Since assuming the role of President at the beginning of this year,
Donald Trump has taken a particularly hard line on
immigration policies. Not only did he implement a "Muslim ban" (a subject he has attempted to skirt around on several occasions), he also put an end to DACA - a programme which awarded over half a million 'dreamers' the right to reside in the states - and promised to build a wall in order to keep Mexican and South American immigrants out of the USA.
This was hardly surprising, considering that Trump's campaign focused greatly on the impact that "bad hombres" supposedly have in the states.
However, what may come as a shock to many of his supporters is that Trump himself comes from a family of immigrants - and his predecessors had some very different ideas about how foreign settlers in a country should be treated.
In 1905, the President's grandfather, Friedrich Trump, wrote a letter to the Prince Regent of Bavaria, begging him to let his family stay in Germany. Friedrich was actually born in Germany, but had emigrated to the USA at the age of 16 in the hopes of finding a better life. Once there, he settled down with his wife and had a daughter.
However, the family were forced to return after Friedrich's wife - Trump's grandmother - "could not tolerate the climate in New York". Though he was actually born in the country, German authorities denied him the right to stay in the country because he had failed to complete his mandatory military service.
Friedrich had also neglected to register his emigration 20 years earlier, so there was no way he would be allowed to return.
In an act of desperation, he contacted the authorities directly, and explained that being forced to return to the states was causing his wife to be "overcome by anxiety", and had made his daughter sick.
"Why should we be deported?" he wrote. "This is very, very hard for a family. What will our fellow citizens think if honest subjects are faced with such a decree — not to mention the great material losses it would incur. I would like to become a Bavarian citizen again."
He went on:
"In this urgent situation I have no other recourse than to turn to our adored, noble, wise, and just sovereign lord, our exalted ruler His Royal Highness, highest of all, who has already dried so many tears, who has ruled so beneficially and justly and wisely and softly and is warmly and deeply loved, with the most humble request that the highest of all will himself in mercy deign to allow the applicant to stay in the most gracious Kingdom of Bavaria."
Under Trump's current policies, Friedrich would have been denied entry to the US when he first tried to emigrate. As a 16-year-old boy, he had no valuable skills and was unable to speak English. This would have been enough to turn him away.
But this does not seem to have influenced Trump's decision to crack down on immigration issues.
In fact, his own wife would be subject to deportation under the current laws, as she once failed to disclose some illegal earnings she made while working in the USA on a visitor's visa. Of course, it's unlikely that she'll face any consequences for this, as
the President has a talent for looking after his own.
