Barack Obama made many bad deals as President of the United States.
Ending these horrible agreements was a cornerstone of Trump’s Presidential campaign.
And there is one dangerous deal Trump just announced he may stop.
Before Obama left office, he entered into an agreement with the government of Australia to accept between 1,000 and 3,000 refugees the Australian government refused to accept.
Currently, there are 1,200 refugees on the Islands of Papua New Guinea and Nauru.
These refugees are largely from the Middle East and Asia with the majority being from Iran.
Australia has been paying Island nations to house their refugees in detention centers since the government led by Prime Minister Malcom Turnball campaigned on cracking down on refugees arriving by boat.
Obama agreed to resettle the refugees in America to assist the Australian government which had come under pressure for the conditions of the refugee centers.
In a phone call with the Australian Prime Minister, Trump blasted the deal as “the worst deal ever” and a potential security threat to America.
The Washington Post reports:
“This is the worst deal ever,” Trump fumed as Turnbull attempted to confirm that the United States would honor its pledge to take in 1,250 refugees from an Australian detention center.
Trump, who one day earlier had signed an executive order temporarily barring the admission of refugees, complained that he was “going to get killed” politically and accused Australia of seeking to export the “next Boston bombers.”
At a signing ceremony for his executive orders, Trump further expressed his displeasure with the deal.
This order was written to allow Trump to accept these refugees because they were part of a “pre-existing agreement”, but Trump fumed because many of the refugees were from the countries Trump was instituting extreme vetting.
The Post also reports:
“Many of the refugees came from Iran, Iraq, Sudan and Somalia, countries listed in Trump’s order temporarily barring their citizens from entry to the United States. A special provision in the Trump order allows for exceptions to honor “a preexisting international agreement,” a line that was inserted to cover the Australia deal.
But U.S. officials said that Trump continued to fume about the arrangement even after signing the order in a ceremony at the Pentagon.
“I don’t want these people,” Trump said. He repeatedly misstated the number of refugees called for in the agreement as 2,000 rather than 1,250, and told Turnbull that it was “my intention” to honor the agreement, a phrase designed to leave the U.S. president wiggle room to back out of the deal in the future, according to a senior U.S. official.”
Trump also tweeted his intention to reconsider the deal.
Do you believe it? The Obama Administration agreed to take thousands of illegal immigrants from Australia. Why? I will study this dumb deal!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 2, 2017
Trump considers this deal a threat to the United States.
Will he stop it?
