Santorum: Trump’s ‘Right on’ in Saying We Need Fewer Low-Skilled Immigrants

TAPPER: Senator Santorum?

RICK SANTORUM, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, Donald Trump is not Ronald Reagan. And — but Donald Trump is someone who is focused in his campaign, on trying to help the working men and women in this country who have been left behind by both Republicans and Democrats.

And he speaks like a lot of the people that he’s representing. He doesn’t speak in ways that I find acceptable. And this is one of those cases.

But to suggest that because he is intemperate and because he says things that are off-color, if you focus on what he’s trying to accomplish with immigration reform, I think he’s right on. I think he’s right on in saying that we need to make sure that we’re not bringing in — this is not when my dad and my grandfather came over a hundred years — almost a hundred years ago.

TAPPER: Why not?

SANTORUM: Because we had a very low-skill economy at that time. We actually were in need of workers at the turn of the last century, who were low-skilled workers. That is not the case anymore.

We did not — we have record levels of immigration, we have over a million people coming into this country every year, most of whom are unskilled, most of whom are coming in through — quote — “chain migration. “ It’s not a merit-based system.

And you have Democrats and Republicans — the four things the president has asked for, Democrat and Republicans agree to. Ending chain migration, getting rid of the visa lottery —

(CROSSTALK)

SANTORUM: — I mean, having border security, and doing something about DACA. Those are reasonable things the president has put on the table.