Nationalism – Page 155 – immigrationcourtside.com

HISTORY: Forgetting The Past — Italian-Americans Who Support Trump Have Forgotten How The Racist Slurs & Criminal Stereotypes Purveyed By Trump & His Nationalist Buddies Were Once Directed At Them!

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/06/02/opinion/illegal-immigration-italian-americans.html?em_pos=small&emc=edit_ty_20170602&nl=opinion-today&nl_art=9&nlid=79213886&ref=headline&te=1&referer=

Helene Stapinski writes in this NYT op-ed

“From 1906 to 1915, the year Vita died, Basilicata lost nearly 40 percent of its population to emigration. The Italian landowners — the same ones who raped and starved my relatives and maybe yours — were devastated by American emigration, left with too few hands to work their land.

The Italian government, initially happy to see its poorest and most troublesome people leave the country, realized that the best and strongest were now leaving as well, looking for a better life and higher wages. Before a United States congressional commission, a politician from Calabria testified that emigration from the South had gone too far, adding that he was sorry Columbus had ever discovered America.

The United States government used the theories of Cesare Lombroso, a 19th-century Northern Italian doctor, to stop more of his suffering, starving countrymen and women from immigrating.

Lombroso, a traitor to his own people, was convinced that there was such a thing as a “natural born criminal.” He measured the heads and body parts of thousands of fellow Italians — particularly Southerners — and came up with a description that matched the description of most of the immigrants coming over at the time: short, dark, hairy, big noses and ears.

He compared them to lower primates and said they were more likely to commit violent crimes when they arrived in the United States than immigrants from Germany, Norway, Austria, Sweden, England and every other European country.

Lombroso — and a growing sea of American nativists — branded the Southern Italians savages and rapists, blaming them for the crime that was on the rise in the United States.

The United States Immigration Commission concluded in the infamous 1911 Dillingham report: “Certain kinds of criminality are inherent in the Italian race. In the popular mind, crimes of personal violence, robbery, blackmail and extortion are peculiar to the people of Italy.”

The Immigration Act of 1924 barred most Italians from coming into the country — causing immigration from Italy to fall 90 percent. Even though the vast majority of those coming to America were good, honest working people and not criminals.

Italian-Americans who today support the president’s efforts to keep Muslims and Mexicans out of the country need to look into their own histories — and deep into their hearts. After all, they’re just a couple of generations removed from that same racism, hatred and abuse. Had our ancestors tried to come days, weeks or months after the 1924 ban, we may not have even been born.”

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Read the entire op-ed at the link.

Notwithstanding Trump and his White Nationalist gang (whose anti-American, anti-world efforts were on display this week), we are a nation of immigrants.

PWS

06-02-17

N. Rappaport Reviews Travel Ban Litigation For HuffPost!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/5929ff8ce4b08861ed0cca0e

Man, Nolan sure gets around in terms of different publications! And, he is both timely and highly relevant! Here, Nolan writes in HyuffPost:

“In April 2016, I wrote an article entitled, “If he is elected to the presidency, Donald Trump will have statutory authority to suspend the entry of all Muslim aliens.”

The article included a successful prediction of Trump’s temporary travel ban. But I failed to foresee that it would be rejected on the basis of his campaign statements, or that using campaign statements that way would put our country on the brink of a constitutional crisis.

. . . .

The campaign statements that Judge Gregory uses to justify his decision can be used again and again to attack anything Trump does that has a negative impact on a country with a large Muslim population.

If the Supreme Court does not reverse Judge Gregory’s decision, other courts will follow suit and President Trump ultimately will be faced with the constitutional crisis of not being able to meet his national security responsibilities as the Chief of the Executive Branch with respect to terrorism coming from Muslim countries unless he defies the orders of the Judicial Branch.”

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Read Nolan’s complete article on HuffPost at the above link!

I appreciate Nolan’s helpful summary of what has happened to date on the “Travel Ban” litigation. Nevertheless, I disagree with his conclusion that the President will not be able to “meet his national security responsibilities as Chief Executive.”

