Socialist Andrés Manuel López-Obrador, currently the frontrunner in Mexico's presidential election on July 1, has a wonderful goodie to offer the Mexican descamisados: the right to flee his socialist regime.

It's a new one, given that each Mexican presidential candidate, up until now, has always campaigned on the promise that life would be so good for Mexicans if he becomes president.  You would think there would be no need to flee illegally to El Norte.

AMLO, as he is known, sees things differently.  According to the Daily Caller:

Mexican presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) called for mass immigration to the United States during a speech Tuesday declaring it a "human right" for all North Americans.

"And soon, very soon – after the victory of our movement – we will defend all the migrants in the American continent and all the migrants in the world," Obrador said, adding that immigrants "must leave their towns and find a life in the United States."

He then declared it as "a human right we will defend," eluniversal.com reports.

While the election is not until July 1, Obrador is by far the frontrunner.

What kind of presidential candidate promises his constituents the prospect of illegal immigration as the "reward" for voting for him?  "Vote for me, get ready to put yourself in the hands of smugglers, and then face an uncertain future as a foreigner subject to ICE raids in the U.S."?  Is that it?

What an embarrassment.

Only the most cynical and revolting of candidates would do this.  This reminds me of some of the awful presidents who ruled Mexico in the aftermath of Porfirio Díaz in the early 20th century, most of whom were horrible people who triggered violent civil wars and didn't seem to think there was a problem.

It's a fact that socialism always triggers mass flight, and this guy admits he likes it.

Obviously, he considers emigration from Mexico a good thing.  Not surprisingly, emigration is a natural byproduct of socialist regimes wherever they are found.  The rafts, after all, never sailed toward Cuba.

What's interesting about this issue is how ignorant he seems to be on the topic.  The people who flee are unlikely to be the people he thinks will flee as he burbles on about "human rights."  It will be the doctors, the teachers, the businessmen, the people with brains who go first, legally or illegally.  Since these will be people with something to offer, it's likely they will get in legally.

As socialism progresses, the poorer classes will follow.

Here's the other interesting thing about this campaign "promise": Mexico can't afford it.  It's already hit zero population and experiencing a bust.  It can't, demographically, afford to lose more people.  Already, Mexico is experiencing its own wave of illegal immigration from Central American countries, which should intensify after the country empties out with AMLO at the controls.

Now, AMLO feels that if he makes a hash of the economy, emigration to the U.S. should kick in as a benefit to Mexican voters and provide his government with the "safety valve" (and remittances) his government needs.  Same old game the Mexican government has always played: encouraging illegal immigration as a means of warding off troublemakers who could launch protests over the state of the domestic economy.

It's also cynical towards us imagining that Mexicans will always be loyal to Mexico, even after they've been intentionally and cynically driven out by socialism.  Some will.  But a lot of them won't.  All you have to do to estimate how this will work is ask middle-class Venezuelans, Argentines, and Cubans who've emigrated here whether they identify with their old home countries.  Most will tell you they despise the places and are glad to wave the American flag here.

And it's cynical toward the very idea of citizenship, which is another oddity, given that Mexican nationality and Mexican citizenship are considered two different things in that country.  The "human right" to benefit Mexicans that AMLO is promising to voters – emigration to the States – is not based on the idea of becoming an estadounidense; rather, it is based on bennies and goodies that the U.S. doles out to illegals, free of charge.  Illegals coming here get free medical care, free housing, free food, free education, and a host of other benefits, costing Americans billions.  So instead of offering bags of beans to voters, AMLO is offering American bennies.

It's also cynical in another way: AMLO knows that the pope, the Democrats in the U.S., and the European Union will back him in his quest for free bennies paid for by Americans for the Mexicans.  That is the global establishment, and he obviously means to leverage it.

What a great future that all suggests for Mexicans under socialism.  If they vote for this charlatan, they'll deserve what they get, and not just from AMLO, who will wreck all the businesses in the country as he expropriates, but from President Trump: deportations, fingerprinting, separation of kids, higher smuggler fees, and a wall.

The latter can't begin soon enough.

Image credit: Hseldon10 via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.