In his annual letter to JPMorgan Chase shareholders, Jamie Dimon, Wall Street’s longest-serving CEO, said, “We need to resolve immigration — it is tearing apart our body politic and damaging our economy.” Dimon believes immigration reform is “important both morally and economically.” I previously pointed out moral and economic failures in our current immigration policy, as well as how California (and America) cheats struggling human beings.
“We need to resolve immigration — it is tearing apart our body politic and damaging our economy.”
Dimon’s letter outlined principles he says most Americans share: border control, a path to citizenship for two million undocumented Dreamers, and improving the country’s merit-based immigration system. He also believes immigrants to our country should be taught “American history, our language and our principles.”
“People immigrating to this country should be taught American history, our language and our principles.”
Last Sunday, President Trump criticized illegal immigrant caravans moving through Mexico and called on Congress to pass strict border laws. This is the fifth year the group, Pueblo Sin Fronteras (Towns without Borders), has sponsored the caravan. Refugee caravans are “a movement made of people who were forced to flee their countries of origin due to persecution and violence.” Trump tweeted, “Border Patrol Agents are not allowed to properly do their job at the Border because of ridiculous liberal (Democrat) laws like Catch & Release. Getting more dangerous. ‘Caravans’ coming. Republicans must go to Nuclear Option to pass tough laws NOW. NO MORE DACA DEAL.”
Alex Mensing, a US collaborator who works for Pueblo Sin Fronteras, started in the city of Tapachula and borders Guatemala. The caravan of over 1,200 people is currently in Oaxaca, Mexico, about 420 miles from their starting point. Mensing said the migrants would turn themselves in to U.S. border officials and request asylum. More than fifty thousand people — 50,308 — were either apprehended or deemed inadmissible at the southwest border last month, U.S. Customs and Border Protection announced yesterday.
Reports about Dimon’s letter surfaced just a day after President Donald Trump signed a presidential order to send National Guard troops to secure the Mexican border. The Republican governor of Texas, Greg Abbott, supports the National Guard order from Washington. He pointed out Texas has continued a presence of National Guard members along the border since he took office.
Conversely, the Democratic governor of Oregon, Kate Brown, says she will resist any attempt by President Trump to deploy her state’s National Guard detachment to protect America’s southern border. Brown announced she had “no intention of allowing Oregon’s guard troops to be used to distract from his troubles in Washington.”
Presidents can call up National Guard units using two different legal authorities, both enacted by Congress in 1956. Trump invoked the weaker Title 32 law, which burdens governors to order the Guard to duty for Homeland Defense activities. Oregon’s governor and others can simply ignore his order entirely — or refuse it publicly.
Sources expect Democratic governor of California, Jerry Brown, to follow the Oregon governor’s lead, although California supported previous National Guard border operations — including George W. Bush’s deployment of 6,000 troops in 2006 and President Obama’s use of 1,200 four years later.
“We simply cannot allow people to pour into the United States undetected, undocumented, unchecked and circumventing the line of people who are waiting patiently, diligently and lawfully to become immigrants.” U.S. Senator Barack Obama
Over a Million Illegal Immigrant Drivers
The California Department of Motor Vehicles announced this week more than one million undocumented immigrants have received driver’s licenses. The Safe and Responsible Drivers Act first took effect in 2015 and the state awarded over 600,000 illegal immigrants licenses that year. An April 2017 study by PNAS, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, found positive results from the program. Offering undocumented immigrants a license did not increase the total number of accidents or occurrence of fatal accidents, while the program may have led to a reduction in the incidence of hit and run accidents. Authors concluded the controversial policy improved traffic safety and reduced costs for California drivers.
Today, along with California, there are about eleven other states, as well as Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, that allow undocumented immigrants to obtain driver’s licenses, although a Rasmussen poll last year showed 61 percent of Americans oppose driver’s licenses being given to people who are in the country illegally.
A 2017 Rasmussen poll found 61% of Americans are opposed to driver’s licenses being given to people in the country illegally
Ironically, undocumented immigrants were allowed to receive driver’s licenses throughout the U.S. until 1993, when California, under Republican Governor Pete Wilson, became the first state to restrict access. Some 45 other states followed suit.
REAL ID
As a result of jurisdictions giving current state driver’s licenses to immigrants in the U.S. illegally, American citizens in those locations must now pay for a new license or REAL ID, unless they have a valid U.S. passport, passport card, military ID or another form of Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) approved identification.
By October 1, 2020, the federal government will require a driver license or identification card be REAL ID compliant if the individual wishes to use it as identification to board a domestic flight or enter military bases and most federal facilities. California DMV began offering a federal compliant REAL ID driver license or ID card as an option to customers on January 22, 2018.
Finding Refuge in Sanctuary
As of July 2017, there is a patchwork of six states (California, Colorado, Illinois, New Mexico, Oregon and Vermont), and dozens of cities and counties that have adopted pro-immigrant policies inspired by the Sanctuary Movement. The City of San Francisco, for more than three decades, has announced itself as a safe haven for immigrants. Immigration advocates proudly refer to the locale as a “sanctuary city.”
