RUSH: I saw a startling statistic today. It’s from Breitbart, so I tend to think that it’s valid. Now, this headline’s kind of misleading, I think, but it’s still true. “Illegal Immigration Under Trump On Track to Hit Highest Level in a Decade.” Now, when I saw the headline, my thoughts immediately went back to November of 2016 and December of 2016 and even November and then January 2017.

You remember back then we were hearing, it was being reported that the number of illegal immigrants attempting to cross the border was falling like crazy, was declining incredibly fast. That the numbers of people trying to get into America illegally was plunging, and we were told the reason why is because we just elected a new sheriff, Donaldus J. Trump, and he was gonna shut the border, and there was gonna be a wall, and these people knew.

And then, on the other hand, there were some stories, hey, they’re really ratcheting it up, they’re making a mad dash to get in while they can because Trump is not gonna put up with it.

And indeed, President Trump was elected, and of the top three issues that got him elected, dealing with illegal immigration and all of its ramifications is the number one reason he got elected – very close to also draining the swamp and returning the levers of government to more contact with average, ordinary Americans. So this statistic is that illegal immigration under Trump is on track to hit the highest level in a decade.

And here’s the text. “Illegal immigration at the United States-Mexico border is expected to hit the highest level in a decade next year, as border-crossings surged to record levels last month. Last month, illegal immigration at the southern border soared to the highest level for a single month since April 2014, marking the most southwest border crossings since President Trump was elected in 2016 on a platform to reduce immigration to the country.

“The record illegal immigration outpaced projections from Princeton Researcher Steven Kopits, who expected about 31,575 border crossings last month. The actual border crossings exceeded those expectations by almost 40 percent. The southwest border numbers, according to Kopits’ research, indicate that Fiscal Year 2019 will see the highest level of illegal immigration at the southern border in more than a decade.

“In total, Kopits projects that there will be more than 600,000 border crossings next year — a level of illegal immigration that the country has not seen since Fiscal Year 2008 when total southwest border apprehensions exceeded 705,000.”

That’s apprehensions. Now, folks, 600,000 illegal immigrants projected to get into the country next year is the equivalent of 60 caravans, roughly speaking. Does this news surprise you? Now, we know Trump has not gotten the money to build the wall. But a lot of people are under the impression, how many news stories do you see on a weekly basis, monthly basis, of all the new deportations and all the people caught and apprehended and sent back?

Has the impression not been given that illegal immigration is a much more difficult proposition these days, it’s much harder to get in because Trump has got the Border Patrol and ICE, and they’re working with a vengeance. Nobody’s said that it’s been arrested. Nobody’s said that Trump has stopped it. Nobody’s made that claim.

And again, this is not the New York Times reporting this. This is a Trump-supporting website, Breitbart, saying that there’s gonna be a record number. Well, record since 2008, 600,000 illegals will make it across the border next year. Now, these are projections based on current numbers. And there’s still no money for the wall. And there is no eagerness for any money to build a wall anywhere, other than a few pockets of conservative congressmen on the Republican side. Outside of that, there isn’t any impetus to stop this.

The evidence that there’s no impetus to stop it is that it’s not being stopped. Now we’ve got the caravans, and the caravans, you know, 5,000, 7,000, 3,500, whatever it is, the caravans are a microcosm of what we thought, you know, was a relative comparative trickle. And the caravans have all of the ingredients — I mean we went into Somalia, Black Hawk Down, we went into Mogadishu because of a picture of a starving Somalian baby with flies buzzing around his head. That picture took us into Mogadishu.

Now we have stories and pictures of Trump separating mothers from their babies at the border. It’s so horrible. Now we’ve got Trump tear gassing mothers and their babies simply seeking a better life from their war-torn native country. It’s so horrible, 600,000.

Folks, this can’t continue. We’re never gonna have a more focused anti-illegal immigration president than we’ve got now, and we’re gonna set a record? Well, a new high since 2008. 2008 fiscal year, 705,000 apprehensions, projected 600,000 illegals will make it across the border next year.

“President Donald Trump is strongly defending the U.S. use of tear gas at the Mexican border to repel a crowd of migrants that included angry rock-throwers but also barefoot, crying children,” says the AP. So here we go again.

