Trump's Racist Fearmongering Is His Latest Scam: A Closer Look

-The Republicans have done so little, and what they have done is so unpopular, that their only strategy for the midterm elections is to invent a

racist

scam

to scare people. To learn more about this, it's time for "A Closer Look." The one constant in Donald Trump's life from his early days in Manhattan real estate until now is that he is a con artist. He literally sold fraudulent products, from a vitamin kit that was determined by a urine test to a Trump deodorant. And I have to say, the last person I would buy deodorant from is Donald Trump.

I mean, he

look

s how sweaty he gets. Can you imagine the advertisement for that deodorant? "Trump deodorant. Always let them see you sweat." In fact, this week a new lawsuit was filed in Manhattan Federal Court accusing the Trump family of defrauding investors by selling them get-rich-quick schemes. -President Trump, three of his adult children and his company are now facing a new lawsuit for allegedly defrauding consumers in a "systematic fraud and pattern of extortion." -The federal lawsuit was filed today in Manhattan and accuses Trump, his company and three of his children of promoting get-rich-quick schemes that have harmed investors, and that includes a telecommunications marketing company, Trump Network, which marketed vitamins and the Trump Institute, which offered real estate seminars. -I can't believe Trump had an institute.

I just assumed he escaped FROM a high school. Trump has been selling

scam

s his entire life. If he weren't president, he'd be selling counterfeit video games out of the back of his Camaro. "He's an Xbok. He's just as good." And like the con man that he is, Trump simply makes up things he can think of to attract gullible people. In an interview with Fox this week, for example, he claimed that he saved us from a war with North Korea that definitely would have happened if President Obama were still in office. -You have news out there that is very false.

And I can do the best thing ever. North Korea as an example. We would have gone to war with North Korea. I think President Obama would have gone to war. If he were a year older, he would now be in a war with North Korea himself. -Oh, uh, sorry. I was just dreaming of another year of Obama. I asked a team of computer scientists to estimate how much younger I would

look

now if Obama had been president for one more year, and this is what they came up with. And now that President Trump is simply selling his supporters more fraudulent products, he replaced the vitamin kit and deodorant with a Space Force and a border wall, things he will never actually deliver.

He just takes the wall. Does not exist. It will never exist. So now Trump is sending troops to the border in a stunt and claiming that's as good as a wall. -You're talking about 10,000, maybe 15,000 US military personnel on active duty on the border, more than we have fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan, more than we have fighting ISIS in Syria. Are you really going to do that? It's very important. We have to have a wall of people. -That's right, the wall is no longer made of bricks. It is made of people. "Our incredible troops are going to the border where we will stack them on top of each other Tetris style." Republicans...Republicans make things up because they can't defend their real record.

For example, last year the GOP passed a health care bill in the House that would have eliminated protections for pre-existing conditions, and it was wildly unpopular. So now that they're running for re-election, they're just lying about it. -We can protect pre-existing conditions. And you must understand that everyone agrees that we will protect pre-existing conditions. -I am passionate about protecting people with pre-existing conditions. -We will always protect Americans with pre-existing conditions. -Republicans will protect people with pre-existing conditions much better than Democrats. -The health plan that the president has presented covers pre-existing conditions. -Okay, first, his plan doesn't cover pre-existing conditions.

Secondly, he doesn't have a plan. The House passed a bill last year. That plan failed in the Senate. And then we never heard from it again. Sarah Sanders managed to fit two lies into one sentence. She's like the Rick Steves of lies. "I'll show you how to pack two lies, one misdirection, and three evasive answers into one simple carry-on." Republicans don't want people to think about their health care bill or the huge tax cut they gave to the rich, so they're frantically throwing out one

racist

idea after another. Like Trump's

latest

stunt on birthright citizenship, a right enshrined in the 14th Amendment.

Automatic citizenship for anyone born in this country is the cornerstone of our post-Civil War attempt to build an inclusive democracy. And yet, Trump claimed this week that he could unilaterally change it by executive order, something he obviously cannot do. I was always told that a constitutional amendment was needed. Guess what. Dont do it. -Dont do it. -Number one, you don't need that. Number two... -That is very much in dispute. -Well, you can definitely do it with an act of Congress. But now they say I can do it only with an executive order. -Have you talked about that with the lawyer? -Yeah.

Have. -So, what part of the process? -He is in the process. It will happen. With executive order. That's what you're talking about. I didn't think anyone knew except me. I thought I was the only one. -Yes, you thought you were the only one because it's crazy. Trump is like a guy who gets committed to an asylum, and when his roommate says, "You know, the Statue of Liberty has been spying on me," Trump says, "You too? I thought I was the only one." . And now Republicans, who spent years paying lip service to the Constitution, have been squirming to align themselves with Trump, like Texas Sen.

Ted Cruz, who fully embraced Trump in his hard-fought re-election bid. When Cruz, a constitutional lawyer, was asked about Trump's comments, he said: "I have long supported ending birthright citizenship. I would need to examine the legal arguments behind an executive order, and I haven't seen them yet. ". There you go. Ted Cruz says he needs to analyze the legal arguments. If only he had known this guy he ran for Senate in 2011. -The 14th Amendment establishes birthright citizenship. I have looked at the legal arguments against it and I will tell you, as a Supreme Court litigator, those arguments are not very good.

