Hold on, ‘Trump offering refugee status to anti-migrant Brits’ is from the Telegraph, not the Onion

Donald Trump may offer refugee status to people who oppose immigration, according to the Telegraph. And apparently that degree of obvious hypocrisy isn’t satire. It may as well say ‘the US will allow people who oppose immigration to become immigrants’.

Anti-immigrant Trump

Apparently if you’re a white European or South African, immigration is fine, according to Trump’s totally not racist policies. Shortly after entering office, Trump declared an “invasion” of “illegal aliens” and is now seeking to overhaul the global system for refugees. That’s despite the US being party to the 1967 Refugee Protocol, if not the 1951 Refugee Convention. Trump’s proposal does not contain a reference to the protocol’s principle of non-refoulement, which is the prevention of a refugee being sent back to the country where they face persecution or war.

The US under Trump is also now sending migrants to Guantánamo. On top of that, he’s ended safe and legal routes for some nations making irregular immigration and confrontation more likely. The president has permanently halted the refugee admissions programme, even though it protects foreigners who are at risk in their own countries for serving with the US army.

Starmer follows Trump

Keir Starmer has also stoked racist sentiment by claiming the UK risks becoming an “island of strangers” because of immigration. His administration recently announced that migrants coming to the UK will need to have A-level standard English. This completely arbitrary policy is almost as ironic as the Telegraph headline, given many Reform voters, and indeed other British nationals, are not that proficient in English.

What’s more, there are already controls on immigration. To emigrate to the UK, one needs either a job offer, significant capital, education prospects, UK ancestry, family or humanitarian reasons. Additionally, UK employers usually must pay an ‘immigration skills charge’ for hiring abroad. The government proposed raising that by 32% in May and it will come into effect on 16 December.

The idea the UK is ‘full’ is also misguided. Only 5% of land is used for homes and gardens. That means all 67m of us live in a country where 95% of the land is used for other things. To be sure, 71% of UK land is used for agriculture. And no one’s saying we should develop all of it. But it’s not ‘full’.

The US and the UK are countries that neo-colonise a lot of the planet and then complain when people want to immigrate or become refugees. Yet again, the irony isn’t lost.

Featured image via the Canary