Rand Paul: Building a Northern Wall 'Pretty Dumb'

GOP presidential candidate Rand Paul tore apart rival Gov. Scott Walker's suggestion to build a wall at the Canadian border as "a pretty dumb idea" — but ranked "the dumbest" idea that of Donald Trump, who has vowed to make the Mexicans pay for a southern wall. 

In an interview with the Boston Herald's "Morning Meeting" radio show on Monday,
the Kentucky senator mocked an escalation among GOP presidential candidates to one-up each other on tough immigration policies.


The audio was posted by the Boston Herald. 

"Everyone is competing to say 'I will put them in camps, I will throw them out, I will put them in jail, I will have an electric fence,'" Paul said. "What we need to do is have a functioning immigration system with a good work program for jobs that we need that Americans are not filling and zero tolerance for those who come illegally."

"There are places for walls in big cities along the southern border, but we have gotten into this shouting match about who is going to build the bigger wall. We have some people saying 'my wall is going to be as big as the Great Wall of China, how big will your wall be?'"

Paul laughingly skewered Walker's plan to build a northern wall. 

"That's a pretty dumb idea," he said.

"There have been a lot of dumb ideas, the one that said the Mexicans will pay for the wall is probably the dumbest," Paul said of Trump's plan, but added, "Putting a wall up between us and Canada is a ridiculous notion."

Paul said he's been working to reach out to minority communities, and the GOP needs to do the same if it wants to win back the White House.

"We cannot win without being a more diverse party — that means the Hispanic vote and the African-American vote," he said. "We are at 5 to 8 percent of the African-American vote … the Hispanic vote, the Asian vote, you name it, we do poorly with the different ethnic groups. We need to do better."

Republicans can win the Hispanic vote, he insisted, "if the nominee is someone like me who says that immigrants are an asset to our country, that they have come here seeking the American dream," Paul said.

"It doesn't mean we don't have to secure the border. My attitude and belief towards those who are Hispanic is that most of them came here searching for the same thing as many ancestors from Germany and England and various places."

Paul is lagging in polls, with a Real Clear Politics average showing him with just 3.7 percent support in the crowded field that has Trump with a commanding 25.7 percent support. 

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