Fort Collins, Colorado, recently passed legislation that provides legal funds to illegal aliens to protect them from deportation. On July 6, the Fort Collins City Council passed Ordinance No. 64 by vote of 5-2. This ordinance appropriates $150,000 away from services for the taxpaying citizens of Fort Collins to pay lawyers for illegal aliens facing immigration proceedings. The ordinance was supported by Susan Gutowsky, Julie Pignataro, Tricia Canonico, Emily Gorgol, and Mayor Jeni Arndt. Only Council Members Kelly Ohlson and Shirley Peel opposed the measure.
As expected, numerous open-borders groups testified in support of the ordinance. There was also a strong showing of Fort Collins residents who testified in opposition.
“The appropriate way to work this [legal defense fund] is through voluntary donations to a nonprofit and possibly with pro bono legal services. Our hard-earned tax dollars are not the City Council’s personal slush fund to do with as you please,” stated one Fort Collins resident.
Another resident, Glen Colton, added that more illegal immigration into the city would negatively impact the job market for American citizens and legal immigrants in Fort Collins, as competition for employment will increase in an economy that has not yet fully recovered from the COVID-19 economic crash.
FAIR staff also submitted written testimony opposing the ordinance, noting in addition to these concerns that funds like these amount to unfair privileges for illegal aliens at the expense of American citizens and legal immigrants, who do not have a right to taxpayer-funded legal representation in civil as opposed to criminal legal matters.
While taxpayer-funded deportation defense funds appear to be proliferating across Colorado, Aurora, Colorado’s effort failed in January. However, earlier this year the Colorado state legislature passed House Bill (HB) 1194, which created a statewide immigration legal defense fund within the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. The department was tasked with distributing $100,000 to “qualifying nonprofit organizations that provide legal advice, counseling, and representation for, and on behalf of, indigent [illegal aliens] who are subject to an immigration proceeding.” This despite the fact that such funds fly in the face of federal law, which allows illegal aliens to retain counsel but provides that such representation should not be at taxpayer expense.
Joe Biden’s border crisis is having deadly consequences nationwide.
Border agents apprehended 188,829 illegal immigrants last month, the most since March 2000, and as the number of people surging to the border has increased, so has the flow of lethal drugs.
For the 5th straight month, more fentanyl has been seized at the southwest border than in the corresponding months in 2018, 2019, and 2020 combined.
Enough fentanyl was seized in June 2021 to kill 238 million Americans.
That was just the fentanyl that was seized. Biden’s own Border Patrol Chief warns that cartels are “dictating” where illegal immigrants cross the border so criminals can smuggle lethal narcotics without detection.
As CBS News reports, the result is “a flood of drugs coming into this country at the US-Mexico border” with “deadly consequences” throughout the nation – reporting confirmed by law enforcement, who described a fentanyl explosion linked to Biden’s border crisis.
Biden’s open borders agenda is aiding and abetting the flow of lethal drugs, fueling a nationwide opioid crisis, profiting criminal organizations, and costing American lives.
President Joe Biden said during a CNN town hall on Wednesday night that he is pushing to eliminate the sales of handguns.
“I’m the only guy that ever got — passed legislation when I was a senator to make sure we eliminated assault weapons,” Biden said. “The idea you need a weapon that can have the ability to fire 20, 30, 40, 50, 120 shots from that weapon, whether it’s a, whether it’s a 9mm pistol or whether it’s a rifle, is ridiculous.”
“I’m continuing to push to eliminate the sale of those things, but I’m not likely to get that done in the near term,” Biden added.
WATCH:
They’re not hiding their intentions. Joe Biden says he wants to ban handguns — not merely AR-15s like their previous dishonest talking points suggested. Watch Biden stumble through this town hall answer. pic.twitter.com/DI3CDTN1wL
— (((Jason Rantz))) on KTTH Radio (@jasonrantz) July 22, 2021
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Three Texas Democrats who fled the state to subvert democracy have tested positive for COVID-19 which comes after they met with Vice President Kamala Harris earlier this week.
“Friday night, a Member of the Texas House Democratic Caucus tested positive for COVID,” the Texas House Democrats announced in a statement. “Saturday morning, two additional Members, each of whom are also fully vaccinated, tested positive on a rapid test.”
House Democrat Caucus Chairman Chris Turner responded by saying in a statement:
The House Democratic Caucus is following all CDC guidance and protocols. This is a sober reminder that COVID is still with us, and though vaccinations offer tremendous protection, we still must take necessary precautions. We are in touch with public health experts in Texas to provide additional guidance. Our caucus will follow all recommendations from public health experts as we continue our work.
The Texas Democrats asked that people respect “the privacy of Members and their personal health” which comes after photos surfaced showing nearly all of the Texas Democrats who fled the state to subvert democracy not wearing masks while on board private jets flying to Washington, D.C.
Harris met with the Texas House Democrats on Tuesday this week and praised them for refusing to participate in legitimate democratic processes in their home state, saying, “You are doing this in support and defense of some of our nation’s highest ideals.”
More than 50 Democrats fled the state on private planes so there would not be enough legislators present for a variety of bills to be passed, including voter integrity laws, bills that would protect girls from having to compete against biological males in sports, fund arrests of illegal aliens, clampdown on abortion, and crackdown on racist Critical Race Theory being taught in schools.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott told Fox News on Monday night that Democrats who fled the state to stop the state’s legislature from voting on bills during a special legislative session will “be arrested” the moment that they step foot back in the state and hauled to the state Capitol to do their jobs.
