President Donald Trump knows the new immigration plan he unveiled Thursday is probably dead on arrival — but that isn’t the point.
Instead of trying to push it through Congress, Trump is already treating the plan less like a legislative blueprint and more as a campaign document as he readies for his tough 2020 re-election fight.
With some advisers concerned that his slash-and-burn, “build the wall” message falls flat with independent swing voters, Trump hopes to unite Republicans around what he casts as a more pragmatic approach friendly to American businesses in need of high-skilled labor, and to position himself as a problem-solver willing to work with recalcitrant Democrats.
