Boots & Sabers

The blogging will continue until morale improves...

Tag: Illegal Immigration

Foreign Enemies Look to Exploit U.S.’ Open Border

This doesn’t seem like a problem /s

The US faces a significant threat in Venezuela’s cozy relationship with Iran, with enemy nations using the socialist country as a base in the hemisphere to attack America, experts have warned.

 

Fears are rising over the influence Iran has on Caracas as the two regimes strengthen economic and military ties and grow more hostile towards Washington DC.

 

Last week the FBI Miami launched a manhunt to find Iranian spy Majid Dastjani Farahani, who the government accuses of looking for allies to kill US officials while operating from Venezuela.

 

Meanwhile four Iranians were charged in 2021 for plotting to kidnap dissident journalist Masih Alinejad from Brooklyn before using a speedboat to take her to Tehran via Caracas.

 

Experts warned DailyMail.com the brazen acts and strengthening relationships between dictator Nicolas Maduro and America’s enemies could spell doom in the near future.

 

They said the rich-oil nation is being used as an ‘air bridge’ because it is geopolitical gold dust due to it being just 300 miles from the Miami coast in case any world war erupted.

Georgia State Lawmakers Consider Penalties Against Sanctuary Stories

Yes. More of this.

ATLANTA (AP) — Some Georgia senators want to punish cities and counties that they say are illegally harboring immigrants who are in the country without permission by cutting off most state aid to the local government and removing elected officials from office.

 

The Senate Public Safety Committee voted 4-1 on Wednesday to rewrite House Bill 301, with supporters saying the move is needed to enforce a 2009 state law that outlaws so-called sanctuary cities and counties.

 

It’s the latest measure proposed by Republicans after police accused a Venezuelan man of beating a nursing student to death on the University of Georgia campus.

I don’t think they should remove local elected officials. Leave that up to the voters. But they can’t leave unaddressed local governments that violate state laws.

Democrat Arizona Governor Welcomes Illegals

Keep that door wide open, eh?

PHOENIX (AP) — An Arizona bill that would have made it a crime for noncitizens to enter the state through Mexico at any location other than a port of entry has been vetoed by Democratic Gov. Katie Hobbs.

 

The Republican-controlled Legislature approved the measure late last month along party lines. Arizona has emerged as a popular illegal border crossing point, and the bill would have let local law enforcement arrest non-U.S. citizens who enter Arizona from anywhere but a lawful entrance point. A violation would be a top-tier misdemeanor – or a low-level felony for a second offense.

 

In a letter to Arizona Senate President Warren Petersen on Monday, Hobbs said the measure raised constitutional concerns and was expected to lead to costly litigation.

“This bill does not secure our border, will be harmful for communities and businesses in our state, and burdensome for law enforcement personnel and the state judicial system,” Hobbs wrote.

Illegals Dropped Off by the Busload

The only thing unusual about this story in Biden’s America is the scale. Illegals are being dropped off in communities all over the country.

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Hundreds of migrants were dropped off Friday at a San Diego bus stop instead of at a reception center that had been serving as a staging area because it ran out of local funding sooner than expected, showing how even the largest city on the country’s southern border is struggling to cope with the unprecedented influx of people.

 

Migrants who previously had a safe place to charge phones, use the bathroom, eat a meal and arrange to head elsewhere in the U.S. were now left on the street as migrant aid groups scrambled to help out as best they could with makeshift arrangements.

 

Border Patrol buses carrying migrants from Senegal, China, Ecuador, Guatemala and many other countries arrived outside a transit center. Migrant aid groups said they would be bused from there to a parking lot where they could charge their phones and get a ride to the airport. The vast majority planned to spend only a few hours in San Diego before taking a flight or having someone pick them up.

“Are we in San Diego?” asked Gabriel Guzman, 30, a painter from the Dominican Republic who was released after crossing the border in remote mountains on Thursday. He was told to appear in June in an immigration court in Boston, where he hopes to earn money to send home to his three children.