“What the law is, it’s in the Constitution, and that is the house, the State House of Representatives who were here in the Capitol in Austin right now, they do have the ability to issue a call to have their fellow members who are not showing up to be arrested, but only so long as that arrest is made in the state of Texas,” Abbott said. “That’s why they have fled the state. Once they step back into the state of Texas, they will be arrested and brought to the Texas Capitol, and we will be conducting business.”
This is a developing news story, refresh the page for updates.
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Texas state House members voted 76-4 Tuesday to send law enforcement to track down and return dozens of Democratic lawmakers who fled the state to break quorum and block legislation on election reforms.
The state House cannot vote on legislation without a two-thirds majority of its 150-member body present. At least 51 Democratic House members fled the state on Monday, taking chartered flights to Washington, D.C., in protest of the Texas election reform efforts and in support of the For The People Act, a Democrat-backed proposal for the federal government to take over much of the election process.
Texas House members voted Tuesday for law enforcement to bring back “under warrant of arrest, if necessary,” the absent House members, according to The Wall Street Journal.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) called a special session of the legislature last week the focus on a slew of legislation that Democrats in the House derailed earlier this year with a similar act, breaking quorum and preventing the House from proceeding. The election reform legislation is part of that bundle of bills that was tabled.
Abbott pledged Monday that the runaway House members would be arrested as soon as they returned to Texas.
“What the law is, it’s in the Constitution, and that is the house, the State House of Representatives who were here in the Capitol in Austin right now, they do have the ability to issue a call to have their fellow members who are not showing up to be arrested, but only so long as that arrest is made in the state of Texas,” Abbott said during an appearance on Fox News. “That’s why they have fled the state. Once they step back into the state of Texas, they will be arrested and brought to the Texas Capitol, and we will be conducting business.”
Abbott also accused the Democrats of misrepresenting the election legislation, which includes reforms such as mandatory voter identification, in order to justify their trip to Washington, D.C.
“The thesis that they are operating under is completely false, because what the Texas law does, doesn’t hinder anybody’s ability to vote,” he said. “In fact, interestingly, what Texas is seeking to do is to add additional hours to vote. Texas has 12 days of early voting and the hours of which will be expanded. And we will ensure that hours are expanded on Election Day also. So their entire thesis is completely wrong.”
The state lawmakers have planned to take such unprecedented action for weeks. The lawmakers had considered fleeing to West Virginia and Arizona to pressure Sens. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) and Joe Manchin (D-WV) to support the For The People Act. The Democrats eventually decided against fleeing to either state out of fear that GOP governors would help extradite them back to Texas.
“Today, Texas House Democrats stand united in our decision to break quorum and refuse to let the Republican-led legislature force through dangerous legislation that would trample on Texans’ freedom to vote,” state Democratic leaders said in a joint statement Monday as lawmakers boarded chartered planes to D.C.
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Illegal immigrant women who are pregnant or nursing will no longer be arrested or detained, barring exceptional circumstances, ICE announced Friday.
Pregnant women can still be sent into the immigration courts to face eventual deportation, but should not be placed into a custodial setting for fear of disrupting the pregnancy or the bond with a nursing child, the agency said in its new policy.
When circumstances do require a pregnant, postpartum or nursing woman to be taken into custody, she must be given mental health services and housed in facilities that can handle her needs, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement said.
And the use of restraints on pregnant women remains banned, except in cases where it’s ordered by a doctor or where the woman is deemed to be an immediate threat to herself or others.
“Given the unique needs of this population, we will not detain individuals known to be pregnant, postpartum or nursing unless release is prohibited by law or exceptional circumstances exist,” said Tae Johnson, ICE’s acting director. “This reflects our commitment to treat all individuals with respect and dignity while still enforcing our nation’s laws.”
The policy drew praise from immigrant rights advocates, but they said ICE should go further.
“ICE should stop detaining or arresting people who would be at particular risk in detention, must implement robust oversight of detention facilities, and ensure the release of all people who would be particularly vulnerable in detention,” said Eunice Cho, a lawyer on the American Civil Liberties Union’s prison project.
The latest trains will feature more comfortable seating, individual power outlets and USB ports, onboard Wi-Fi, enhanced lighting and panoramic windows, larger vestibules, a more contemporary food service experience, including self-service options, as well as state-of-the-art customer trip information, digital seat reservation system and navigation display systems. The trains were designed with the latest health and safety standards, including enhanced HVAC, touchless restroom controls, and automated steps.
Amtrak touted the trains’ multi-power systems, which will permit “a substantial environmental benefit through reduced criteria pollutants compared to the existing fleet.”
“These new trains, some of which will be our first hybrid battery operations in the United States, will transform the way Americans travel,” remarked Siemens executive Michael Cahill. “Over the past decade, we’ve worked closely with Amtrak and its state partners to develop and deliver trains that meet the needs of America’s travelers, these next generation trainsets build on that experience and offer much more.”
“Based right here in Sacramento for 30 years, this Siemens facility is one of the largest such plants on the continent and one of the most sustainable, and this new contract cements California’s leadership in clean transportation and reducing carbon emissions,” added Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA).
