MCALLEN, TEXAS: TRUMP BORDER VISIT & ROUNDTABLE ON IMMIGRATION & BORDER SECURITY
WITH BORDER PATROL:
Newly inaugurated Gov. Gavin Newsom has pledged to make his
home state of California “a sanctuary to all who seek it” in direct
defiance of President Trump’s drive to secure the nation’s border with
Mexico and enforce U.S. immigration laws.
California’s grossly
unconstitutional obstruction of federal immigration laws is about to
get ramped up, Newsom’s speech suggests. The state already has
unprecedented sanctuary laws on its books that shield its 2.4 million
illegal aliens from U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE).
Federal prosecutors are considering filing criminal charges against
elected officials harboring illegal aliens in sanctuary jurisdictions,
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told the Senate Judiciary
Committee a year ago.
The Trump administration is suing
California over its “sanctuary state” laws that punish compliance with
federal immigration laws and provide legal cover for corrupt officials
to continue brazenly flouting immigration laws and interfering with
federal agents trying to enforce them.
The federal lawsuit
targets three statutes curbing the power of California’s state and local
law enforcement to hold, question, and transfer detainees at the
request of immigration authorities, and punish employers for cooperating
with those authorities. The laws also impose draconian restrictions on
communication between local police and federal immigration enforcement,
including information regarding when criminal aliens are scheduled to be
released from local jails.
Under the longstanding doctrine in
American constitutional law known as “dual sovereignty,” states cannot
be compelled to enforce federal immigration laws, but they are obliged
not to hinder their enforcement. The so-called sanctuary cities that
form the bulk of the sanctuary movement really ought to be called
traitor cities because they are in open rebellion against the United
States, just like the slave states that seceded from the Union before
the Civil War.
The sanctuary movement gave illegal aliens
permission to rob, rape, and murder Americans by, among other things,
stigmatizing immigration enforcement and characterizing it as somehow
racist. Some left-wingers use the dreadful euphemism "civil liberties
safe zones" to describe sanctuary jurisdictions. The phrase deliberately
blurs the distinction between citizens and non-citizens by implying
illegal aliens somehow possess a civil right to be present in the U.S.
But dealing with the illegal alien problem is the furthest thing from
Democrat politicians’ minds. They view illegals as future Democrat
voters and demonize anyone who supports enforcing federal immigration
laws that could lead to the deportation of their future voter base.
“People’s lives, freedom, security, the water we drink, the air we
breathe — they all hang in the balance,” the leftist politician said
Monday outside the state Capitol in Sacramento.
Children
should not be “ripped away from their parents” at the border or left
hungry while Trump promises to expend billions of dollars on “a wall
that should never be built.”
Newsom (D) became the state’s 40th governor, succeeding Jerry Brown
(D) who was term-limited. Before being sworn in as governor, Newsom was
the state’s lieutenant governor and before that, mayor of San
Francisco.
While Newsom vowed to worsen the nation’s illegal
alien crisis, another leftist, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (D),
promised this week to provide “free” health care to all his city’s
residents, including illegals. The program, according to one ridiculous
low-ball estimate, will cost only $100 million.
“This is the
city paying for direct comprehensive care (not just ERs) for people who
can’t afford it, or can’t get comprehensive Medicaid — including 300,000
undocumented New Yorkers,” de Blasio spokesman Eric Phillips wrote on
Twitter Tuesday.
Newsom’s pledge came as President Trump’s
negotiations with Democrats over $5 billion needed to fund construction
of the border wall continued to go nowhere
and the federal government continued to be partially shut down for lack
of appropriated funds. Trump has vowed to keep the shutdown going as
long as it takes to secure funding for the wall.
“Just left a
meeting with [Senate Minority Leader] Chuck [Schumer] and [Speaker of
the House] Nancy [Pelosi], a total waste of time[,]” Trump tweeted
Wednesday. “I asked what is going to happen in 30 days if I quickly open
things up, are you going to approve Border Security which includes a
Wall or Steel Barrier? Nancy said, NO. I said bye-bye, nothing else
works!”
The U.S. House of Representatives voted 217 to 185 on
Dec. 20 to approve a temporary spending bill after adding $5.7 billion
in appropriations for the wall. The measure floundered in the Senate and
the partial shutdown got underway Dec. 22. But that was back in the
previous Congress. Now the Democrats control the House.
The
meeting came the day after President Trump took rhetorical aim at his
enemies as he delivered his first-ever prime time address from the Oval
Office in a bold attempt to rally the country in favor of building a
wall on the porous U.S.-Mexico border, his signature campaign promise.
Vice President Mike Pence said the White House has delivered numerous
proposals and offers in three weeks of negotiations, but Democrats
stubbornly refused to support any funding for the wall.
“I can
give you 15 speeches [Schumer] gave, in which he talked about border
security,” Trump said prior to the meeting. “The only reason they’re
against it is because I won the presidency.”