 

Abd Boudeah, of Mauritania, flew to Tijuana, Mexico, through Nicaragua and followed other migrants to an opening in the border wall, where he surrendered to agents Thursday after walking about eight hours. The former molecular engineering student said he fled persecution for being gay and planned to settle in Chicago with a cousin who had been in the U.S. for 20 years.

White House Colludes with Special Interest Groups

I remember a time in Wisconsin when this kind of collusion was considered a threat to democracy.

Administration officials aren’t disengaged from the impeachment fight. President Joe Biden slammed the impeachment as “petty partisan games.” And aides are monitoring it closely, often elevating Republicans who have questioned the merits of impeachment.

 

But the administration is also leaning on allied outside groups to poke holes in the GOP’s case against Mayorkas and echo the message coming from Pennsylvania Avenue.

 

[…]

 

The Congressional Integrity Project has led the charge externally. The group launched in late 2022 — ahead of Republicans taking over the House — with the goal of combatting the investigative onslaught into the Biden administration. The organization has been tracking the targeting of Mayorkas closely, but as impeachment seemed increasingly likely, it ramped up that element of its operations.

 

Over the last six weeks, the Congressional Integrity Project has worked closely with advocates in the immigration policy space to defend Mayorkas and to paint the GOP effort as a “shameful” and unfounded partisan act tied to fringe conservatives, such as Georgia Rep. Majorie Taylor Green and Arizona Rep. Andy Biggs.

 

The groups, including America’s Voice and the American Immigration Lawyers Association, have stayed in touch over a shared chat where they coordinate strategy, said Douglas Rivlin, communications director at America’s Voice. They have pushed various constituencies to speak out against the impeachment effort they’ve sought to frame as “unconstitutional.”

Mayorkas Impeached

Good. It’s good to see the House Republican leadership stick with this. Yes, it’s largely symbolic since the Senate will never convict, but when you only control one half of one branch of government, you should still do everything in your power to fight for the American people.

The House of Representatives has narrowly voted to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, making him the first cabinet member to face impeachment in nearly 150 years.

 

Many Republicans blame Mr Mayorkas for an unprecedented influx of migrants at the US-Mexico border.

Gallagher’s falling star

My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a part:

Wisconsin Congressman Mike Gallagher has had quite a week. After a controversial vote against impeaching Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Gallagher made the surprise announcement that he will not be seeking reelection. The moment says a lot about where the Republican base is right now.

 

[…]

 

Impeachment is a political tool granted to the House of Representatives by the Constitution to be used against anyone in the other two branches of government. It is one of the famed “checks” that creates “balance” in our system of government. The criteria for impeachment are intentionally vague because it is a political tool — not a legal one.

 

Even though the Democrat majority in the Senate would never convict Mayorkas, the House Republican leadership sought to impeach Mayorkas to vent the frustration of their constituents and use the most powerful tool available to them to try to check the Executive Branch’s wonton disregard for the laws it is charged to faithfully implement.

 

Gallagher voted against impeaching Mayorkas and it failed by a narrow margin. Gallagher’s reasoning was sincere, but flawed. He aspires to a higher standard for impeachment that the Democrats abandoned long ago and is not appropriate for the seriousness of the border crisis and Mayorkas’ role in it.

 

The reaction to Gallagher’s vote from Republican voters and moderates was immediate and vicious — perhaps overly so, but reflective of the pent-up frustration and anger about Biden’s border treachery. Republican voters are looking for elected Republicans to use every tool available to fight for a secure border. We are sick and tired of watching elected Republicans latibulate when our country needs people to fight for it.

 

Gallagher took both barrels of that gurgling anger. Although he did not state this reaction as the reason, he announced that he will not seek reelection a couple of days after his vote. Gallagher was a rising Republican star with legitimate conservative credibility, but this singular vote has most likely ended his political career.

 

House Fails to Impeach Traitor Mayorkas

I give credit to the House Republican leadership for taking this to a vote. Shame on the anti-American swamp critters who failed to do their duty.

House Republicans failed to impeach Homeland Security Sec. Alejandro Mayorkas for his mishandling of the southern border crisis in a nail-biting vote that came down to the wire and sparked chaos on the floor.