You know, that famous Reuters picture, that fleeing woman with her three children, it more and more looks like it was staged. If you look closely at the background of the picture, A, the picture’s been cropped. If you look at the whole picture, you see other clusters of people posing for cameramen. And if they’re not posing, they’re just standing around. Nobody’s fleeing. The setting where that woman is seen racing with her kids, it’s not an emergency circumstance. You see people just basically sitting and standing around. Everything is posed here. And they’re just adding that tear gas was being used.

And, by the way, this woman — I mentioned this earlier — this woman supposedly has completed a thousand mile or more journey on foot. And I’m telling you this woman could rival Oprah at the plus clothes rack. It doesn’t look like the woman has walked anywhere. And here she is being portrayed as a war-torn, suffering, starving, barely getting by, now getting tear gassed by Donald Trump.

But, see, none of that matters ’cause the media’s outrage over Trump tear gassing kids is perfectly timed to replace the media’s outrage over Trump separating children. “Critics denounced the border agents’ action as overkill, but Trump kept to a hard line. ‘They were being rushed by some very tough people and they used tear gas,’ Trump said Monday of the previous day’s encounter. ‘Here’s the bottom line: Nobody is coming into our country unless they come in legally.’

“At a roundtable in Mississippi later Monday, Trump seemed to acknowledge that children were affected, asking, ‘Why is a parent running up into an area where they know the tear gas is forming and it’s going to be formed and they were running up with a child?'”

Because they’re being paid to! Because they’re being threatened to! They’re being directed to! Just like cowardly thugs have done since time immemorial, these caravans are using women and children as human shields! These women and children are being threatened! These women and children are in fact being used to create these very photo-ops!

“Border Agents: Rock-Throwing Migrants Pushed Women And Children to the Front of the Horde.” I have no doubt that that’s true. “Department of Homeland Security: 110% surge in migrant men using kids to enter the U.S. It’s rampant fraud. Educated on a legal loophole that let’s migrant families with kids enter the United States, the homeland security department reported today that men showing up with kids at the border has increased 110% in the last two years. Homeland Security noted that children could be used by smugglers and drug traffickers to enter the country.”

How many frigging loopholes do we have here? We’ve got this loophole that if you get to the border from a country south of Mexico, you automatically get in. Well, you get to claim asylum. If you come from Mexico, we can stop you. “Families are using fraud to game the immigration system. Homeland Security said that 170 families have been caught lying about their relationships to enter the country.” Meaning they’re not even families. They’re just making it up.

A guy finds a woman, they pick up a couple straggling kids, and they show up at the border and claim to be a family. Who’s got ID? They’re coming from a war-torn area where they’re noncitizens. “We don’t have any ID. I heard I don’t need ID to vote. Why do I need ID?”

“Mexico Calls for Full Investigation of U.S. Tear Gas at the Border.”

“Migrant Dies in Clash at Border Bridge from Tear Gas.”

“Tear Gas Used Once a Month at Border Under Obama.” See? You want to know one of the most frustrating things for me is the ineffectiveness of news like this. Five years ago, almost to the day, Barack Obama, his Border Patrol was tear gassing tons of people that were storming the border illegally and not a single word about it from anybody at the Drive-By Media, not a single concern, even. Nobody in media was even worried. They may not have even freaking known. But even if they had known, they wouldn’t have cared because Obama can do no wrong and Obama was never gonna be reported in a bad light like this.

So now it’s five years later and you tell people outraged over Trump separating families and Trump tear gassing kids. “Wait a minute. Obama did this back in -” “He did not. Obama wouldn’t do something like this. I know Obama. He wouldn’t do that.” The ineffectiveness of the truth about Democrats five years later, seven years later. I have to admit, it’s frustrating that that stuff has no impact on people. No effect whatsoever.

Anyway, 600,000 illegal immigrants projected to cross the border next year. You know, while these caverns are being dealt with, people are crossing the border. “But wait, Rush. I read that Trump shut it down for five hours.” I read the same thing. No, no, no. Don’t misunderstand. I’m not accusing Trump of anything. I’m pointing out the nature of the problem.

It isn’t stopping. And each day that it happens is just another drop of corruption, another drop of poison or pollution that’s affecting the overall American culture and society, diluting it, watering it down ever so slowly. It’s not stopping.