Throughout his four decades in the Senate, President Biden frequently advocated for increases in funding to Amtrak. Since his inauguration, the Commander-in-Chief has stressed a desire to promote green energy within the rail service.
As he stated during a celebration of Amtrak’s fiftieth anniversary in April:
And, as I’ve said from the beginning, when I think about fighting climate change, I think about jobs. And rail and hopefully the expansion of rail provides good union jobs, good-paying jobs. It also connects people to jobs and economic opportunities that can be reached from wherever you live.
Accordingly, the American Jobs Plan — President Biden’s $2.7 trillion infrastructure bill — contains multiple provisions that would increase spending on climate change solutions. For instance, the legislation suggests allocating “$35 billion in the full range of solutions needed to achieve technology breakthroughs that address the climate crisis and position America as the global leader in clean energy technology and clean energy jobs.”
On his first day in office, President Biden nixed the contract for the Keystone XL Pipeline, which would have transported over 800,000 barrels of oil per day from Alberta to refineries on the Texas Gulf Coast. He subsequently promised green energy jobs to the thousands of Americans who lost positions.
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Rep. Chip Roy (R-TX) tore into President Joe Biden during an interview on Friday over the administration’s push to go door-to-door to get as many Americans vaccinated as possible, saying that the administration needed to back off.
Roy told RealClearPolitics that his “dad had polio” and he grew up watching his dad “live a life ravaged” by that disease.
“I’m very pro-vaccine,” Roy said, adding that it was “a great blessing” that a vaccine ended polio and that he was “delighted” that the disease no longer impacted people.
“Likewise, I’m delighted there are millions of people who are able to avail themselves of a [coronavirus] vaccine that they believe, in their calculation, is good for them and their well-being,” he added. “That is great.”
“I’m just sick and God-darn tired of the left, and this government, dictating to me, frankly, anything at all,” Roy said. “Back the f- off. That’s my message to the White House.”
Roy predicted that the political left would “lose their ever-loving collective mind” and call him “an anti-vaxxer” when the truth is that he is “a big believer in freedom.”
The remarks come after President Joe Biden said this week, “We need to go to community-by-community, neighborhood-by-neighborhood and, often times, door-to-door, literally knocking on doors to get help to the remaining people protected from the virus.”
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said that the Biden administration would be sending “strike forces” into communities to get people vaccinated.
“We’re continuing to press to reach it and we will in the next couple of weeks for adults over the age of 18,” Psaki said. “But our work doesn’t stop there and we are going to continue to press to get 12 to 18 year-olds vaccinated, to continue to work with communities where there’s lower vaccination rates. That’s one of the reasons we initiated these strike forces to go into communities and work with them to determine what they need. To take a localized, specific approach that works with elected officials in communities.”
Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ), the chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, also slammed the Biden administration for the push. “Door-to-door vaccine checks on Americans are a blatant abuse of government authority and a pure power play by the Biden administration,” Biggs said. “The federal government has no right to track the private health information of Americans or to intimidate people into getting the vaccine.”
In a letter to the administration, Biggs said that the administration’s decision was “deeply disturbing and violates the privacy of Americans.”
Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) also called out the Biden administration on Twitter after Biden made his remarks.
“How about don’t knock on my door. You’re not my parents,” Crenshaw tweeted. “You’re the government. Make the vaccine available, and let people be free to choose. Why is that concept so hard for the left?”
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Committees of the Massachusetts state legislature have been busy in the past few weeks hearing in-state tuition, driver’s licenses and non-citizen voting bills that give significant new benefits to illegal aliens at the expense of the state’s citizens and legal immigrants. However, the committees have yet to vote on any of these bills.
In the past, similar bills have passed out of committee but have not been considered by the full Senate or House. While they would likely be vetoed by Governor Charlie Baker (R), the question remains whether the legislative chambers could muster the two-thirds supermajorities needed to override a veto.
In-State Tuition
On June 8, the Joint Committee on Higher Education considered Senate Bill (S.) 823 and House Bill (H.) 1352 that would extend in-state tuition rates at public colleges and universities in Massachusetts to illegal aliens. Right now, there is no uniform statewide policy, leaving the decision to individual schools. These bills would allow illegal aliens to qualify for the in-state rates if they’ve attended a Massachusetts high school for three years and either graduated or received a GED. The Senate bill would exempt the University of Massachusetts (UMass) Law School and Medical School from this requirement.
The committee also considered a bill, H. 1348, sponsored by Rep. Marc Lombardo (R-Billerica), that would ban public institutions of higher education statewide from providing in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens.
Providing in-state tuition would benefit illegal aliens tremendously. UMass Boston charges $14,697 for in-state students and $35,159 for out-of-state students for the 2021-2022 academic year. Even at Fitchburg State, one of the more reasonable schools for tuition, illegal aliens would be able to attend for $970, the in-state rate instead of paying $7,050, the cost for out-of-state students.
Newton resident Henry Barbaro of the Massachusetts Coalition for Immigration Reform and other opponents of illegal immigration testified in opposition. Barbaro called the idea unfair to American citizens and legal immigrants and asked, “[w]hy would anyone go through the bother of legally immigrating to Massachusetts when they can sidestep the process and gain the same benefits?”
Seventeen states currently grant in-state tuition to illegal aliens.
