President-elect Donald Trump will not have any problem with using a border fence instead of a wall, but if he tries to institute amnesty for illegal immigrants, he will lose his supporters, conservative pundit Patrick J. Buchanan told Newsmax TV.
Trump must make building the border wall his first priority since it was his signature issue, and after that, he should prioritize deportations, starting with criminals, Buchanan said on Tuesday's "The Howie Carr Show."
Next, he said, employers who have hired multiple illegal immigrants should be prosecuted and given community service to discourage others from hiring illegal immigrants.
But Trump should not accept any suggestion of amnesty, Buchanan said.
"If he goes for amnesty, I think he'll lose his people," he said. "I think Trump's folks will stay with him on a fence, not a wall, and stuff like that, but I think if he went for amnesty, he would lose his people. This is even more important, I think, to Trump. It was his defining issue."
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Buchanan supported Trump early in the process, and compared his victory to Nixon's in 1968.
"It was just a phenomenal day and phenomenal night," he said. "I was up until 3 a.m. I was looking at those states, and I kept saying it's not locked up yet, they haven't called this one, Hillary might be able to make it, but it was one of the great nights for me. Of course, '68 was a great night when I was with Nixon in those days, but this was one of the greatest."
He predicted the mainstream press will be no less enthused with Trump's appointments than they were with his surprise victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Trump, Buchanan said, is the only Republican who could have beaten Clinton, but the party will have to expand to get more minority voters if it hopes to remain viable.
"They're really going berserk down here," he said, noting the newspapers are especially unhappy with the appointment of Stephen Bannon as chief strategist and chief counselor.
"They're going after him; he's going to have an interesting experience," Buchanan said.
"I think the Republican Party is going to have to start moving in the way Trump did," he added. "Picking up a larger share at least in the African-American vote and increase among the Hispanic vote, and they may be able to do it."
Meanwhile, Ohio Gov. John Kasich might be "cooked and done" after refusing to support Trump after his nomination.
"The story has been floating around that Trump offered him, if he would come aboard as VP, something like sort of carte blanche," Buchanan said. "You're going to be deputy president for foreign and domestic policy and everything, and Kasich not only didn't come aboard, he didn't show up at the convention in his own state."