National Guard at Border “Works for the President”

With an increase in illegal southern border crossings, National Center Senior Fellow Horace Cooper commended President Donald Trump on his “investment” of thousands of National Guard troops to help with federal law enforcement efforts there. During an interview with Stuart Varney on the “Varney and Co.” program on the Fox Business Network, Horace also laid out the potential political costs for politicians opposing a stronger stance against illegal immigration.

While the President currently approved between 2,000 and 4,000 guardsmen, Horace noted it’s a number that could change depending on the initial results of the deployment.

Talking about the political price that might be paid by liberal politicians decrying increased security efforts, Horace said:

[They] really need to be paying attention on this particular issue. We had a federal government shutdown over the issue of immigration. And – overwhelmingly – Democrats admitted that they were receiving a great amount of negative pressure. This was one of the first shutdowns where it was Democrats who ended up feeling the pain over having done this.

Asked about the possibility of building a border wall and overall enhanced security efforts, Horace said “it looks like the issue works for the President.” He added that “if the issue stays the way that it is, it might be prudent for Democrats to rush up and say ‘let’s take this issue off the table’” rather than have it hurt their popularity.

Horace, who impressed Varney in previous interviews, drew more praise from the veteran Fox host. He told Horace: “You’ve got such a logical, forward-looking brain. You gotta come back on the show – we miss you!”



The National Center for Public Policy Research is a communications and research foundation supportive of a strong national defense and dedicated to providing free market solutions to today’s public policy problems. We believe that the principles of a free market, individual liberty and personal responsibility provide the greatest hope for meeting the challenges facing America in the 21st century.