I have little doubt that if there were a legitimate “national security” crisis, the Federal Courts would give the Executive considerable discretion to operate. President Trump’s problem is that there is no obvious national security crisis at present. Therefore, his attack on nationals of predominantly Muslim countries seems to be out of bounds, and motivated by religious animus and a desire to fulfill campaign promises, rather than by any legitimate national security considerations.

FPWS

05-29-17

NYT Sunday Maggie: The “Deportation Resistance” In Trump’s America — Re-energized Or Outgunned? — The “country woke up in Arizona!”

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/23/magazine/is-it-possible-to-resist-deportation-in-trumps-america.html?em_pos=medium&emc=edit_ma_20170525&nl=magazine&nl_art=1&nlid=79213886&ref=headline&te=1&_r=0

Marcela Valdes writes:

“On Monday, Feb. 6, two days before Guadalupe García Aguilar made headlines as the first person deported under President Donald Trump’s new executive orders on immigration, she and her family drove to the modest stucco offices of Puente, an organization that represents undocumented immigrants. It was a postcard day: warm and dry, hovering around 70 degrees, the kind of winter afternoon that had long ago turned Phoenix into a magnet for American retirees and the younger, mostly Latin American immigrants who mulch their gardens and build their homes.
García Aguilar and her family — her husband and two children — squeezed together with four Puente staff members into the cramped little office that the group uses for private consultations. Carlos Garcia, Puente’s executive director, had bought a fresh pack of cigarettes right before the talk; he needed nicotine to carry him through the discomfort of telling García Aguilar that she would almost certainly be deported on Wednesday. Until that moment, she and her family had not wanted to believe that the executive orders Trump signed on Jan. 25 had made her expulsion a priority. She had been living in the United States for 22 years, since she was 14 years old; she was the mother of two American citizens; she had missed being eligible for DACA by just a few months. Suddenly, none of that counted anymore.
García Aguilar’s troubles with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) began in 2008, after police raided Golfland Sunsplash, the amusement park in Mesa, Ariz., where she worked. She spent three months in jail and three months in detention. (ICE booked her under the last name “García de Rayos.”) In 2013, an immigration court ordered her removal. Yet under pressure from Puente, which ultimately filed a class-action lawsuit contending that Maricopa County’s work-site raids were unconstitutional, ICE allowed García Aguilar (and dozens of others) to remain in Arizona under what is known as an order of supervision. ICE could stay her removal because the Obama administration’s guidelines for the agency specified terrorists and violent criminals as priorities for deportation. But Trump’s January orders effectively vacated those guidelines; one order specifically instructed that “aliens ordered removed from the United States are promptly removed.” García Aguilar, who had a felony for using a fabricated Social Security number, was unlikely to be spared.
Orders of supervision are similar to parole; undocumented immigrants who have them must appear before ICE officers periodically for “check-ins.” García Aguilar’s next check-in was scheduled for Wednesday, Feb. 8. She had three options, Garcia explained. She could appear as usual and hope for the best. She could try to hide. Or she could put up a fight, either from a place of sanctuary or by appearing for her check-in amid media coverage that Puente would organize on her behalf. Whatever she decided, he said, she would be wise to spend Tuesday preparing for separation from her children.
The family was devastated. García Aguilar left the meeting red-faced with tears.
The next day a dozen activists gathered at Puente to strategize for García Aguilar’s case. After reviewing the logistics for the usual public maneuvers — Facebook post, news release, online petition, sidewalk rally, Twitter hashtag, phone campaign — they debated the pros and cons of using civil disobedience. In the final years of the Obama administration, activists in Arizona had come to rely on “C.D.,” as they called it, to make their dissatisfaction known. Puente members had blocked roads and chained themselves in front of the entrance to Phoenix’s Fourth Avenue Jail. Yet Francisca Porchas, one of Puente’s organizers, worried about setting an unrealistic precedent with its membership. “For Lupita we go cray-cray and then everyone expects that,” she said. What would they do if Puente members wanted them to risk arrest every time one of them had a check-in?