Driver’s Licenses
On June 23, the Joint Committee on Transportation considered two bills to authorize illegal aliens to receive Massachusetts driver’s licenses and ID cards, S. 2289 and H. 3456. The bills allow illegal aliens to provide a wide variety of documents to establish identity but the requirements are easily susceptible to fraud. Moreover, the bills prohibit the Registry of Motor Vehicles from keeping copies of these records, in order to prevent federal immigration authorities from accessing and using them.
A driver’s license is useful to create an appearance of lawful presence and serves as a virtual passport to the nation, opening many doors that would otherwise be unavailable. In addition to giving an individual the ability to travel freely throughout the country, it is also used for countless other purposes like registering to vote and applying for government benefits, as well as for establishing bank and credit card accounts.
Illegal aliens possessing driver’s licenses also pose a national security threat and frustrate the purposes of the REAL ID Act. Nineteen of the 9-11 hijackers had nearly thirty driver’s licenses between them.
Bristol County Sheriff Thomas Hodgson (R) has repeatedly testified against similar bills in previous sessions, including at a 2019 marathon hearing in the legislature’s largest hearing room, where he said “passing these bills will make it even easier for criminal illegal aliens to evade law enforcement and victimize law-abiding U.S. citizens and Massachusetts residents … Making illegal immigrants eligible for official Massachusetts driver’s licenses is not only wrong, but it’s reckless. It will have a negative effect on the public safety of the people of the commonwealth.”
House Minority Leader Bradley Jones (R-North Reading) likewise condemned the bills as “wrong policy” and “rewarding people that are here illegally.”
Supporters of the bills claim they now have momentum and the support of a majority of members in each chamber. However, they still do not appear to have a supermajority in either chamber which would be needed to override a veto.
Sixteen states and the District of Columbia grant driver’s licenses to illegal aliens, most recently joined by Virginia in 2020.
Non-Citizen Voting
Finally, also on June 23, the Joint Committee on Election Laws heard dozens of bills regarding elections, but most notably several that would allow non-citizen voting in local (but not state or federal) elections. From narrowest to broadest:
H. 832 by Rep. Lindsay Sabadosa (D-Northampton) would amend the Northampton city charter to allow for non-citizen voting for local elections in that city;
H. 828 by Rep. David Rogers (D-Cambridge) would create a process by which any city or town could adopt non-citizen voting for its local elections, without requiring further authorization from the legislature;
S. 465 by Sen Jamie Eldridge (D-Acton) and H. 770 by Rep. Mike Connolly (D-Cambridge) would allow non-citizen legal immigrants over 18 to vote in local elections in any city or town statewide.
A small handful of localities across the country have non-citizen voting for some local elections, and no state has a statewide mandate for it like in S. 465 and H. 770. Most recently, the Vermont legislature overrode Gov. Phil Scott’s vetoes of two bills that authorize non-citizen legal residents to vote in local elections in the cities of Montpelier and Winooski.
On Friday, President Joe Biden signed yet another executive order titled, “Executive Order on Promoting Competition in the American Economy.”
“Today, I’m going to be signing shortly the executive order promoting competition to lower prices, to increase wages and to take another critical step toward an economy that works for everybody,” Biden said at the White House.
“The heart of American capitalism is a simple idea: Open and fair competition. That means that if your companies want to win your business, they have to go out and they have to up their game,” Biden said. “Let me be very clear: Capitalism without competition isn’t capitalism. It’s exploitation.”
“Without healthy competition, big players can change and charge whatever they want and treat you however they want,” Biden continued. “And for too many Americans that means accepting a bad deal for things you can’t go without. So, we know we’ve got a problem, a major problem. But we also have an incredible opportunity.”
There are multiple policy areas laid out in the order.
“The order seeks to juice competition in broadband by encouraging the Federal Communications Commission to reintroduce a so-called ‘nutrition label’ for internet service providers that would give consumers more clear information about a provider’s services,” explained CNN. “It calls for the FCC to restrict early termination fees and to ban exclusivity deals that currently limit apartment buildings and other rental units to only one Internet provider.”
The order also directs the FCC to restore “net neutrality” rules imposed under the Obama administration “that would prohibit them from selectively blocking, slowing or speeding up websites.”
Looking to rein in Big Tech, the order also “establishes an administration-wide policy to scrutinize mergers more heavily, including completed mergers.”
“We have to get back to an economy that grows from the bottom up and the middle out,” Biden said. “The executive order I’m soon going to be signing commits the federal government to full and aggressive enforcement of our antitrust laws. No more tolerance for abusive actions by monopolies, no more bad mergers that lead to mass layoffs, higher prices, fewer options for workers and consumers alike.”
The order also includes the creation of new rules on data collection and the prohibition of “unfair competition in online marketplaces,” as well as pushing for the “right-to-repair” which would stop technology manufacturers from suing independent repair service providers.
“This order affirms that it is the policy of my Administration to enforce the antitrust laws to combat the excessive concentration of industry, the abuses of market power, and the harmful effects of monopoly and monopsony — especially as these issues arise in labor markets, agricultural markets, Internet platform industries, healthcare markets (including insurance, hospital, and prescription drug markets), repair markets, and United States markets directly affected by foreign cartel activity,” the order states. “It is also the policy of my Administration to enforce the antitrust laws to meet the challenges posed by new industries and technologies, including the rise of the dominant Internet platforms, especially as they stem from serial mergers, the acquisition of nascent competitors, the aggregation of data, unfair competition in attention markets, the surveillance of users, and the presence of network effects.”