As much as someone may dislike the birthright citizenship policy, it is in the United States Constitution. -Wow. Somehow, Cruz lying is only the second most disgusting thing in that clip after his hair. I mean, he looks at how sweaty he is. Is Trump using deodorant? All this talk about birthright citizenship is an extension of Trump's

latest

attempt to scare people about a migrant caravan headed toward our southern border. In reality, the caravan is made up of a few thousand vulnerable people fleeing poverty and violence, and who are still thousands of kilometers and months away, if they ever make it this far.

But if you listen to Trump, it's an imminent invasion full of criminals and terrorists. -At this very moment, large, well-organized migrant caravans are marching towards our southern border. Some people call it invasion. It's like an invasion. You will find MS-13, you will find the Middle East. You will find everything. -These are some bad people coming. These are not babies. These are not little angels who come to our country. In reality, it's mostly young men and a lot of tough people. There are a lot of rude people, John. They are pushing the women to the front (which is not good) and they are pushing the few children to the front.

When you look at that caravan, and you see... largely, a large percentage of men, young and strong. -Sounds like a divorcee from Long Island trying to convince her friends to go to a club. "There will be many men, young and strong. They love to travel." Of course, implying that they are strong young men is just another racist signal designed to scare people, and in doing so, Trump has enlisted the help of a right-wing propaganda outlet that exists entirely for one purpose: to spread his lies and whip their audience into a racist frenzy, and in recent days, Fox News has gone into overdrive, telling people that there could be more caravans and that those caravans could be spreading disease. -This is an invasion.

This is an act of attack on the sovereignty of the United States. -This is an invasive and threatening force that could very well break through our fence as they did with the Guatemalan fence. -What happens with diseases? I mean, there's a reason you can't take a child to school unless he's vaccinated. -They come with diseases like smallpox, leprosy and tuberculosis that will infect our people in the United States. -Smallpox and leprosy? Where does this caravan come from, medieval England? The last... True story. The last natural case of smallpox was in 1977. It really makes your scaremongering a lot less convincing when the only diseases you can think of are those from the "Oregon Trail." But the strangest example of how Fox spread this racist hoax was a segment on Lou Dobbs' show on Monday.

Dobbs might be Fox's most virulent conspiracy theorist. After bombs were mailed to prominent Democrats, he called them fake. He's also been obsessively tracking the caravan's location, which, as we showed you last week, has sometimes caused him pronunciation problems. -The caravan of mostly Central American immigrants is in the Mexican city of Wah-la-da tonight. -Now I just wanted to show you that to give you some context for the next clip. Dobbs had a guest come up with a theory about immigrants spreading disease that was so crazy even Dobbs couldn't accept it. -We simply cannot tolerate the continued invasion of this country when Americans suffer every day.

The national debt is exploding. We have diseases spreading across the country that are causing polio-like paralysis in our children. It's one thing after another. -You cannot blame this disease on illegal immigrants. We don't know the cause of it. I don't know if that... I don't think that's fair. Many, you know, but there are many reasons to keep this country safe, including, including, making sure that everyone is healthy when they are brought into the country, without a doubt, right? Is that fair? -That's fair. But that's part of the problem. We don't know where diseases come from. - Well, that's...

You know what? I think we're going to leave it with that. -"Wah-da-la!" Lou Dobbs just had that moment that many of us had in our 20s. Remember, you're at a party at someone's house, you look around and say, "Man, everyone at this party is an idiot." And then you're like, "Wait. I'm at this party." The caravan hysteria has gotten so out of control that Shepherd Smith had to look directly into the camera this week and assure Fox viewers that they were not in danger. -The migrants, according to Fox News, are more than two months away.

If any of them really come here. But tomorrow is a week away from the midterm elections, which is what this is all about. There is no invasion. No one will come looking for you. There is nothing to worry about. -Oh Lord. Fox News has gone so far off the rails that the only sane person who works there has to talk to viewers like kids who accidentally watched a horror movie. "It's okay. There's nothing to worry about. The Babadook isn't real..." "...and it won't come looking for you." And that's great. The only problem is, a few hours later, Sean Hannity shows up on the same network and yells, "The Babadook is real and it's outside your house!" The caravan hysteria is a scam designed to distract everyone while Trump and his cronies loot the government for his personal benefit.

That's a point Obama made over the weekend as he campaigned in Wisconsin. -They are trying to convince everyone to be afraid of a group of impoverished and malnourished refugees thousands of miles away. It's this group of people, we don't even know where they are. They are very low. That is the most important! And you know, as soon as the election is over... Everyone will be like, "What? What happened? We were being invaded? Where did he go?" They are giving tax cuts to billionaires. They don't want you to realize that. "Look, look, look! There!" They are sabotaging your healthcare. "No, wait!

Look, look!" It's like a scam, where a door-to-door salesman tries to sell you a security system while his friend sneaks up behind him and takes all your stuff. It's like "Home Alone." Do you remember that movie? -Oh Lord. He is right. It's like "Home Alone." And Trump was in it too. Trump's racist scaremongering on immigration is the latest scam from a guy who has been scamming people his entire life. And he feels at home in theModern Republican Party. They are robbing you and trying to distract you while they do it. They hope you don't realize until it's too late and then you say... -What?

W-What happened? -This has been "A

closer

look."