President Donald Trump reportedly discussed fortifying the U.S.-Mexico border with a moat populated by snakes and alligators, among other lethal ideas for stemming the flow of migrants across the southern border, according to a batshit insane new report in the New York Times.
During a March meeting with White House advisers, Trump reportedly floated the prospect of “a water-filled trench, stocked with snakes or alligators” that would encircle an electrified border fence “with spikes on top that could pierce human flesh,” according to the New York Times.
Trump also suggested allowing U.S. service members to fire on migrants should they throw rocks as military personnel.
“After publicly suggesting that soldiers shoot migrants if they threw rocks, the president backed off when his staff told him that was illegal,” the New York Times reports. “But later in a meeting, aides recalled, he suggested that they shoot migrants in the legs to slow them down. That’s not allowed either, they told him.”
Trump had previously suggested in November 2018 that U.S. service members who encounter migrants armed with rocks “will consider that a firearm – because there’s not much difference when you get hit in the face with a rock.”
However, U.S. Army North documents published by Newsweek established that service members at the border are operating under the Standing Rules For The Use Of Force, which authorized troops to respond only in self-defense, and only in a proportional manner.
“Our standard rules of force apply here,” U.S. Northern Command spokesman Air Force Capt. Lauren Hill told Task & Purpose at the time. “As with anything, deadly force is authorized in self-defense for those faced with an imminent threat of death or serious bodily harm.”
The snake- and alligator-filled moat, however, seems a bit more ambiguous. According to the New York Times, Trump’s idea ” aides to seek a cost estimate” for the project, which I absolutely cannot wait to obtain under a Freedom of Information Act request.
In the meantime, Task & Purpose has obtained exclusive footage of that March Oval Office meeting:
Dr. Evil — sharks with laser beams attached to their heads — HD