 

The 214-216 vote marked the second of three major legislative failures of the day for House Republicans who remain deeply divided across the House and Senate.

Senate Releases America-Hating Bill

No

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senators on Sunday released a highly anticipated $118 billion package that pairs border enforcement policy with wartime aid for Ukraine, Israel and other U.S. allies, setting off a long-shot effort to push the bill through heavy skepticism from Republicans, including House Speaker Mike Johnson.

 

[…]

 

If the number of illegal border crossings reaches above 5,000 daily for a five-day average, an expulsion authority would automatically kick in so that migrants are sent back to Mexico without an opportunity to make an asylum claim. If the number reaches 4,000, presidential administrations would have the option of using the expulsion authority.

There is so much bad about this bill, but that last quoted provision is the absolute deal killer. It effectively legalizes 1.8 million illegal aliens PER YEAR before we even really try to stop the flow. That is a nation-killing wave of illegal aliens that will crush our social safety nets and economy.

This is a terrible bill and it is terrible politics for Republicans. They are trying to hand Biden a giant “bipartisan” bill that pretends to fix our border problem during an election year. Terrible policy. Terrible politics. Every Republican who supports this bill should be run out of office like a Taco Bell squirt with as little compassion as they are showing the victims of violent illegal aliens.

Biden’s Border Policies Causing Flood of Illegals

People are flooding into our border because word is out that they will be able to stay. What this story misses is that this reality is not because of overwhelmed courts and border agents and whatnot. That is just another consequence. Illegals are allowed to stay because that’s how Joe Biden wants it. It is policy.

Today, people from around the globe are streaming across the southern border, most of them just as eager to work. But rather than trying to elude U.S. authorities, the overwhelming majority of migrants seek out border agents, sometimes waiting hours or days in makeshift encampments, to surrender.

Being hustled into a U.S. Border Patrol vehicle and taken to a processing facility is hardly a setback. In fact, it is a crucial step toward being able to apply for asylum — now the surest way for migrants to stay in the United States, even if few will ultimately win their cases.

[…]

In December alone, more than 300,000 people crossed the southern border, a record number.

It is not just because they believe they will be able to make it across the 2,000-mile southern frontier. They are also certain that once they make it to the United States they will be able to stay.

Forever.

And by and large, they are not wrong.

The United States is trying to run an immigration system with a fraction of the judges, asylum officers, interpreters and other personnel that it needs to handle the hundreds of thousands of migrants crossing the border and flocking to cities around the country each year. That dysfunction has made it impossible for the nation to expeditiously decide who can remain in the country and who should be sent back to their homeland.

“I don’t know anyone who has been deported,” Carolina Ortiz, a migrant from Colombia, said in an interview…

Illegals Overwhelm Denver

They voted for this. 

DenverCNN — 

This is what an overwhelmed city can look like: a preschooler sleeping under a bridge for a month; crowds lining up each night to get food and shelter; and the mayor calling out for help. And when that city is Denver in the winter, and the overnight temperatures sink below zero degrees Fahrenheit, the problems are life-threatening.

“Our city is really struggling,” Mayor Mike Johnston told CNN after he visited families in a makeshift encampment – a sign of the unfolding emergency triggered by the mass arrival of people from outside the city.

“This is both a humanitarian crisis for the individuals that are arriving, and it’s a fiscal crisis for the cities that are serving. Those two crises are coming to a head right now.”

[…]

Johnston is looking at Denver having to foot an annual bill of $180 million for migrant services, which would lead to major cuts in other city budgets, he said. “We don’t want to take police officers off the street. We don’t want to take firefighters off the street. We don’t want to not do trash pickup or not have our parks and recreation centers open.” But hard decisions are coming, he said.

[…]

Johnston said Texas Gov. Abbott had not returned his calls but if he could talk to him, he would empathize. “I understand they feel like they have this huge influx of people that they can’t handle in Texas alone. I agree with him that no one state or one city should need to solve this entire challenge. But I think there’s a way for us to work together to say, let’s create a coordinated plan where we send people to cities that have capacity, where they can be successful.”

No. Close the dang border. The fact that a bunch of people want to be in America is not a reason for us to allow them to enter illegally and crush our communities.