Ernesto Lopez argued that they needed to take advantage of this rare opportunity. A week earlier, thousands of people had swarmed airports around the country to protest the executive order barring citizens from seven Muslim-majority nations. “There’s been a lot of conversation about the ban, but for everything else it’s dead,” Lopez said. “Nobody is talking about people getting deported. In a couple of months, it won’t be possible to get that media attention.”
Garcia wasn’t sure a rally for García Aguilar would work. “We’re literally in survival mode,” Garcia told me that week. It was too early to tell how ICE would behave under Trump, but they were braced for the worst. Nobody had a long-term plan yet. Even as he and his staff moved to organize the news conference, his mind kept running through the possibilities: Would it help García Aguilar stay with her family? Would it snowball into an airport-style protest? Would it cause ICE to double down on her deportation? He decided it was worth trying.
Shortly before noon on Wednesday, García Aguilar and her lawyer, Ray Ybarra Maldonado, entered ICE’s field office as supporters chanted “No está sola!” (You are not alone!) behind her. Telemundo, Univision and ABC shot footage. Supporters posted their own videos on Twitter and Facebook. ICE security warily eyed the scene. An hour later, Ybarra Maldonado exited ICE alone. García Aguilar had been taken into custody. All around the tree-shaded patio adjacent to ICE’s building, Puente members teared up, imagining the same dark future for themselves. Ybarra Maldonado filed a stay of deportation, and Porchas told everyone to come back later for a candlelight vigil.
That night a handful of protesters tried to block several vans as they sped from the building’s side exit. More protesters came running from an ICE decoy bus that had initially distracted those attending the vigil out front. Manuel Saldaña, an Army veteran who did two tours in Afghanistan, planted himself on the ground next to one van’s front tire, wrapping his arms and legs around the wheel. The driver looked incredulous; if he moved the van forward now, he would break one of Saldaña’s legs. Peering through the van windows with cellphone flashlights, protesters found García Aguilar sitting in handcuffs. The crowd doubled in size. “Those shifty [expletive],” Ybarra Maldonado said as he stared at the van. ICE, he said, had never notified him that her stay of deportation had been denied.
Four hours later, García Aguilar was gone. After the Phoenix Police arrested seven people and dispersed the crowd, ICE took her to Nogales, Mexico. By then images of García Aguilar and the protest were already all over television and social media. She and her children became celebrities within the immigrant rights movement. Carlos Garcia, who was with her in Nogales, told me that Mexican officials stalked her hotel, hoping to snag a photo. “Everyone wanted to be the one to help her,” he said. “Everyone wanted a piece.” Later that month, her children — Jacqueline, 14, and Angel, 16 — sat in the audience of Trump’s first address to Congress, guests of two Democratic representatives from Arizona, Raúl Grijalva and Ruben Gallego.
During the Obama years, most immigrant rights organizations focused on big, idealistic legislation: the Dream Act and comprehensive immigration reform, neither of which ever made it through Congress. But Puente kept its focus on front-line battles against police-ICE collaboration. For Garcia, who was undocumented until a stepfather adopted him at 16, the most important thing is simply to contest all deportations, without exception. He estimates that Puente has had a hand in stopping about 300 deportations in Arizona since 2012.
Ever since Arizona passed Senate Bill 1070, one of the toughest anti-undocumented bills ever signed into law, the state has been known for pioneering the kind of draconian tactics that the Trump administration is now turning into federal policy. But if Arizona has been a testing ground for the nativist agenda, it has also been an incubator for resistance to it. Among the state’s many immigrant rights groups, Puente stands out as the most seasoned and most confrontational. In the weeks and months following Election Day 2016 — as progressive groups suddenly found themselves on defense, struggling to figure out how to handle America’s new political landscape — Garcia was inundated with calls for advice. He flew around the country for training sessions with field organizers, strategy meetings with lawyers and policy experts and an off-the-record round table with Senators Dick Durbin and Bernie Sanders in Washington. A soft-spoken man with a stoic demeanor and a long, black ponytail, Garcia was also stunned by Trump’s victory. But organizers in Phoenix had one clear advantage. “All the scary things that folks are talking about,” he told me, “we’ve seen before.” On Nov. 9, he likes to say, the country woke up in Arizona.”

