Don't mess with Spicey.
On another note, have you yet noticed the virtual flood of the heart-tugging, human interest immigration stories, of families being ripped apart, of people being denied health care, of children, children, children?
One guy, who has been deported multiple times, was detained once again at the border, and was again deported. He claimed he just wanted to come to the US to work, to support his three children, who is everything to him. He lives for his children. His children are so important to him that upon re-entering Mexico, he jumped off a bridge, committing suicide. Other reports from very different news outlets show that he was a serial criminal in Mexico and was fleeing Mexico to avoid a life, or maybe death, sentence. But none of that matters. The important thing is, he killed himself because he was deported. Bad USA, bad. Shame on you.
The Daily Beast has an article, where the headline at least, leaves the distinct impression that ICE scooped up a woman with a brain tumor and locked her up for deportation. Well, no, that's not at all hat happened. The piece states that,
"lawyers for the woman who remains in the custody of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement fear she’ll die there without ever seeing or speaking to her family again." But my favorite line in the story is,
"It’s a scenario that advocates worry could become far more common under President Donald Trump's new immigration enforcement rules," as if ICE locking up people is a cause of brain tumors and when that happens, they can't talk to their families ever again. <snort>
The reporting over Trump's DHS and ICE directives, you know, the ones that tell them that it's OK to enforce the laws already on the books, is getting lots of lots of attention, and spin, as you would expect. This
story from Reuters has several little gems. Chicago immigration lawyer Mike Jarecki said,
"The memos make it very clear that they want to create an enforcement environment, and they don’t want to just instill fear — they want to go after people, put them through the system and ultimately deport them." Golly, gee, Mr Law School Graduate, that's how the law works. Yes, they want to put the illegal aliens through the system and ultimately deport them. Doh.
And on the the “expedited removal” process
that’s already available under current law, expect many lawsuits (that will not succeed) over that one. But the little gem is this:
"Anyone who cannot prove in the heat of the moment that they either have legal status or that they’ve been here continuously for two years could be dragged off to detention and removed without getting a lawyer or a hearing before a judge," said Johnson-Xenitelis, who also teaches crime and immigration at New York Law School.
"In the prior administration, this only happened to people found at or near the border who had been in the U.S. for less than 14 days."
Soooo, the only thing that has changed is the time frame. Under the 14 day policy, they still were subject to proving "in the heat of the moment" that they either have legal status or that they've been here continuously for that particular time frame. He and others are upset that, while before you could just remain out of sight for 14 days and then you were good to go, it's now 2 years, which makes it more difficult to be here illegally.
Nevertheless, as the story notes, if someone is undocumented and has no legal right to be here, it's gonna be a tough sell that they should be given immunity from deportation.
On the other hand, I do think that anyone who has been documented as a DREAMer (DACA) and thus have been given paperwork that allows them to remain and work here, that's straight-up documented, and they should only be deported for the same reasons as any other non-permanent resident (felony, gang membership, etc.). We gave them our word, and we should live up to it (and I think we are, so far). That's not to say that the DACA program needs to be renewed in perpetuity, though. At some point these people need to apply for a visa or residency and get
legal legal.