A Harvard–Harris Poll found 80 percent of voters believe local authorities should comply with the law by reporting to federal agents the illegal immigrants with whom they come into contact.
San Francisco bans local police from helping federal authorities deport immigrants who came to the U.S. illegally. Leaders justify their actions as grounded in the spirit of America’s founding principles as a nation of immigrants. They claim sanctuary cities act as a protective shield and obstruct federal efforts to pinpoint and remove people at random.
The same Harvard–Harris Poll found 77 percent of voters expressed support for comprehensive immigration reform against only 23 percent who oppose.
In response, about November 2017, the Department of Justice warned sanctuary jurisdictions they will lose certain federal law enforcement grants if they prohibit officials from communicating with ICE; block ICE from interviewing jail inmates; or fail to notify ICE of the pending release of criminal aliens ICE is seeking to deport. The funding, part of Byrne Justice Assistance Grants, are the largest source of federal criminal justice funds for state, local and tribal authorities.
“The public wants honest immigrants treated fairly and those who commit crimes deported and that’s very clear from the data.” Mark Penn, Harvard–Harris
A Reuters analysis claims the “top 10 sanctuary cities in the U.S.” receive $2.27 billion in federal funding for programs ranging from public health services to early childhood education. The public rates cracking down on sanctuary cities as the most popular action, followed closely by an increase in border patrol, which is backed by 75 percent of voters. Trump’s plan to build a wall is the most divisive proposal with 53 percent of respondents opposing further construction.
Citizens Revolt
While the Department of Justice is suing California for refusing to cooperate with federal immigration enforcement, some California cities are mounting an attack from within. The City of Los Alamitos was first to announce they would support federal law over state regulations by drafting an ordinance allowing them to opt out of state-level sanctuary laws. Other cities in Orange and San Diego Counties are drafting similar exemptions of their own.
Supporters of the growing Citizen Revolt in California say government overregulation has hobbled rural industries and are infuriated by its liberal immigration laws.
I reported previously how California Northstate grows increasingly less like the rest of the Golden State. The vast, sparsely-populated region is more White, more rural and poorer than the rest of the state — and residents are more conservative. While California has become the center of the resistance to Trump, a number of Northern Californians are waging a resistance of their own: against California itself.
The LA Times reported on April 3rd the City of Huntington Beach voted to file a lawsuit against California and the state attorney general to challenge the legality of state mandates that expand protections for undocumented immigrants. City Attorney Michael Gates plans to file the suit this week after the City Council approved the action in a 6-1 vote. More than 100 speakers, including U.S. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Costa Mesa), vehemently spoke about undocumented immigrants and sanctuary cities.
A majority of the audience dressed in Make America Great Again memorabilia and chanted “USA, USA, USA.” Many draped American flags on their backs and held signs with messages such as “Build wall, deport them all” and “We love President Trump.”
Orange resident Gerald Thomas told how he and his family “paid our dues and waited in line” to become U.S. citizens after leaving the Philippines in 1972. “Nobody offered us sanctuary or an easier way. If I can do it, everyone who came here illegally can do it too,” Thomas said. “It’s a personal insult if they think they can bypass our laws.”
Democratic Hypocrisy
As a lifelong supporter of the Democratic party, I’m angry with leaders today, as Democrats champion the fight to protect Illegal Immigrants in America. Why? They want cheap labor. Slavery is prohibited, but Democrats offer shelter to poor, homeless, starving people if they will do the work Americans do not want to do. They even join with the worst Republican president in our lifetime, George W Bush, to enslave desperate people.
I’m not sure what happened to Democrats. In December 2005, U.S. Senator Barack Obama spoke to the nation on C-SPAN:
“We all agree on the need to better secure the border and punish employers who choose to hire illegal immigrants. We are a generous and welcoming people here in the United States but those who enter the country illegally and those who employ them disrespect the rule law. And they are showing disregard for those who are following the law. We simply cannot allow people to pour into the United States undetected, undocumented, unchecked and circumventing the line of people who are waiting patiently, diligently and lawfully to become immigrants.”
“We need strong border security at the borders but we also need a virtual border that is created by employers having to check to see if these people genuinely are legally in this country.”
The first Civil War in the U.S. was fought over states’ rights and demands by Democratic politicians to forcibly enslave a minority population to provide work for the economic interests of the powerful and privileged. It looks today as if the U.S.A. is on a path to a second Civil War — again over the rights of states to ignore directives from the federal government and maintain their interest in enslaving poor, minority workers.
Does this place Republican President Donald Trump in the same league as Republican President Abraham Lincoln? What are your thoughts? Please leave your comments below and be sure to FOLLOW ClearHeath Life Strategies. We provide News of the News You Wish You Knew.
https://www.c-span.org/video/?c4656370/sen-barack-obama-illegal-immigration
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