Protecting Our National Sovereignty

A key thesis of the recently published National Security Strategy of the United States is that this country should get down to serious business in this Western Hemisphere especially about our borders. The important message: protect and restore our sovereignty, with control over immigration being at the top of the list along with stopping trafficking and drug dealing.

Some people forget how immigration affects national security

Here, a new essay by Andrew Sullivan, a Never Trumper subscriber, and regular writer for the New Yorker and National Public Radio, argues that the administration is losing ground among previous supporters due to the too aggressive enforcement of immigration law.

Sullivan appears to support stopping illegal aliens at the border but not those working inside the country. President Obama deported 250,000 annually but these were stopped at the border and never came into contact with most working Americans. That is the kind of law enforcement Sullivan seems to like.

Those in the interior were deported 150,000 a year under Mr. Obama and they were arrested by ICE after an immigration judge issued an order of deportation.

What is different today?

Well, the same judges are issuing the same deportation orders. Except open border enthusiasts are going outside the immigration court system and judge shopping to stop the regular enforcement of immigration law.

The success of the administration is no one is trying to get across the border—which means at least 250,000 of our potential “neighbors” are annually not getting into the US. Same result as under Mr. Obama.

Why then does enforcing immigration law qualify as fascist? Which is what some never Trumpers and their friendly judges have described even though it is all sound legal law enforcement.

Deporting from the interior

True, the US government is now deporting 600,000 illegal aliens a year but almost entirely from the interior. Some of these people are criminals, some have been unlawfully working in the country, and some are relying (illegally) on our social welfare programs. And some, including those here legally are apparently fraudulently ripping us of for literally billions annually.

So, what is it progressives and apparently some previous Trump supporters object to?

Well, progressives call these illegal aliens “our neighbors;” although the term previously used was “undocumented.”  Why? In at least the 1970’s, supporters of open border immigration wanted to soften the crimes these illegal aliens committed—unlawfully entering the country, working here illegally, stealing someone’s identity, the fraudulent use of a social security number; and often evading income taxes. (Why else offer them amnesty that requires paying back taxes?)

But all these crimes are somehow to be overlooked because these people do landscape, agricultural or household chores and are our “neighbors.” Some argue that since LEGAL immigrants commit criminal acts at a rate less than that of native Americans, we somehow should be allowed to lump all legal AND illegal immigrants together and ignore the huge number of illegal aliens sitting in various prisons and jails around the country!! No one can ignore that ICE finds and arrests thousands of illegal aliens guilty of violent crimes every week.

“Neighbors” behaving most un-neighborly

Even those illegal aliens “working” in the country are in professions where 95% of the jobs are held by American citizens or legitimate guest workers, also “our neighbors.” Ignored is the fact that some of these neighbors are also killers— one arrested 70 times who knifed a young Ukraine woman legal immigrant. And indeed, the illegal alien shooters, rapists, traffickers, and killers are also “our neighbors.” Do they get to stay in America too?

But if arrested by an ICE officer, which the ICE officer has been sworn to do, opponents of ICE contend that is somehow beyond the pale. And because the “optics” make folks uncomfortable—like academic microaggressions—interfering with such law enforcement, which itself is against the law, is universally condoned or even undertaken by members of the Democratic party, blurring completely the distinction between lawful immigrants—which this President in 5 years in office has brought in over 5 million—vs those not here lawfully, particularly career criminals and cartel members attracted to the sanctuary status they enjoy in major US cities and some key states.

And “Oh Sacre bleu,” Mr. Sullivan is mad the ICE officers are masked! Why is this the case? Because the criminal cartels are offering bounties to have them identified and killed.

National security requires enforcing immigration law in the interior

At issue is a simple issue. Should immigration laws be enforced elsewhere than at the border? And should ICE agents publish their own names and addresses to facilitate the cartels, criminals, and rioters to harm them and their families? And should their vans be gayly decorated so they can be easily rammed and the agents inside harmed or killed?

What is the difference between those impeding the work of ICE and the activities of those seeking to sway the judiciary—such as the thug who threatened to kill Judge Kavanaugh following Senator Schumer threatening the judge with “you won’t know what hit you.”

Getting serious about our sovereignty means going beyond just border enforcement. Taking down sex traffickers of children and drugs is not a pretty business. That is why the administration is taking such tough measures to take Venezuela out of that business, (which Sullivan opposes).

Driving home the point

Deliberate interference with law enforcement is a serious crime. But the fiction that only the border needs to be defended is simply a political fairy tale that our drive-by media, academia, and entertainment community have subscribed to for the last half century.

Then as early as 1975 illegal immigration was largely dismissed as just a few “undocumented workers” crossing the Rio Grande. Or some seasonal fruit pickers occasionally working in America. All part of the normal demographic landscape.

But then as the former Attorney General told Congress at least 8.5 million additional unvetted migrants were let into the country between 2021-4, including an estimated ten thousand Chinese men of military age according to Brian Kennedy, the founder of the Committee on the Present Danger-China.

Getting rid of potential terrorists and cartel gangs requires internal law enforcement, not just border patrols. That is the job of ICE. We have to stop pretending such law enforcement is mean spirited and that American sovereignty means little to the American people, because after all we are all neighbors.

This article was originally published by RealClearDefense and made available via RealClearWire.