Category Archives: immigration

The Racism of the Mayor

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And the straightforwardness of one recruit. Progressive-Democrat Mayor Karen Bass is upset that so many Americans of Latino background are enlisting in the Customs and Border Patrol along our southern border. Bass responded to a report that [a]pplications up 70% from last year as over half of southern border agents are now Hispanic.

Well, in a way, I think it’s sad. I think that those Border Patrol agents are going to have a difficult time when they’re out in the field and they see what actually happens in real life separate from their training.

Not so much. Maybe Bass ought to travel along the border without her entourage screening her and see for herself.

On the other hand, here’s a young recent recruit to the CBP:

Juan Peralta, a 20-year-old who said friends back home were surprised that he’d joined up and would say things like, “How do you feel about arresting your own kind?”
“And how do you answer that when you hear that?” [CNN‘s David] Culver asked.
Peralta responded, “They didn‘t come in the right way. So, they aren‘t my kind.”

A Step in the Right Direction

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Against the backdrop of the multi-billion dollar Medicaid fraud being pulled off in Minnesota and so far only partially uncovered (for all the dozens of indictments and convictions), a fraud that centers on sending those billions of dollars overseas, comes this move by Missouri’s State Treasurer Vivek Malek:

Missouri State Treasurer Vivek Malek told Just the News he is teaming up with the state legislature to impose new requirements that remittance payment businesses ensure that customers are lawfully in the United States before they can send money to foreign countries….

It’s not just Somali immigrants and illegal aliens resident in Minnesota, either.

“It has been found that at least $4.4 billion in remittances sent to Mexico have been tied to cartel money laundering through small wire transfers,” [Malek] said. “Cartels don’t sneak money across the border or throw the bag across the border. They wire it. And if we are serious about crushing cartels, we have to shut down their financial arteries.”

This is a strong move, and it’ll be instructive to see which States—Progressive-Democrat-run vs Republican-run—start taking similar steps. State by State legislation, though, is patchy, incomplete, and slow. What’s needed is the same move done at the Federal level. Treasury should monitor such transmissions, blocking those sent by inappropriate senders—illegal aliens, for instance. Treasury has ample authority under our Constitution’s Commerce Clause.

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations….

Remissions of US money to foreign relatives of those present in the US, whether legally so or illegal alien, is pretty clearly Commerce with foreign Nations.

Another Progressive-Democrat Foolish Lawsuit

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Blue State AGs don’t like President Donald Trump’s (R) Executive Order imposing a $100,000 fee on H1B visa applicants.

A group of Democratic state attorneys general on Friday filed a challenge to President Donald Trump’s imposition of a $100,000 fee to apply for an H-1B visa.

Oregon Attorney General Dan Rayfield, lead AG on the case, based it on this:

Oregon’s colleges, universities and research institutions rely on skilled international workers to keep labs running, courses on track and innovation moving forward. This enormous fee would make it nearly impossible for these institutions to hire the experts they need, and it goes far beyond what Congress ever intended. This threatens Oregon’s ability to compete, educate, and grow.

It may make colleges, universities, and research institutions efforts to hire certain skilled workers more difficult. That, though, is a business model question, not a legal one. No enterprise has an inherent right to pursue the business model of its choice, and government has no obligation whatsoever, to comport laws or regulations to the requirements of any business model. Those entities must alter their business models to accommodate changing legal environments, just as they must with changing market environments.

The only thing threatening [Oregon’s] ability to compete, educate, and grow is those institutions’ insistence on their entrenched models as they are, rather than adapting them. The question of whether the EO goes beyond Congressional intent is a separate matter, and the AGs’ claim of that is wholly conclusory.

This frivolous and foolish lawsuit is just another instantiation of Party’s dislike of all things Trump, independent of merit or lack regarding a Trump move.

Regarding Illegal Aliens Applying for Asylum

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The Supreme Court has agreed to hear a case involving the Trump administration’s limitation on illegal aliens’ ability to apply for asylum. The case, Noem v Al Otro Lado, centers on the meaning of “arrival in the United States” within the meaning of federal immigration law: does an alien “arrive” on meeting with immigration officers when the meeting occurs on the Mexican side with no actual entry into the US.

This should be an open-and-shut case. Here’s what 8 US Code § 1158 – Asylum, paragraph (a)(1) says on the matter:

Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section or, where applicable, section 1225(b) of this title.

That’s clear. Present in the United States and brought to the United States means inside—being within the borders of—the United States. Nothing more, nothing less. In particular, this statute makes clear that “on the Mexican side” plainly is not inside the United States (to say nothing of the affront to Mexican sovereignty if “on the Mexican side” were taken to mean inside the US.

Section 1225(b) only specifies the process for granting or denying asylum, but this is what its paragraph (a)(1) says that’s relevant to Otro Lado:

An alien present in the United States who has not been admitted or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters) shall be deemed for purposes of this chapter an applicant for admission.

This is, in its essence, a repeat of the Asylum paragraph above. In the United States explicitly excludes being still on the Mexican side of the border. An alien, illegal or otherwise, must be on the US side of the border—within the US—before he can apply for asylum

Full stop.

The obvious alternative, though, should the Court rule wrongly on this, is to withdraw all US immigration officers from the Mexican side of the border.

A Mistake

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DHS, according to Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin, is looking at so-called “ICE tracking apps,” which allow users to share locations of immigration enforcement activity in real time. Of course they should be looking at these.

However.

According to McLaughlin, while such apps might currently be legal, they are “being used by gangs, suspected terrorists, and others to evade law enforcement and even target officers.”
She said the Department of Justice might consider whether the apps and other tracking tools amount to obstruction of justice.

That’s looking at the wrong end of the apps. It’s certainly true that, as McLaughlin also says, there has been a 1,000% increase in assaults against ICE officers.

But the way to deal with that is not to go after the apps as obstructions of justice. The proper way to deal with that is to treat the use of the apps in particular ways as obstructions of justice, backtrack those uses to their users, and then to go after the users who actually obstruct justice or who interfere with law enforcement officers in the course of their actions.

The apps themselves are merely tools. They’re agnostic in themselves; it’s the users who are…not agnostic.

Moreover, targeting the apps over their misuse also would fuel the Left’s war on our 2nd Amendment, making it easier to target our weapons over their misuse.