“I will say this, you have to form a very very strong barrier from people just flowing in like candy. It’s no good, you can’t have it. We either have a country, or we don’t have a country,” he said.
Donald Trump on Saturday made his first-ever political visit to Iowa, speaking to conservative Christians, stoking speculation about his political plans and labeling the United States a “laughingstock” during an interview with NBC News.
He warned the Family Leadership Summit in an evening speech that Republicans will have a “really tough” time in the 2016 presidential race if Hillary Clinton runs. He said the Senate’s immigration bill “could be a death wish” for the Republican Party but insisted the GOP has to do “the right thing.” And he bragged about buying the old Post Office building in Washington: “You have the White House, you have Congress and I’m building right in the middle!”
In an interview after the speech, Trump said he’s focused on midterm elections for now, not the 2016 presidential race (though he declined to say which GOP Senate races or candidates he finds promising in 2014). He declined to elaborate on what immigration reform proposals he might back. And he said Sen. Rand Paul’s fight with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie over national security and civil liberties is “probably bad overall for the Republican Party.”
Summing up his view of the U.S., Trump said, “we used to be the king and the queen all put together, and now we’re a laughingstock as a country.”
[…]