Senate Deal Sanctions Illegal Crossings

This is a terrible deal. Just. Close. The. Border.

Under the proposal, as described by two sources briefed on the talks, the president would be permitted to temporarily halt new asylum claims by foreigners who arrive in the United States anywhere other than an official port of entry if border crossings reach 4,000 a day over a two-week period. Federal officials could then quickly turn back those migrants to Mexico without a hearing. Such a “shutdown” would become mandatory if the daily number of crossings reached an average of 5,000 over a week or 8,500 in one day.

 

The US experienced about 10,000 border crossings per day in December, the latest month in which data is available.

 

Even in the event of a shutdown, the U.S. would continue to process 1,400 asylum claims per day by people who do arrive through an official port of entry. (According to one source, those migrants would count toward the 4,000 needed to trigger the president’s emergency powers.) There’s also a cap on the number of days the emergency authority can be used in a year, both sources said.

Illegal Aliens In Every Town

They are normalizing and mainstreaming the flood of illegal aliens.

PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — Maine Gov. Janet Mills and a state lawmaker who immigrated from Somalia unveiled a proposal on Friday to try to resolve the state’s serious worker shortage by tapping swiftly growing immigrant communities.

 

Maine traditionally has had among the smallest immigrant populations in the country. According to the 2020 U.S. Census, only about 4% of the state’s residents were born outside the U.S.

 

That has been gradually changing as tens of thousands of residents descended from Somalia and other African countries have made homes in Portland and Lewiston, two of the state’s biggest cities. Those arrivals helped push up the percentage of foreign-born residents by about a percentage point between 2000 to 2022, according to census figures.

The Office of New Americans is proposed in a bill by state Rep. Deqa Dhalac, the first Somali immigrant to become mayor of a U.S. city in 2021, when she took office in South Portland. She was elected to the Maine Legislature last year. Dhalac and Mills say the bill would address shortages in critical industries including health care, education and construction.

Illegals Crush Immigration Courts

Remember that these are only the people who were caught illegally entering our nation. Millions and millions more are just moving in.

…unprecedented 3 million currently pending in immigration courts around the United States.

 

Fueled by record-breaking increases in migrants who seek asylum after being apprehended for crossing the border illegally, the court backlog has grown by more than 1 million over the last fiscal year and it’s now triple what it was in 2019, according to government data compiled by Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse.

Judges, attorneys and migrant advocates worry that’s rendering an already strained system unworkable, as it often takes several years to grant asylum-seekers a new stable life and to deport those with no right to remain in the country.

 

[…]

 

When migrants are apprehended by U.S. authorities at the border, many are released with a record of their detention and instructions to appear in court in the city where they are headed. That information is passed on from the Department of Homeland Security to the Justice Department, whose Executive Office for Immigration Review runs the courts, so that an initial hearing can be scheduled.

 

“They’re just being released without any idea of what comes next,”

Milwaukee Newspaper Whitewashes Whitewater Story

As if you needed some more evidence that Milwaukee’s newspaper is anything other than a Leftist propaganda rag… the background is that Brietbart ran a story a couple of weeks ago about the influx of illegal immigrants into the little town of Whitewater. The Brietbart story was prompted by a letter from city officials to federal officials asking for more money to deal with the influx of illegal immigrants. Outrage ensued because the struggles of Whitewater mirror the struggles of small communities across America that are being overwhelmed by the influx of illegal aliens foisted on them by the Biden administration.

The Milwaukee paper took it upon themselves to dig in to prove that the right-wing media got it wrong. Well, the right-wing media got it a little wrong in that the influx of illegal aliens occurred over the course of a couple of years (allegedly), but the rest was correct. The illegal aliens in Whitewater are leading to an increase in crime and increased costs for schools and other resources. From the MJS story:

In January 2022, Whitewater police responding to an apartment fire found two children sleeping on the floor with no adults present. The next day, they found a family with a toddler living in a 10-foot-by-10-foot shed in frigid weather. Then, they encountered a 14-year-old girl being forced to work 30 hours a week instead of attending school.

