Going abroad always forces one to see one's home country in a renewed light. And it’s a light that shines on the good and the bad, allowing one to be more critical and appreciative of the country you call home.
For the past two weeks, I have been off air, travelling through Croatia, Bosnia, and Montenegro. It was a rich and eye-opening experience, and these observations were intensified given my return to everything going on between Washington D.C. and Los Angeles.
One of the first things I noticed in Croatia was that, despite being a relatively poor country, it was incredibly well run. Its streets were pristine. It was peaceful. And when I asked Croats about crime, they looked confused as to why I'd be so curious about something that so rarely occurs.
Then, upon returning to the United States, I was met with scenes of burning cars, shattered glass, violent looters, and civil unrest in one of the wealthiest cities of the world’s wealthiest nation.
I came back to Pelosi behind the podium, rolling out the ever-so-predictable verbiage, “mostly peaceful protests.”
Sure. Those videos of people using sledgehammers to tear apart the sidewalk so they can hurl chunks of concrete at police officers, I bet if you looked up “mostly peaceful” in Webster’s Dictionary, you'd find that exact illustration.
Officials like Nancy Pelosi think we can’t see the footage for ourselves and interpret what’s going on. And as much as they’d like to, they can’t pull the wool over our eyes.
But frankly, what Democrat leaders don’t understand is that there is no better way to consistently turn Democratic voters into Republican voters than by attempting to gaslight them into thinking that riots like those in L.A. aren’t dangerous and don’t need to be controlled.
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Just look at the polling data from the last two elections, you can’t tell me I’m wrong.
Take a guess. Which group has turned on the Democratic Party more than almost any other group? It’s not fourth-generation, college-educated Whites. It’s legal immigrants: Those who fought and sacrificed and waited their turn for a chance to vote in this country.
In 2020, legal immigrants favored Biden by 27 percent. In 2024, they swung so far that they favored Donald Trump by at least 1 point, some polls say as much as 8 points. That’s almost a 40-point swing.
That doesn’t just happen, folks. You have to screw up miserably, like the Democrats have. It started with the 2020 riots. As cities burned, they tried to shove the “mostly peaceful” rhetoric down the throats of everyday Americans, and they simply refused to buy it.
In short, the people who came to this country in pursuit of a more prosperous future for their families made their choice. And the Democratic party is going to have to live with that.
Going back to Croatia for a moment. Throughout my trip, the one uniting factor across almost every person I spoke with was a deep respect for their country. And when I pressed them as to why they felt that way, they revealed that the driver behind this was all about family, 'The family unit, keeping the family together, not bringing dishonor to the family.'
To Croatians, the love of country and the love of family go hand in hand. It was immensely refreshing.
I love the United States, but when you're from here, it's easy to view it as the center of the world. And don’t get me wrong, I still view America, as Reagan said in his farewell address, “She's still a beacon, still a magnet for all who must have freedom, for all the pilgrims from all the lost places who are hurtling through the darkness, toward home.”
However, we also can’t ignore the fact that, in many ways, we’ve lost our way. And that doesn't mean we can’t learn or revere and respect the fact that other countries might have their heads screwed on a little more straight than us at times.
In many ways, in this country, we’ve lost sight of the most fundamental unit of society: the family. But I promise you this. The people who are immigrating to this country legally haven’t lost sight of that. And that’s how they decide who to vote for.
It’s an often-forgotten fact, but at one point in time in U.S. history, New Orleans’ ports welcomed the second largest number of immigrants, behind only New York City. Haitians, Irish, Cubans, Jews, Sicilians — people from all corners of the world were welcomed here to this city with open arms, regardless of class.
I say this because I grew up in neighborhoods predominantly populated by immigrants, and those were the folks who stressed that strong, irreplaceable family bond. So, for anyone who thinks this is about keeping foreigners out, you’re 110% wrong. This country thrives just as much on immigrants as it did in the days of Ellis Island. But there’s a process, as there was back then, and it has to be respected.
When you bypass that process and allow people to flock in illegally, it not only undermines the value and safety of our society, it undermines the value of the family and those who are looking to secure a future for their children.
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