. . . .

On May 3, the day Arreola was to have been deported, Arreola and Andiola gathered with friends, family and supporters for a prayer breakfast at the First Congregational United Church of Christ in Phoenix, which had offered to house Arreola if she chose sanctuary. Pastor James Pennington had been active in the fight for gay rights. The patio of First Congregational was decorated with several flags, including a rainbow flag, an Arizona state flag and an American flag. Inside the church, members of Puente and former members of ADAC formed a circle with several non-Hispanics who had only recently allied themselves with the undocumented. Standing together they recited Psalm 30 in Spanish:

Te ensalzaré, oh Señor, porque me has elevado, y no has permitido que mis enemigos se rían de mi.

I’ll praise you, Lord, because you’ve lifted me up. You haven’t let my enemies laugh at me.

Yet their enemies remained hard at work. A week later, Marco Tulio Coss Ponce, who had been living in Arizona under an order of supervision since 2013, appeared at ICE’s field office in Phoenix with his lawyer, Ravindar Arora, for a check-in. ICE officers, Arora said, knew that Coss Ponce was about to file an application for asylum — several of his relatives had been recently killed or threatened by the Sinaloa cartel in Mexico — and they had assured Arora several times that Coss Ponce would not be removed. They said he simply needed to wear an ankle monitor to make sure he didn’t disappear. The fitting was delayed several times until finally Arora had to leave to argue a case in court. After he departed, ICE officers handcuffed Coss Ponce and put him in a van, alone. Three hours later, he was in Nogales.”

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Read the entire, very lengthy but worthwhile, article at the link.

Wow, can’t help but think “what if” all the energy, emotion, and activity on both sides of the immigration issue were re-directed at working together to “make America greater,” rather than engaging in a dangerous, counterproductive “grown up” game of hide and seek aimed at intimidating and removing productive members of American society who aren’t causing anyone any particular harm!

I’ve got some bad news for “the enforcers.” The U.S. families of most of the deportees aren’t going anywhere. And, there will be a steep price to pay in future generations for intentionally alienating some of America’s “best and brightest,” and our hope for the future as a nation.

Actions have consequences. Hate and disrespect aren’t quickly forgotten. Witness that even today, more than a century after the event, we’re still struggling as a nation with the misguided and hateful cause that created the short-lived “Confederate States of America,” killed hundreds of thousands of Americans of all races, and ruined millions of lives.

Something to think about on Memorial Day.

PWS

05-29-17

Colbert King Op-Ed In WashPost: Terror Threat On The Right!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-us-has-a-homegrown-terrorist-problem–and-its-coming-from-the-right/2017/05/26/10d88bba-4197-11e7-9869-bac8b446820a_story.html

King writes:

“As the Anti-Defamation League noted in a new report, “A Dark & Constant Rage: 25 Years of Right-Wing Terrorism in the United States,” the United States has experienced a long string of terrorist incidents, with many connected not to Islamist terrorists but to right-wing extremists.

The findings were startling.

The ADL analyzed 150 terrorist acts in the United States that were committed, attempted or plotted by right-wing extremists. “More than 800 people were killed or injured in these attacks,” the ADL said, noting that the attacks “surged during the mid-to-late 1990s and again starting in 2009” — the beginning of Barack Obama’s presidency.

The also looked at other acts of violence and determined that “from 2007 to 2016, a range of domestic extremists of all kinds were responsible for the deaths of at least 372 people across the country. Seventy-four percent of these murders came at the hands of right-wing extremists such as white supremacists, sovereign citizens and militia adherents.”

