation’s status, detailing various instance in which he proposed to intervene. However, his discourse on Thursday night was riddled with gross inaccuracies and manipulative data, skewing reality especially when it came to immigration, the U.S. economy, and his past achievements.
To make things clear: Back when Trump was making claims about immigration, he focused heavily on it in his address, echoing numerous deceptive and false accusations, for example, linking it to a surge in criminal activity. He referenced grave and highly publicized crimes supposedly committed by individuals in the US illegally as supporting evidence.
The inference of a national escalation in violent crime linked with the wave of migrants, however, flies in the face of substantial proof. The FBI does not distinguish crimes based on the immigration status of the criminal, and there are no indications showing an increased crime rate by migrants, whether at the Mexico-U.S. border or in cities like New York which have seen a significant influx of migrants.
Contrary to such baseless assertions, countrywide statistics reveal that violent crime has been in steady decline. Research attribute lower probabilities of arrest for violent, drug, and property crimes to individuals residing in the U.S. unlawfully as compared to U.S. citizens by birth. The National Academy of Sciences released a 2020 study, which further established ‘significantly diminished felony arrest rates’ for individuals present in the U.S. unlawfully rather than legal immigrants or U.S. citizens from birth.
The narrative that other countries are deliberately sending their murderers, drug dealers, and other criminals to U.S. no longer holds water as there is no specific evidence to corroborate it.
Shifting focus to the country’s economy, the reality is vastly different from Trump’s portrayal. The impact of the COVID-19 pandemic lead to a substantial recession during Trump’s term. In an effort to stabilize the economy, the government had to borrow a whopping $3.1 trillion in 2020. When Trump vacated the White House, there were fewer jobs than when he began his tenure.
Perhaps one might be tempted to exclude the challenges stemming from the pandemic. During the initial three years of Trump’s tenure, economic growth averaged 2.67%, an impressive figure indeed. Yet, this is much less than the 4% average growth experienced during Bill Clinton’s eight-year tenure from 1993 to 2001, based on the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
An interesting fact is that the current President Biden exceeded Trump in terms of economic growth. Before the onslaught of the pandemic, Trump had brought the unemployment rate down to 3.5%, however, the active workforce’s participation rate for people aged 25 to 54 has been higher during Clinton’s time. Interestingly, the participation rate has also fared better under Biden’s leadership compared to Trump.
Turning towards the topic of Afghanistan, it’s important to highlight that the presented figures are grossly overstated according to the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) that is tasked with overseeing the American taxpayer money funneled towards resolving the conflict. The quoted $85-billion appears similar to figures in a July 30 quarterly SIGAR report that broke down how the U.S. had invested around $83 billion into building, training, and equipping Afghan security forces since 2001.
It’s vital to understand that these funds encompassed salaries of troops, training costs, operational expenses, infrastructure, along with equipment and transportation spanning two decades. A report by SIGAR and an elucidation by Dan Grazier, a defense policy analyst at the Project on Government Oversight, serve as sources for this information.
In actuality, merely about $18 billion out of this amount was allocated for equipping Afghan forces from 2002 to 2018, as elucidated in a June 2019 SIGAR report. An estimation in a 2017 Government Accountability Office report showed that near about 29% of dollars spent on Afghan defense forces between 2005 and 2016 covered equipment and transportation.
Transportation costs not only included equipment but extend to contracted pilots and aircrafts meant for officials meeting transportation. Extrapolating this proportion to the full two decades, it is computed that U.S. has spent nearly $24 billion on equipment and conveyance for Afghan forces since 2001.
Even if this is assumed to be correct, a significant portion of these military assets would be deemed obsolete after years of use, as per experts like Grazier. Additionally, U.S. forces had disposed previously unwanted equipment and prior to withdrawal rendered several Humvees and aircraft un-usable, as stated by Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, the head of the U.S. Central Command.
While the exact worth of United States-provided Afghan equipment now in the hands of the Taliban remains unknown, Pentagon officials have acknowledged that it’s substantial.
President Biden time and again has acknowledged the American citizens who were among the 240 people kidnapped by Hamas on October 7. Reports suggest that eight Americans remain captive, including three reported fatalities. For example, three days into the attack which marked the beginning of the Israel-Hamas conflict, Biden made a statement revealing that American citizens are part of those captured by Hamas.