 

“Every shift, we were having contact with somebody that was recently here from Central America,” said police chief Dan Meyer. “That was not typical.”

 

It was the start of an unexpected influx of new residents. City officials estimate that 800 to 1,000 migrants have been drawn to Whitewater by jobs on farms and in factories and by available housing. Mainly from Nicaragua

 

[…]

 

There are many more English-language-learners in schools, and drivers being pulled over without licenses, and people being found in overcrowded or unsafe living situations.

 

[…]

 

The police have invested in interpreting software; the school district has hired more Spanish-speaking staff; the library got a grant to translate key brochures into Spanish.

 

[…]

 

Meyer and Weidl had drafted the letter with the aim of showing residents the city had done everything it could to secure more funds before asking taxpayers for money in a referendum. They believe an infusion of dollars to up police department staffing and add an immigrant liaison position, among other ideas, could go a long way.

 

[…]

 

There is no public transportation system in the town, so many undocumented individuals drive without licenses. It’s only recently that free clinics opened to serve those without health insurance.

 

[…]

 

“we would have, say, third graders who didn’t know their ABCs or we would have high school students who didn’t know how to read,” Ramirez said.

 

Before, the teachers mostly helped students of Mexican heritage who grew up bilingual in the U.S. Suddenly the district had to hire instructors who could teach migrant kids in Spanish to read and write. And it’s tougher to catch up high schoolers who are taking classes like chemistry and history compared to younger children, Ramirez said.

 

[…]

 

Meyer, the police chief, drew the estimate of 800 to 1,000 new migrants from the number of new children in schools and the number and type of calls police have received. It’s “probably a conservative estimate,” he said, as a chunk of those who have arrived are young, single men who aren’t in school.

 

Meyer said his officers’ investigations in cases involving migrants take longer, leaving less time for proactive policing. As a way to quantify that decline in officers’ available time to police in the community, he provided data that showed officers initiated half the number of traffic stops in 2023 compared to an 11-year average.

 

At traffic stops, unlicensed drivers might give a fake name or fake ID documents. And because they come with so few possessions, people under investigation for crimes easily slip away and can’t be found for follow-up interviews.

 

Officers might not realize until later that it was the third or fourth time police had stopped someone until a time-consuming effort to truly identify the person. Then there’s the task of correcting all the prior records in the system.

 

“It’s hours and hours of manpower,” he said.

Look at all of those tax dollars being spent on law enforcement, schools, the library, and everything else. Accompany that with the increase in crime, unsafe driving, unsafe living conditions, and overall decline in safety.

Now multiply that by the 10,000 communities across America that are dealing with Biden’s illegal invasion. He is killing our nation and he’s doing it on purpose.

Fetterman’s Concerned About Open Border

I’m really starting to think that Fetterman’s stroke actually fixed some of his brain and made him more rational.

Sen. John Fetterman, D-Penn., said that he hopes Democrats know that it “isn’t xenophobic” to be worried about the southern border and argued that the Democratic Party should engage in debates about it.

“I hope Democrats can understand that it isn’t xenophobic to be concerned about the border,” Fetterman told Politico. “It’s a reasonable conversation, and Democrats should engage.”

Fetterman cited the near 270,000 border encounters in September, according to the outlet, and said it was “astonishing.”

“You essentially have Pittsburgh showing up there at the border,” he added.

Republicans Willing to Trade Border Security for More Ukraine Funding

This is a positive development. Even the squishy Republican Senators are drawing a hard line here.

Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked the advance of a $110 billion (£87 billion) package of wartime funding for Ukraine and Israel as they pressed their demands for tougher immigration measures at the Mexico border.

 

The vote, a 49-51 tally that fell short of the Senate’s 60-vote threshold for moving ahead, came just hours after President Joe Biden said it was “stunning” that Congress has not yet approved tens of billions of dollars in military and economic assistance for Ukraine.

 

His administration warned of dire consequences for Kyiv – and a “gift” to Russia’s Vladimir Putin – if lawmakers don’t act.

 

The vote was along party lines, with every Senate Republican voting “no” along with Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent who generally votes with Democrats but had expressed concerns about funding Israel’s “current inhumane military strategy” against Palestinians.