And, reported the ADL, the hate and terror mongers choose their marks carefully: Jews, Muslims and — the most common racial target — African Americans.

According to The Post, a study by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism at California State University at San Bernardino showed an overall increase of 13 percent in hate crimes reported, with 1,812 incidents reported in 2016 — the year of our nasty, hate-filled presidential race.
So how about pivoting from Saudi Arabia to turn White House attention to our own homegrown terrorist problem? After all, right-wing extremism may be the predicate that led a hate-filled white student to pick up a knife in the middle of spring commencement celebrations and stab an innocent and promising young man of color to death.

Surely that is worth a presidential thought or two.

Manchester has prompted elevation of Britain’s threat level to its highest.

In light of Richard Collins’s murder, the discovery of a noose in a fraternity house this month, as well as white supremacist fliers posted on campus earlier this year, where is the University of Maryland’s threat level? How about America’s?

After all, haters seem emboldened as never before.”

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Read King’s entire op-ed at the link.

Food for thought, particularly in our gun-fueled society.

PWS

05-29-17

HISTORY: Paul Fanlund In Madison Cap Times: How We Got From Nixon To Trump!

http://host.madison.com/ct/opinion/column/paul_fanlund/paul-fanlund-so-why-can-t-america-just-be-good/article_e8734a95-ed8b-5544-a32f-f5ee791264a3.html#tncms-source=behavioral

Fanlund writes in an op-ed:

“When Roger Ailes died, essays about him ranged from adoring to vilifying. As creator of Fox News, he was perhaps the nation’s most influential political messenger — or propagandist — of the past 50 years.

One aspect of any honest obituary, of course, was his misogyny. Ailes was finally forced out at Fox in 2016 after years of sexual harassing women employees. His 17-year-old son threatened his father’s accusers at the funeral, warning mourners that he wanted “all the people who betrayed my father to know that I’m coming after them, and hell is coming with me.”

But what I found most interesting in immersing myself in analyses of Ailes’ life was how little his craft had to do with liberal versus conservative ideology.

Rather, Ailes was perhaps the master of the dark art of inventing and relentlessly reinforcing hateful caricatures of political opponents — in his case, people of color, bureaucrats, university professors and, of course, the media.

His brilliant execution of that art culminated in Donald Trump.

Ailes, as is widely known, learned from Richard Nixon, for whom he worked as a young television consultant. Nixon launched his political career much earlier by championing “forgotten Americans,” lunch-pail-toting working men whose fortunes, in Nixon’s telling, were stymied by taxes and regulations imposed upon them by far-away elites.

The rest, as they say, is history. Nixon appealed to his “silent majority” to stand against anti-war and civil rights protesters. Democrats opened the floodgates to Republican demagoguery by advancing civil rights. The GOP today has broadened its pool of villains to include Latino and Muslim immigrants.

The 1980s brought jolly Ronald Reagan with his fantastical stories about welfare queens, followed by George H.W. Bush’s law and order and patriotism themes, and so on.

“Individual issues would come and go — acid, amnesty and abortion in 1972, and immigration, political correctness and transgender bathrooms in 2016 — but the attacks on liberals as elite, out of touch and protective of the ‘wrong people’ came from the same playbook,” wrote David Greenberg, a Rutgers professor of history and journalism, in a New York Times op-ed on Ailes.

OK, but why does it always work?

Why are so many — especially older, white, middle-class people — so susceptible to this toxic narrative when it is clear that the trickle-down GOP policies that follow do them so little good?

Maybe, I theorize, it has something to do with how we were all taught.

I’ve talked with many friends about the flag-waving jingoism of our pre-college education, in which our nation was portrayed as perfect, our leaders without fault.

My formal education began when Dwight Eisenhower was president, an era of unfettered national pride. We were a paragon of liberty and justice and never fought in unjust wars. It was as if someone decided that American children could not process the slightest balance or shade of gray.

In this frame, Andrew Jackson was, as Trump likes to say, a glorious “swashbuckler” like himself, not a president who drove Native Americans from their homes, killing thousands in the process. Nor were we ever taught that Jackson, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson and other forefathers owned slaves.