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President Joe Biden’s administration has announced a federal initiative to bring back to the United States illegal aliens who were deported for committing crimes but who are the relatives of American service members, as well as Veterans and service members who were deported after committing crimes.
On July 4th weekend, Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas revealed the details of the initiative designed to bring back to the U.S. illegal alien service members, their illegal alien relatives, and Veterans who were deported after having committed crimes.
“The Department of Homeland Security recognizes the profound commitment and sacrifice that service members and their families have made to the United States of America,” Mayorkas said in a statement:
Together with our partner the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), we are committed to bringing back military service members, veterans, and their immediate family members who were unjustly removed and ensuring they receive the benefits to which they may be entitled. Today we are taking important steps to make that a reality. [Emphasis added]
DHS and the VA will work to identify deported Veterans who they say are potentially eligible for VA benefits and ensure that they, as well as their families, are provided any one of the coronavirus vaccines.
Mayorkas said he has directed U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) to review cases of “all eligible current and former” illegal alien service members and the immediate illegal alien relatives of service members who would be eligible under the initiative to return to the U.S.
“USCIS, ICE, and CBP will develop a rigorous, systematic approach to review the cases of individuals whose removals failed to live up to our highest values,” a DHS news release stated.
Mayorkas has billed the decades-long deportations of illegal alien Veterans, service members, and the family members of service members as “unjust removals” and is directing a DHS review of policies to prevent similar deportations in the future.
As Breitbart News reported, the Biden administration issued a DHS memo advising that illegal alien service members and their relatives should not, in most cases, be deported.
The initiative is part of a larger operation by the Biden administration to bring potentially hundreds of thousands of deported illegal aliens back to the U.S.
Last month, top DHS officials revealed to Congress that they are looking to bring potentially 35,000 deported illegal aliens back to the U.S. who were initially enrolled in the now-defunct “Remain in Mexico” program. In addition, the administration is reviewing thousands of cases of deported illegal aliens whom they claim may have been wrongly deported under former President Trump’s administration.
John Binder is a reporter for Breitbart News. Email him at jbinder@breitbart.com. Follow him on Twitter here.
A group of Texas sheriffs sued the Biden administration last week for restricting the authority of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to take and deport illegal immigrants.
Sheriffs from the border counties of Kinney, Edwards, McMullen, and Hudspeth in Texas along with an association of ICE officers accused the Biden administration of violating federal immigration law with its restrictions on ICE operations.
“As part of President Joe Biden’s pledge to take a more humane approach to immigration enforcement compared to the harsh policies of former President Donald Trump, the Biden administration issued a memo Feb. 18 directing ICE to focus on deporting immigrants who are national security or terrorist threats, gang members, those who have been convicted of certain aggravated felonies and any that entered the country after Nov. 1,” Courthouse News reports. “ICE officers who want to take into custody jailed immigrants falling outside those categories must first obtain approval from their bosses.”
The lawsuit states that the Biden administration’s action has blocked ICE agents from taking into custody illegal immigrants accused of crimes such as human trafficking and drug smuggling.
“Since the issuance of the February 18 Memorandum, ICE officers have been unable to take custody of, or issue detainer requests for, dangerous criminal aliens whose detention is mandated by the [Immigration and Nationality Act]. Specifically, detention is required for aliens who have committed or been convicted of numerous crimes other than aggravated felonies, such as: crimes of moral turpitude, crimes involving controlled substances, human trafficking, money laundering, and certain firearm offenses,” the lawsuit states.
In May, ICE officials told The Washington Post that Biden had “functionally abolished” the agency by restricting its operations so much. The Post reported at the time:
Under new Biden administration rules curtailing immigration enforcement, ICE carried out fewer than 3,000 deportations last month, the lowest level on record. The agency’s 6,000 officers currently average one arrest every two months.
ICE under President Biden is an agency on probation. The new administration has rejected calls from some Democrats to eliminate the agency entirely, but Biden has placed ICE deportation officers on a leash so tight that some say their work is being functionally abolished.
As ICE deportations have plummeted, the number of people entering the U.S. illegally has spiked under the Biden administration.
Biden tapped Vice President Kamala Harris in March to head the administration’s response to the border crisis. Since the announcement, Harris has faced a heavy criticism from officials in some border states as the border crisis continues. Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich called on Biden to fire Harris as the administration’s “border czar” in May.
“To date, her response to the border crisis has been absolutely abysmal, so I am requesting that she be replaced as your ‘border czar,’” Brnovich wrote in a letter. “We are not nearly 50 days into her appointment, and Vice President Harris has shown little interest in observing what is happening along the border and has failed to articulate any plan to deal with the devastating effects of this crisis.”
The White House has blamed the ongoing border crisis on former President Donald Trump, claiming its policies led to the surge in immigration that began after Biden won the election last year.
“After coming into office, our administration immediately jumped into action to address the influx of migrants at the border, something that began during and was exacerbated by the Trump administration,” White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said during a press conference May 4.
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Left-leaning immigration groups announced multiple legal offensives Wednesday against President Biden and his administration, suing to try to stop ICE movements of illegal immigrants in one case and demanding speedier action on admitting a refugee in another case.
The American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the ICE case, pointed out it was the group’s first immigration lawsuit against the new Biden team — after more than 400 lawsuits against the Trump administration.
