Kasich Says ‘The Lord Doesn’t Want’ Us to Ignore Plight of Illegal Immigrants

Image credit: @JohnKasich/Twitter
Image credit: @JohnKasich/Twitter
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Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) shared an important message Thursday on CNN, when he claimed the “Lord doesn’t want” us to ignore or fail to understand the plight of illegal immigrants.

The governor and one-time Republican presidential contender appeared on the news channel to discuss the incoming migrant caravan, a group of thousands of Central Americans headed toward the U.S. border without legal immigration documents.

While the Ohio politician said toward the beginning of his appearance on CNN that the U.S. doesn’t “want all those people coming across our border,” arguing there “are ways to deal with it,” Kasich urged Americans of all political stripes to “start putting ourselves in the shoes of other people.”

He told anchors Poppy Harlow and Jim Sciutto that it “could easily have been all of us, that we’re in the caravan, that we’re marching north trying to save our families and save our children.”

“Let’s stop putting up walls around ourselves and not understanding the plight, the trouble, and the problems of others. It is not right, and the Lord doesn’t want it. And our people, at their hearts, want to reach out to others,” Kasich said. “Look at what they do in these storms —  they go and they rescue people they don’t know. They put ’em in their homes. They feed them. That’s America, not all this garbage and this division, and yelling, and screaming, and hatred on all sides.”

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From a practical standpoint, Kasich told Harlow and Sciutto the U.S. government could begin to vet some of these migrants before they reach the border, allowing in those “who are legitimately in need of asylum.”

The governor’s comments come as Defense Secretary James Mattis is preparing to sign deployment orders expected to send some 800 troops to the southern perimeter to help U.S. Border Patrol agents stop the caravan, which the United Nations has estimated to include more than 7,000 people.

Homeland Security Secretary Kristjen Nielsen made clear Thursday during an interview with Fox News that the soldiers “do not have any intention right now to shoot at people,” though the troops and border agents will be making arrests.

“I also take my officers and agents, their own personal safety, extraordinarily seriously,” she added. “They do have the ability, of course, to defend themselves.”