07 October 2016•Update: 07 October 2016
NEW YORK
Border patrol officers in the southern U.S. have been ordered to let in immigrants so that they can vote in the upcoming election, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump claimed Friday.
Trump said Art Del Cueto, vice president for the National Border Patrol Council union, told him officers were instructed to ignore background checks on immigrants and speed up citizenship applications, the Chicago Tribune reported.
"That's a massive story," Trump said told reporters at Trump Towers in New York.
A spokesman for the council that has endorsed Trump for president, later told the newspaper in a telephone interview, however, that some parts of the meeting between Cueto and Trump were mixed up.
Patrol agents have seen a rise in the number of people attempting to cross the border, Shawn Moran said, but it was not true that officers were ordered to allow them in so that they can vote in the Nov. 8 presidential election.
Trump, who has previously expressed concerns about rigging in the election, did not offer any evidence for the claim.
Moreover, immigrants who arrive in the U.S. have practically no chance to gain the right to vote within a month, as this right belongs to US citizens and citizenship application can easily take years to complete.
A hard-line immigration policy has been at the heart of the Trump campaign. The candidate has suggested he would have zero tolerance for undocumented immigrants and he would take measures that includes building a massive wall on the southern border to prevent illegal entry. He also said he would ban immigration from countries affected by terrorism.
