Glenn Beck said that even if passing out teddy bears and soccer balls to illegal immigrant children entices more parents in Central American to send their children to the U.S., it was never his “intent” to lure more illegal immigrant children to unlawfully enter the country or put more children in danger.
On Wednesday’s The Kelly File on Fox News, host Megyn Kelly mentioned that Breitbart News Senior Editor-at-Large John Nolte wrote, in response to those who criticized conservatives who opposed Beck’s effort as lacking compassion, that the truly “compassionate thing to do is to ensure you’re not doing anything that might encourage more parents to send their unaccompanied children on that harrowing trek.”
Kelly asked Beck to respond to Nolte’s belief that “it is not insane, unreasonable, or lacking in compassion to argue that news of a major American media figure greeting children at the border with toys could be used by the drug smugglers and human traffickers already exploiting these kids as a way to recruit more.”
“That may be, but that’s not my intent,” Beck replied, saying he was strongly motivated by justice and mercy.
Beck said illegal immigrant children are coming to America because the country is “not enforcing our own laws,” but he said he was “overwhelmed with the plight of these children.” He talked about an illegal immigrant child who passed away after he drowned in the Rio Grande River, speculating the child probably could not think of anything but his mother. Beck did acknowledge that not everyone who is unlawfully entering the country, though, is an innocent child.
Beck also said he did not mean to say that conservatives who oppose his efforts are not compassionate or good-hearted. And he noted that he has demanded that the children go back to their countries of origin. Beck gave a monologue on Tuesday, which was subtitled in Spanish, that encouraged parents in Central America to not send their children on the treacherous journey to America.
Beck said Americans needed to answer to a “higher citizenship,” and he stated that he wanted the illegal immigrant children to go back home and think the Americans they “met were amazing.” Beck said it was his hope that the illegal immigrant kids go back to their countries and decide they are going to make something of themselves and try “to come to America the right way” in the future.
Nolte initially criticized Beck for giving the mainstream media license to go after and “mock conservatives as un-Christian.” Beck put a spotlight on the “threats” that he claimed he was receiving and went out of his way to emphasize how “deadly” helping illegal immigrant children could be to his career.
“The problem isn’t what Beck did. The problem is how he did it,” Nolte wrote last week. “Beck’s desire to help kids caught in a geopolitical crossfire through no fault of their own is laudable. We all want to help. I’ve yet to hear anyone argue that it’s wrong to use American taxpayer dollars to feed, house, and offer medical care to these children. No one opposes that.”
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