US President Donald Trump is not against immigrants and was only against illegal immigration, his son-in-law Jared Kushner has said amdist reports that authorities could launch sweeping deportation raids across America during this weekend.
Kushner, 38, who is also senior adviser to President Trump, said that he is the manager of the immigration project of President Trump.
Responding to a question during in a fire-side chat with Mastercard CEO and President, Ajay Banga, after addressing the Second Leadership Summit of the US-India Strategic and Partnership Forum on Thursday, Kushner said that Trump is not anti-immigrant.
"Just to be very clear, the president is very pro-immigrant. He's anti-illegal immigration and what he wants to do is make America the land of opportunity," wherein people with merit can figure out the ways to go to the United States, Kushner, considered one of the most influential and powerful individuals in the White House, said.
"We want to make it a much more clean system, a much more streamlined system, much more fair system and one where most people will have the opportunity to try to become American citizens," Kushner said.
"It's the greatest privilege in the world to be an American citizen and that's something that we should make available to people who really want it badly and who want to earn it," the top presidential advisor said.
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"How's this White House thing turning out for you," Banga asked Kushner at the start of the fire-side chat.
"I have to say it's something that I never expected in my life that I would have the privilege of to serve the country at this capacity.
For us it's an absolute honour working for this president and having the opportunity to push forward the change that he's pushing for this country and for the world has been absolutely tremendous," Kushner said.
On Thursday, The New York Times reported that US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are planning to launch sweeping deportation raids this weekend as the Trump administration expands its crackdown on undocumented immigrants.
A senior administration immigration officials says that ICE has about one million names on a list of targets in the raids, which have been postponed for two weeks, partly due to resistance from inside ICE, according to the Time report.
The report says the move planned for Sunday will initially target some 2,000 members of undocumented migrant families in at least 10 cities.