Insisting that the United States’ sovereignty is under attack by asylum-seeking migrants from Central America, a Fox News guest demanded Tuesday night that the U.S. military declare “martial law” at the southern border.
Opening his primetime Fox News show by calling for the military to mobilize at the border because large-scale migration “is how countries collapse,” Tucker Carlson griped that America’s military force was spread too far around the world, supposedly leaving this country vulnerable.
Bringing on retired Col. Douglas MacGregor to bolster his case, Carlson wondered why “is it so repugnant to the leadership” that troops would “protect us” at the border before asking MacGregor if the purpose of the military is to protect against a “threat to the territorial sovereignty” of the country.
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“The U.S. Army belongs on the border right now,” the retired officer said while citing Title 10 of the United States Code. “It’s perfectly obvious to everyone on the border.”
“You can add more patrolmen. You can add more customs officers. It’s not just a function of the wall. They can’t cope with hundreds of thousands of people marching over the borders, especially when they are told if you reach the border, you have to be admitted. We need martial law on the border.”
MacGregor went on to claim that he has spoken to various people in border states and they “all said the same thing—please send troops.”
Border state leaders, however, aren’t all keen on the military at the border. In February, the governors of New Mexico and California announced they were pulling their National Guard troops from the border, calling Trump’s claims of a security crisis “political theater.” Officials in an Arizona border town also passed a resolution to have troop-installed razor wire removed from their border wall.
Trump’s long-sought border wall, meanwhile, is moving along, even if many border-area lawmakers aren’t overly thrilled with it. The Department of Defense just announced it has awarded nearly a billion dollars in contracts to build the wall.
Carlson, who has repeatedly called Mexico a “hostile country” that is “seeking to undermine” the United States by allowing migrants to travel to the border, asked why “would it be offensive to protect this country,” prompting MacGregor to claim it’s because Democrats “see voters moving across the border.”
“No one on the left will advocate for the defense of the border,” he added. “They see in the future a foundation, a human foundation for a permanent dictatorship of the left.”
This is far from the first time that Carlson has advocated for military mobilization at the border. While interviewing then-Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen last week, Carlson pressed her on whether the administration would commit to sending troops to the border since “it’s really a crisis” the magnitude of a Category Five hurricane.