The ACLU said it generally is getting more cooperation from Biden officials but said it will take on the new administration when it has to.
“Today’s suit is a challenge to a decision made by the Biden administration — it’s not a Trump holdover. True to form, we will sue any administration — Democrat or Republican — and hold them accountable when they take positions that violate civil liberties and civil rights,” said Anthony D. Romero, executive director of the ACLU. “This may be one of the first lawsuits filed against the Biden administration by advocacy groups, but I’m guessing it won’t be the last.”
The lawsuit says U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement is transferring detainees from a New Jersey facility to far-flung locations “in the Deep South,” leaving them far from their families and lawyers.
New Jersey offers lawyers for migrants fighting deportation, the ACLU said, so the decision to transfer them is particularly rough because it removes that free assistance.
The ACLU said it wants the potential deportees released back into New Jersey rather than held elsewhere.
The other legal challenge, which was filed last week but announced Wednesday by the International Refugee Assistance Project (IRAP), is demanding the government welcome a man who supported the U.S. military mission in Afghanistan for years but was denied a spot in a special visa program aimed at helping those who helped America.
IRAP says the man, identified only as “John Doe,” became a target of the Taliban for assisting the U.S.
To verify an application, the government usually tries to check in with the U.S. official who supervised the foreign worker to make sure the person’s account of assistance is true.
In the case of Mr. Doe, his supervisor had verified the help. But then the supervisor was kidnapped by insurgents, and the government ruled that the supervisor’s account could not be reverified.
“Mr. Doe’s life has been upended by his service to the United States; the least our government could do is decide his application in a lawful manner,” said Katie Austin, a lawyer at IRAP.
President Joe Biden ended his trip to Michigan with a trip to a local ice cream spot. He ordered vanilla ice cream with chocolate chips in a waffle cone –– and made sure to get two scoops. pic.twitter.com/ZmzdBouj46
President Joe Biden speaks in the East Room of the White House and White House press secretary Jen Psaki speaks during a briefing at the White House in Washington, D.C., on Friday. (Mandel Ngan – AFP / Getty Images)
Apparently, President Joe Biden’s disastrous fiscal policy starts at the top.
Forbes reported that the first-term price tag on Biden’s White House staff could exceed $200 million, making it the most expensive in history.
The outlet also noted that Biden has 190 more employees than his predecessor did at this point in their presidencies.
Adjusted for inflation, the Trump administration spent $164.3 million on personnel over four years, while the Obama administration spent $188.5 million over its first four years, according to Forbes.
With nearly 200 extra cooks in the kitchen — for a grand total of 567 — Biden’s White House has managed to drive up the cost of goods and services, sacrifice the country’s energy independence and surrender the southern border.
Even President Barack Obama employed fewer people at the White House, paying 487 staffers six months into his presidency.
Former President Donald Trump wasn’t known as a budget-obsessed chief executive. But the difference in less than six months is night and day. Trump did much more with much less.
If you look closely at the in-depth breakdown of staffers and their salaries, you might notice the same last name listed multiple times. That stands to reason.
Is President Biden’s White House staff too expensive?
As The Washington Post reported last month, some are concerned about a “pattern” of nepotism in Biden’s White House.
“At least five children of his top aides have secured coveted jobs in the new administration. They include two sons and a daughter of the White House counselor, the daughter of a deputy White House chief of staff and the daughter of the director of presidential personnel,” The Post noted.
The reported nepotism is no doubt costing Americans unnecessary cash while we’re facing a $3 trillion budget deficit by the end of the 2021 fiscal year.
Oh, and the current national debt is upwards of $28 trillion.
One White House position costing Americans big is that of press secretary Jen Psaki, who makes $180,000 annually — as do 21 other Biden staffers.
No sane administration would pay someone that much to argue about 16-cent hot dog savings with Fox News reporter Peter Doocy while gas prices are sky-high.
But this is no sane administration.
The White House is now spending more than ever to do less for the American people.
Analysts predict that President Biden’s American Families Plan would add 21 million Americans to federal benefit programs.
Writing for The Wall Street Journal, Hoover Institution fellows John F. Cogan and Daniel Heil unpacked their recent analysis, which discovered that the Biden administration’s $1.8 trillion omnibus bill would drastically expand the welfare state.
The federal government’s system of entitlements is the largest money-shuffling machine in human history, and President Biden intends to make it a lot bigger… For the first time in U.S. history — except possibly for the pandemic years 2020 and 2021, for which we don’t yet have data — more than half of working-age households would be on the entitlement rolls if the plan were enacted in its current form.
The academics note that families earning six figures would be eligible for generous handouts. Indeed, “most” of President Biden’s spending would benefit middle-income and upper-income households.
Two-parent households with two preschool-age children and incomes up to $130,000 would qualify for federal cash assistance for daycare. Single parents with two preschoolers and incomes up to $113,000 would qualify. And some families with incomes over $200,000 would be eligible for health-insurance subsidies. Other parts of the plan, such as paid leave and free community college, have no income limits at all.
Under the American Families Plan, 57% of all married-couple children would receive handouts, while over 80% of single-parent households would enter the entitlement rolls. Noting that the legislation has a number of “gimmicks” that hide the extent of its revenue proposals, the report forecasts that President Biden’s proposal would add $1 trillion to the federal deficit over the next decade.
