On “Fox News Sunday,” guest host Brit Hume on Sunday grilled Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) on his plan for addressing the influx of undocumented children at the border — sending in the National Guard.
Perry argues that the presence of the National Guard will deter immigrants from continuing to attempt to cross the border.
“They need to be right on the river. They need to be there as a show of force because that’s the message that gets sent back very quickly to Central America,” he said.
Hume challenged Perry, asking what purpose troops could actually serve.
“They’re not, under the law, allowed to apprehend any of these children that are crossing, are they?” he asked.
“The issue is with being able to send that message because it’s the visual of it, I think, that is the most important,” Perry responded. “If you don’t stop the bleeding. If you don’t staunch this flow of individuals that are coming up here, this is only going to get worse.”
Hume continued to press Perry.
“But the question I’m trying to get at with you is this: if these children, who have undergone these harrowing journeys to escape from the most desperate conditions in their home countries, have gotten this far, are they really going to be deterred by the presence of troops along the border who won’t shoot them and can’t arrest them?” he asked.
“I think we’re talking about two different things here,” Perry responded.
The governor then added that the “most humanitarian thing that we can do” is to take care of the undocumented immigrants, quickly process them and return them to their families.
Watch the exchange via Raw Story:
The word is “stanch”. “Staunch” means steady and unwavering, as in, “Governor Perry is staunchly vapid”.