President Trump traveled to the southernmost point in the continental U.S. Thursday for a briefing on federal efforts to stop drug smugglers, human traffickers and illegal immigration.
Mr. Trump toured the Joint Interagency Task Force-South at a naval air station in Key West, Florida, with Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, Coast Guard Commandant Adm. Paul Zukunft and other national-security officials. He said the people on the front lines are doing a “fantastic job” in challenging conditions.
“It is a very tough situation,” Mr. Trump said. “You look at the thousands and thousands of people that are going in 15 different directions from different countries, using the Pacific, using the Caribbean, using everything they can use to get through.”
He added, “It’s a thankless job in many ways, but in other ways it’s something that the people of the United States very much appreciate.”
Mr. Trump used the occasion to reiterate his call for a wall along the Mexican border.
“Drugs are flowing into our country,” he said. “We need border protection; we need the wall. We have to have the wall.”
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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