The bleating from Biden that the war in Ukraine is a “battle for freedom,” or something, has worn thin. He has not articulated what our pressing national interest is, and he has not articulated what the out strategy is. Meanwhile, Ukraine has suspended elections, suppressed speech, and generally turned into yet another dictatorship. Do we really care if a Ukrainian dictator or a Russian dictator lords over that part of the world? How much more American treasure and, potentially, American lives are worth it?

Furthermore, it is clear that the Ukrainian War has ground to a stalemate. Lines have not moved substantially for most of the year despite the big Ukrainian summer offensive. Russia will continue to push and has more resources than Ukraine. The only thing that will change the dynamic is a massive influx of arms and, probably, foreign soldiers to change the power balance. But there is no appetite in Europe or America to spend more, risk their lives, or widen the war with Russia.

Given that’s the case, America would best serve the world by using our power to bring the war to a close as quickly as possible in a negotiated settlement. It will mean that Russia “won” the war by seizing several large parts of Ukraine by force of arms. But Ukraine will survive as a smaller country. And the bloodletting of a generation of Ukrainians and Russians will stop. At this point, that is the best foreseeable outcome for Ukraine and the longer they wait, the less likely it will be.

Illegal Aliens Getting Hurt at Border

Why is this my problem? They are breaking into my fortified home and hurt themselves doing it. FAFO. They are lucky that we are spending untold thousands of dollars treating their injuries instead of just shoving them back over the border to find care in Mexico.

My colleague Miriam Jordan was reporting at the border this year when she noticed an unusual number of migrants in wheelchairs, bandages and casts at shelters. Jordan learned that while there was no comprehensive accounting of wall-related injuries and deaths, doctors at U.S. hospitals along the border have noticed a definite increase.

 

“Desperate people try to jump over, and they suffer much more severe traumatic injuries to the head,” Jordan said. “The falls also shatter their extremities, because of greater impact from falling farther.”

 

Problems continue even after they receive treatment. “Many migrants do not receive the follow-up care that they need after being released from the hospital,” she said, “and they may never regain the ability to work at physically arduous jobs, which they came to America to do, or lead a normal life.”

 

[…]

 

Last year, UC San Diego Health converted a postpartum unit into a ward for border-wall casualties. The sheer number has affected care for local people, too; waiting time for spinal procedures at the hospital has risen to nearly two weeks, from three days.

Illegals Being Diffused Throughout Nation

I was distinctly told that bussing illegal aliens to other cities was racist, but here we are. Realize that there is an entire infrastructure now built to quickly move illegal aliens to towns, big and small, all over America.

DENVER (AP) — As weary migrants arrive in Denver on buses from the U.S.-Mexico border city of El Paso, Texas, officials offer them two options: temporary shelter or a bus ticket out.

 

Nearly half of the 27,000 migrants who arrived in Denver since November 2022 have chosen the bus, plane or train tickets to other cities in the U.S., city data shows. In New York and Illinois, taxpayer dollars also are being spent on tickets, creating a shuffle of migrants in the interior U.S. who need shelter, food and medical assistance as they await rulings on asylum cases that can take years.

 

The transfer of migrants has gained momentum since Republican governors in Texas and Florida started chartering buses and planes to Democratic-led cities in what critics waved off as political stunts. More than a year later, some of those cities, their resources dwindling, are eager to help migrants move on to their final destinations.

The Hard Costs of the Biden Border

Insane

A report released Monday by the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee says the influx of migrants across the country’s southern border could cost taxpayers $451 billion.

 

The fourth report released by the committee says that the tab includes housing, education, property damage done by migrants, law enforcement, and health care costs.

 

report from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services showed that “emergency services for undocumented aliens” added up to $7 billion in fiscal 2021 and $5.4 billion in fiscal 2022, with migrants receiving at least $8 billion in improper Medicaid payouts (10% of the nation’s total of $80 billion).

 

Migrants are also putting a strain on the nation’s criminal justice infrastructure, with the cost adding up to $8.95 billion in fiscal 2022.

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