The Trump campaign lambasted Democrats as “hypocrites” for walling off the convention in Chicago to protect those inside despite the White House’s yearslong refusal to build a wall on the southern border amid the illegal immigration crisis.
“The Democrat Party is made up of out-of-touch elites who live by the motto ‘rules for thee but not for me.’ They put walls around the DNC and Capitol Hill but oppose a border wall to protect the American people; hire private armed security for themselves but support defunding local police; and they oppose school choice as they send their own kids to private school. Hypocrites!” said Karoline Leavitt, press secretary to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, in an email to the Washington Examiner Tuesday afternoon.
Work crews were on-site overnight ahead of Day Two of the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday, putting up a new 6-foot-tall fence around the United Center, where this week’s festivities are centered.
Democrats have now built three layers of walls outside their convention to protect themselves.
The same Democrats that have spent 3.5 years leaving our southern border wide open.
Building walls is good when they’re protecting Democrats but evil when they protect our border. pic.twitter.com/ohvoPBBM3n
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) August 20, 2024
“Democrats have now built three layers of walls outside their convention to protect themselves. The same Democrats that have spent 3.5 years leaving our southern border wide open,” the Trump War Room account on X posted Tuesday morning, along with a CNN clip that showed crews installing the barriers.
“Building walls is good when they’re protecting Democrats but evil when they protect our border,” the Trump War Room added. The Harris campaign and the Democratic National Convention Committee did not respond to requests for comment.
The fencing was partially taken down Monday by protesters on-site who called for the Biden administration not to fund Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, according to a city official.
“They breached the fence. They got into the outer perimeter. They were trying to get into the inner perimeter. They were shaking the fence on the other side,” Chicago Police Superintendent Larry Snelling told reporters on Monday. “Officers responded swiftly to make sure that that didn’t happen.”
The pro-Palestinian protesters chanted, “Biden, Harris, you can’t hide, you’re funding a genocide,” according to videos from inside the protest Monday afternoon.
Several tens of thousands of protesters were predicted to descend on Chicago this week, but Monday’s showing involved roughly 3,500 attendees.
More than a dozen protesters were arrested on Monday. A leader within the group downplayed the group’s collision with the fencing.
“Our focus for the march was having a march on the DNC, and we did that,” said Faayani Aboma Mijana, a spokeswoman for the Chicago Alliance Against Racist and Political Repression, according to ABC-7 in Chicago. “We marched within the sight and sound of the United Center. We protested the genocide, and we don’t control everyone, but at the same time, we are talking about a fence when there is a genocide happening.”
The new fencing appeared to be in addition to two fence perimeters erected before Monday, roughly two blocks from the United Center at Washington Boulevard and Wolcott Avenue.
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One of President Joe Biden’s first acts upon taking office in January 2021 was canceling more than 300 miles of border wall that Congress had passed during the Trump administration but was not completed before Trump left office.
Under Biden, more non-U.S. citizens have been encountered at the nation’s borders than during any one-term or two-term presidential administration. Over 3 1/2 years, U.S. Customs and Border Protection has intercepted more than 10 million migrants at ports of entry and between the ports.