Opinion: Pay attention to the killing of Mollie Tibbets

For many people, her murder underscores the urgency of putting Americans first. View in [Browser]( | Add nytdirect@nytimes.com to your address book. [The New York Times]( [The New York Times]( Friday, August 24, 2018 [NYTimes.com/Opinion »]( David Leonhardt is on a break from writing this newsletter until Aug. 27. While he’s gone, several outside writers are taking his place. This week’s author is [Chris Buskirk]( a contributing opinion writer and the editor of American Greatness, the conservative publication. By Chris Buskirk Iowa police announced this week what we long suspected: Mollie Tibbetts, the Iowa college student who was missing for over a month, is dead. The preliminary autopsy report, released Thursday, reveals that she was killed by “multiple sharp force injuries.” Prosecutors have filed first-degree murder charges against Cristhian Rivera, a 24-year-old Mexican who had been working at Yarrabee Farms in Brooklyn, Iowa, since 2014. The police say that Rivera is in the country illegally — though this has been disputed by his lawyer — and that he presented fraudulent identification to his employer when he was hired. Anyone really interested in understanding why Trump was elected president should pay careful attention to this episode. We don’t yet know for sure if Rivera is guilty, but the tragedy of the scenario painted by the charges is explosive. The way many people see it, if a foreign national, apparently in the country illegally, kills an American citizen, it underscores the urgency of Trump’s message of putting Americans first. In other words, the murder of Mollie Tibbetts was not only ugly and evil, it was unnecessary and utterly preventable by government action. Some supporters of amnesty for illegal immigrants already in the country, as well as increased legal immigration, don’t seem to be able to acknowledge the reality of Tibbetts’ murder. Senator Elizabeth Warren is a case in point. Rather than admit during a [CNN interview]( that our failure to enforce our immigration laws and control the border contributed to Tibbetts’ death, she changed the subject. After saying that she was “so sorry for the family here,” Warren argued that “we need an immigration system that is effective, that focuses on where real problems are,” in effect casting those crossing the border illegally as the “real” victims. Make no mistake, it’s not only Democrats who have a problem here. Pro-immigration Republicans like Paul Ryan and Jeff Flake aren’t much better. Callous disregard for families like the Tibbettses is one of the reasons that President Trump’s common-sense talk about immigration reform resonates with many Americans. Trump remains one of the only national leaders of either party to address major social, political and economic issues of the utmost importance. This is why the Tibbetts case matters not only because of the murder, but because of its social and economic context. Much of American agriculture relies on foreign laborers, often in the country illegally, because attracting American citizens to those jobs would mean paying them more — and employers don’t want to do that. Trump has spoken about raising the real wages of working-class Americans and establishing the conditions for employment security and higher pay, for which border security is a predicate. Establishment Republicans of the Ryan-Flake genus don’t prioritize protecting our borders or the interests of American workers because they misunderstand and misapply libertarian ideas — and they are cowed by corporate interests dependent upon cheap labor. Unfortunately, this has become the norm. In Charles Kesler’s [excellent essay]( Thursday, he talked about norms that should be broken and how Trump is actually doing this. Here is one of them. I studied under Professor Kesler years ago and continue to learn from him. I think you will, too. Elsewhere. James Piereson, a political scientist who is a senior fellow at The Manhattan Institute, describes “[Socialism As a Hate Crime]( in The New Criterion. Given socialism’s bloody track record, the misery it has imposed upon the citizens of countries like Venezuela in recent years and its curious popularity among know-nothing millennials and aging boomers, Piereson’s piece is both necessary and timely. This is my last day substituting for David. I enjoyed writing the newsletter and the interactions I’ve had with many of you. I’ve tried to address some of the challenges you’ve made and the pushback you’ve delivered. Whether or not you agree with what I’ve written, I hope I have at least been clear enough to provide the basis for future dialogue. The full Opinion report from The Times follows. Today in The Big Ideas [The Metamorphosis of the Western Soul]( By WILL STORR Humans want to get along and get ahead. And they will become whoever they need to be in order to do so. 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