Other economists have expressed similar concerns with the American Families Plan. Analysts from the Penn Wharton Budget Model — a nonpartisan think tank at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School that examines the impacts of major legislation — concluded that the American Families Plan would slow long-term economic growth.
By increasing income taxes for wealthier Americans, introducing $2.3 trillion in federal expenditures, and spending with borrowed money, the legislation would slash output by 0.4% within the next three decades. The bill would also decrease the capital stock — the total amount of machinery, buildings, and other productive equipment in the American economy — by 1.2% over the same period.
In essence, long-term economic growth would be hindered by greater demand for federal debt financing, which would cause investors to direct money into loans for the government rather than ventures in the private sector. Such a phenomenon would restrict innovation and productivity, inhibiting American economic vitality for decades to come.
Democrats now claiming it’s Republicans who want to defund the police is like an arsonist showing up at a fire and blaming the firemen, it’s like the Chinese blaming Americans for the Wuhan virus, and it’s like O.J. saying he's going to help find the real killer.
House Democrats have issued a budget proposal that includes a shocking slash to border enforcement, with a billion dollars slashed from Customs and Border Protection (CBP_, among other notable cuts.
Bloomberg Law reported Tuesday that House Democrats are pursuing even deeper cuts to the immigration enforcement budget than the Biden White House, which already proposed a significant reduction in CBP and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) funding levels.
The cuts appear in the House’s draft fiscal 2022 appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security, released this week.
Bloomberg Law reports that the Democrats want stiff cuts, largely to those departments charged with enforcing border regulations and handling illegal immigration, despite the record number of illegal immigrants encountered by Customs and Border Protection in April and May — jumps over already record levels.
If the draft legislation is passed, the “CBP would get $14.1 billion in net discretionary appropriations, almost a billion dollars less than the current fiscal year and a half-billion dollars less than the White House requested,” per Bloomberg, and the “U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement would get $1.55 million less than fiscal 2021, while U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services would get a $346.7 million increase, which would help address processing backlogs.”
The border wall would face the biggest cut. The measure, Bloomberg said, will “rescind more than $2 billion from prior year appropriations for border barrier construction; it proposes no funding for additional Border Patrol agents or the border wall.”
Border governor, Texas Republican Greg Abbott, has proposed filling the hole left by ending construction on a wall across the southern border by building a Texas “border barrier” on the American side of the Texas-Mexico border. Such a project would, theoretically, allow Texas to bypass restrictions against state authorities enforcing federal law; when an illegal immigrant jumped a Texas border-barrier, the state suggests, Texas officials could arrest that immigrant for trespass and other state-level crimes.
There are some increases in the proposed DHS budget.
“The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency would get an added $397.4 million,” Bloomberg notes, citing threats to key infrastructure following the Colonial Pipeline hack, and the “Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties would get $8.1 million more than fiscal 2021, $3.5 million more than White House requested.”
The GOP is already concerned that CBP is underfunded, particularly in light of an ongoing border crisis. In committee meetings earlier this month, House Republicans “grilled” DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over what they deemed a critical lack of funding for border protection amidst some of the highest rates of illegal immigration in two decades, per Fox News.
“Mayorkas was testifying at the House Homeland Security Committee about the Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 budget request for DHS, which he said would include $665 million in investments toward modernizing land ports of entry and $47 million to invest in detection capabilities in addition to investments in border surveillance technology,” the outlet reported.
Mayorkas was asked by Ranking Member John Katko, R-N.Y., if the request contains more hiring for more Border Patrol agents.
“It does not, we have vacancies now and we are focused on recruiting and hiring additional personnel,” Mayorkas responded.
Katko followed up by pointing to an “alarming” retirement rate among agents.
“We have a 21-year high in Border Patrol agents being pulled from all over the country to deal with the crisis at the border, and it seems to me it’d be a good time for us to contemplate pushing up Border Patrol,” he said.
CBP had more than 180,000 illegal immigrant encounters at the border last month. June numbers are expected out next week.
NEW – Biden: "If you think you need to have weapons to take on the government, you need F-15s and maybe some nuclear weapons."pic.twitter.com/PvQtbxbOjY
As a candidate, Joe Biden’s number one promise was to “unite” America. Yet in his first months as president, his number one priority has been to divide our country by race and gender at every turn.
There is no clearer example than the Biden administration’s new effort aimed at indoctrinating America’s schoolchildren with some of the most toxic and anti-American theories ever conceived. It is vital for Americans to understand what this initiative would do, what drives it and, most importantly, how we can stop it.
For decades, the America-blaming left has been relentlessly pushing a vision of America that casts our history, culture, traditions, and founding documents in the most negative possible light. Yet in recent years, this deeply unnatural effort has progressed from telling children that their history is evil to telling Americans that they are evil.
In classrooms across the nation, students are being subjected to a new curriculum designed to brainwash them with the ridiculous left-wing dogma known as “critical race theory.” The key fact about this twisted doctrine is that it is completely antithetical to everything that normal Americans of any color would wish to teach their children.
Instead of helping young people discover that America is the greatest, most tolerant, and most generous nation in history, it teaches them that America is systemically evil and that the hearts of our people are full of hatred and malice. Far from advancing the beautiful dream of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. — that our children should “not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character” — the left’s vile new theory preaches that judging people by the color of their skin is actually a good idea.
