Jeanfromfillmore
02-22-2012, 12:14 PM
Treason in New Haven from the political left
When, five years ago, New Haven, under the administration of its mayor for life, John DeStefano, began issuing city identification cards to illegal aliens living in the city, it was portrayed as a practical solution to the federal government's failure to enforce immigration law. Advocates of the city ID cards argued that so many illegals had settled in New Haven that the city had to cope with them and they needed some official form of identification to do ordinary things like open bank accounts and interact with public services and police. Its advocates didn't mind that the city ID card program was much more than a way of coping - that it also profoundly facilitated and legitimized illegal immigration.
But now that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security plans to attempt some uniform enforcement of immigration law in Connecticut, DeStefano, the immigration law clinic at Yale University, and other supporters of the city ID card have dropped their disingenuous subtlety. At last they admit that they don't want any immigration law enforced.
Enforcement is to be attempted through what ICE calls its "Secure Communities" program, whereby arrest and fingerprint data collected by municipal police departments, which is already shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, will be forwarded by the FBI to immigration authorities, who, upon identifying someone who is in the country illegally, may ask the municipal police to detain him long enough for the immigration authorities to collect him.
Such a procedure, DeStefano and the Yalies say, is "dangerous and unconstitutional," will lead to racial profiling, will violate the instructions given by the mayor to the New Haven police not to help federal agencies enforce immigration law, and will "make New Haven less safe and less secure" by "undermining our police relationships with a significant part of the city's population."
But if the city can share arrest data with the FBI, why can't the FBI share it with another federal law-enforcement agency, ICE? How is mere information sharing necessarily racial profiling?
As for constitutionality, no court has enjoined the "Secure Communities" program, and the Constitution makes federal law "the supreme law of the land ... any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding."
And as for the relationship of the New Haven police with illegal aliens in the city, the mayor and his allies might as well complain that burglars shouldn't be arrested lest they become reluctant to inform against rapists.
Of course illegal entry into the country is not necessarily as bad as burglary. But the argument about undermining the relationship between the police and illegal aliens can be made only if one believes that illegal entry into the country is by itself no offense at all, regardless of federal law against it, and that local officials should refuse to assist enforcement of this particular law, as the New Haven police have been ordered not to. This is "nullification" and "interposition," the hoary treason usually heard from the crazy political right, from survivalists and "sovereign citizens" -- except that, in regard to illegal aliens, it comes from the political left. It is liberal nullification and interposition -- and it is advocated by something that considers itself a prestigious law school.
Governor Malloy's administration seems to realize that there's no legal problem with the "Secure Communities" program, just a political problem. That is, enforcement of immigration law is politically incorrect, at least in Connecticut's "sanctuary cities." So the Malloy administration is asking the feds to seek detainers only for illegals who are wanted in connection with serious crimes, and thus not to enforce immigration law just for its own sake.
The country is divided on illegal immigration -- between those, on one extreme, who want the tens of millions of illegals deported tomorrow because they drive down wages and consume government services while evading taxes and sending billions of dollars out of the country to support families back home, and those, on the other extreme, as in New Haven, who, believing themselves supremely humane, want no immigration enforcement at all and thus who want the United States to forfeit its right even to define itself as a country and thus to commit national suicide.
But the "Secure Communities" program won't be rounding up all illegals for deportation. At most it will be a small reminder that immigration law remains in force if only in principle and that illegals are illegals and thus are still taking their chances.
http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2012/02/22/news/doc4f450d7eb9c12526748283.txt?viewmode=2
When, five years ago, New Haven, under the administration of its mayor for life, John DeStefano, began issuing city identification cards to illegal aliens living in the city, it was portrayed as a practical solution to the federal government's failure to enforce immigration law. Advocates of the city ID cards argued that so many illegals had settled in New Haven that the city had to cope with them and they needed some official form of identification to do ordinary things like open bank accounts and interact with public services and police. Its advocates didn't mind that the city ID card program was much more than a way of coping - that it also profoundly facilitated and legitimized illegal immigration.
But now that the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security plans to attempt some uniform enforcement of immigration law in Connecticut, DeStefano, the immigration law clinic at Yale University, and other supporters of the city ID card have dropped their disingenuous subtlety. At last they admit that they don't want any immigration law enforced.
Enforcement is to be attempted through what ICE calls its "Secure Communities" program, whereby arrest and fingerprint data collected by municipal police departments, which is already shared with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, will be forwarded by the FBI to immigration authorities, who, upon identifying someone who is in the country illegally, may ask the municipal police to detain him long enough for the immigration authorities to collect him.
Such a procedure, DeStefano and the Yalies say, is "dangerous and unconstitutional," will lead to racial profiling, will violate the instructions given by the mayor to the New Haven police not to help federal agencies enforce immigration law, and will "make New Haven less safe and less secure" by "undermining our police relationships with a significant part of the city's population."
But if the city can share arrest data with the FBI, why can't the FBI share it with another federal law-enforcement agency, ICE? How is mere information sharing necessarily racial profiling?
As for constitutionality, no court has enjoined the "Secure Communities" program, and the Constitution makes federal law "the supreme law of the land ... any thing in the constitution or laws of any state to the contrary notwithstanding."
And as for the relationship of the New Haven police with illegal aliens in the city, the mayor and his allies might as well complain that burglars shouldn't be arrested lest they become reluctant to inform against rapists.
Of course illegal entry into the country is not necessarily as bad as burglary. But the argument about undermining the relationship between the police and illegal aliens can be made only if one believes that illegal entry into the country is by itself no offense at all, regardless of federal law against it, and that local officials should refuse to assist enforcement of this particular law, as the New Haven police have been ordered not to. This is "nullification" and "interposition," the hoary treason usually heard from the crazy political right, from survivalists and "sovereign citizens" -- except that, in regard to illegal aliens, it comes from the political left. It is liberal nullification and interposition -- and it is advocated by something that considers itself a prestigious law school.
Governor Malloy's administration seems to realize that there's no legal problem with the "Secure Communities" program, just a political problem. That is, enforcement of immigration law is politically incorrect, at least in Connecticut's "sanctuary cities." So the Malloy administration is asking the feds to seek detainers only for illegals who are wanted in connection with serious crimes, and thus not to enforce immigration law just for its own sake.
The country is divided on illegal immigration -- between those, on one extreme, who want the tens of millions of illegals deported tomorrow because they drive down wages and consume government services while evading taxes and sending billions of dollars out of the country to support families back home, and those, on the other extreme, as in New Haven, who, believing themselves supremely humane, want no immigration enforcement at all and thus who want the United States to forfeit its right even to define itself as a country and thus to commit national suicide.
But the "Secure Communities" program won't be rounding up all illegals for deportation. At most it will be a small reminder that immigration law remains in force if only in principle and that illegals are illegals and thus are still taking their chances.
http://www.nhregister.com/articles/2012/02/22/news/doc4f450d7eb9c12526748283.txt?viewmode=2