Teaching even one child these divisive messages would verge on psychological abuse. Indoctrinating generations of children with these extreme ideas is not just immoral — it is a program for national suicide. Yet that is exactly what the Biden administration endorsed recently in a rule published in the Federal Register aimed at inflicting a critical race theory-inspired curriculum on American schoolchildren.
The rule explicitly cites the New York Times’ discredited “1619 Project” as a motivation. The Times has described the goal of its endeavor as the “re-education” of the American people, and the project even includes a lesson plan that encourages students to practice “erasing” parts of the Declaration of Independence. The Biden rule also directly cites a left-wing activist and leading proponent of critical race theory whose textbook states, “The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination.”
This is what the Biden administration wants to teach America’s children.
The Department of Education rule stems from an executive order Biden signed on his first day in office. Biden’s order abolished the President’s Advisory 1776 Commission I created to honor America’s founding principles, and reversed an executive action I took to stop these depraved theories from being imposed upon federal employees in workforce training sessions.
Thankfully, most Americans oppose this insanity. The left has only gotten away with it until this point because not enough parents have been paying attention and speaking up. But that is quickly changing. From Loudoun County, Va., to Cupertino, Calif., parents are beginning to make their voices heard against the left-wing cultural revolution. What they need now is a plan to actually stop it.
Here are the reforms that every concerned parent in America should be demanding.
First, every state legislature should pass a ban on taxpayer dollars going to any school district or workplace that teaches critical race theory, which inherently violates existing anti-discrimination laws. Inspired by my executive order last year, Florida, Texas, North Carolina, Oklahoma and other states have already taken steps to pass such laws. It needs to happen everywhere — and Congress should seek to institute a federal ban through legislation as well.
Second, each state should create its own 1776 Commission to examine the public school curriculum and ensure that students are receiving a patriotic, pro-American education — not being taught that the United States is an evil nation.
Third, parents have a right to know exactly what is being taught to their children. Last year, many parents had the chance to routinely listen in on classes for the first time because of remote learning. As students return to the classroom, states need to pass laws requiring that all lesson plans have to be made available to parents — every handout, article, and reading should be posted on an online portal that allows parents to see what their kids are being taught. Furthermore, in many places, there are rules preventing students from recording what teachers say in class. States and school boards should establish a “Right to Record.”
Fourth, parents need to organize locally — in every school district in America — to eliminate “Action Civics” and other versions of the effort to contort traditional civics education into a vehicle for political indoctrination. The left’s new argument is that our “divisions” stem from a lack of “civics education” — a problem they intend to “fix” with lots of new taxpayer money and a redefinition of “civics” in schools, just as they are trying to redefine the meaning of “infrastructure.” Right now, Congress is working on a $1 billion bill known as the Civics Secures Democracy Act. No Republican should trust the Biden administration with a billion dollars to spend on such programs. Even worse, the legislation threatens to establish a de facto national curriculum for history and civics, effectively bribing states into adopting the left’s anti-American curriculum. It is Common Core all over again — but much more extreme. And like Common Core, parents must unite to stop this new federal power grab.
Fifth, any parent who objects to the material being taught to their child in public school should get an automatic voucher, empowering them to pick another school of their choice. The government has no right to brainwash students with controversial ideologies against their parents’ will.
Sixth, states need to take back control of their schools of education and credentialing bodies to ensure they are not churning out radicalized teachers. To be clear, the overwhelming majority of our nation’s teachers are some of the most selfless and wonderful people there are — but regrettably, many have graduated from extremely biased education schools and may not even be aware of the degree to which leftist ideology has permeated their curriculum. States should set up alternative credentialing bodies that can certify great teachers who know how to instill a sense of love for America. School districts can then make it a priority to hire teachers with these certifications, especially for English, history, and social studies roles. States could even set up their own versions of Teach for America to get passionate and patriotic young people into the classroom.
Finally, states need to break the tenure monopoly in public K-12 schools. Tenure was originally supposed to protect competent teachers from being subjected to undue political influence; it has turned into a mechanism to protect incompetent teachers who themselves wield undue political influence over our children. Educators who are alienating children from their own country should not be protected with lifelong tenure; they should be liberated to pursue a career as a political activist.
Make no mistake: The motive behind all of this left-wing lunacy is to discredit and eliminate the greatest obstacles to the fundamental transformation of America. To succeed with their extreme agenda, radicals know they must abolish our attachment to the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and most of all, Americans’ very identity as a free, proud, and self-governing people. The left knows that if they can dissolve our national memory and identity, they can gain the total political control they crave.
A nation is only as strong as its spirit. For our children, we must act before it is too late.
Donald Trump was the 45th president of the United States.
“He that takes truth for his guide, and duty for his end, may safely trust to God’s providence to lead him aright.” - Blaise Pascal. "There is but one straight course, and that is to seek truth and pursue it steadily" – George Washington letter to Edmund Randolph — 1795. We live in a “post-truth” world. According to the dictionary, “post-truth” means, “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” Simply put, we now live in a culture that seems to value experience and emotion more than truth. Truth will never go away no matter how hard one might wish. Going beyond the MSM idealogical opinion/bias and their low information tabloid reality show news with a distractional superficial focus on entertainment, sensationalism, emotionalism and activist reporting – this blogs goal is to, in some small way, put a plug in the broken dam of truth and save as many as possible from the consequences—temporal and eternal. "The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it." – George Orwell “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.” ― Soren Kierkegaard