It seems the goal was always to convey “American exceptionalism,” or, more bluntly, reinforce a cultish sense of American superiority.”

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Fanlund’s entire op-ed, at the above link, is well worth a read!

Lots of folks don’t like it when we put US history in perspective. For example, during the “glory days” of my childhood in the 1950’s millions of African Americans throughout the nation, and particularly in the South, were deprived of the basic rights of US citizenship. This was notwithstanding the clear dictates of the 14th Amendment, which had been added nearly a century earlier.

The US and many state governments merely decided not to enforce the law of the land. So much for all of the “rule of law” and “nation of laws” malarkey purveyed by right wingers today.

Indeed, many southern states enacted discriminatory laws that were directly contrary to the 14th Amendment. And, amazingly, for the majority of the 19th and 20th Centuries, courts of law at all levels were complicit in enforcing these unconstitutional laws and ignoring the14th Amendment!

PWS

05-26-17

THE HUMAN TOLL OF IMMIGRATION DETENTION: Mother Attempts Suicide After 6 Months In Texas “Family Detention Centers!”

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mother-family-detention-suicide-attempt_us_59271267e4b062f96a34da5c?45b

Roque Planas reports in HuffPost:

“AUSTIN, Texas ― A woman locked at a family immigrant detention center tried to take her own life this month in what legal advocates described as a desperate effort to free her two kids.

Samira Hakimi, an Afghan national, has spent the last six months detained with her two young children despite a federal ruling that dictates they should have been released within three weeks. The case reinforces the longstanding concerns of immigrant rights groups that say asylum-seeking families should not be forced into prolonged detention.

“They told us you will only be a couple of days in there,” Hakimi told HuffPost. “I never thought that I would be detained here for such a long time. That I’m detained here because I’m from Afghanistan and that’s all. But I’m human.”

In Afghanistan, the Hakimi family had established a high school and multi-branch private university that used Western curricula, taught in both English and Dari and offered more than half its scholarships to women, according to lawyers representing Hakimi and her husband.

Since 2013, the Taliban repeatedly threatened the family for its work. To avoid the danger of commuting, the family moved onto the university campus and contracted private security guards that year.

It wasn’t enough for them to feel safe. “We could not go outside,” Hakimi said. “My children could not go to school. We thought they might be kidnapped. This was always in our minds…. They have their lives to live. They should live happy and free from every small thing, going to school and enjoying their lives.”

Last year, they fled Afghanistan with Hakimi’s brother-in-law and his pregnant wife, who were facing similar threats.

In December, the two families crossed into the United States from Mexico through a legal port of entry, where they all asked for asylum. The men were separated and sent to all-male immigrant detention centers, where they remain. Hakimi and her kids, as well as her sister-in-law and her newborn baby, were sent to the South Texas Family Detention Center in the town of Dilley and later transferred to the Karnes County Residential Center outside San Antonio.

Hakimi passed her “credible fear” interview ― the first step toward applying for asylum. It’s common practice for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to free people who pass these interviews so they can pursue their cases in immigration court, but ICE declined to release her and her children. The agency did not respond to a request for comment explaining why it refuses to release them. Hakimi’s sister-in-law is also still at Karnes with her 10-month-old baby.
DREW ANTHONY SMITH VIA GETTY IMAGES
The Karnes County Residential Center houses mothers who enter the United States with their children. Most of them seek asylum or other forms of humanitarian exemption from deportation.
Hakimi told HuffPost she had suffered from bouts of clinical depression before being detained. Advocates with RAICES, a nonprofit that provides legal services to detained families, say she had attempted suicide in the past and told medical workers at Karnes that her condition had worsened as her case appeared to stall. Neither medicine nor therapy would alleviate the problem, she argued. Her depression stemmed from remaining locked up in the detention center with her children.

As the months dragged on, she lost hope. “Here, no one talks to us,” Hakimi said. “They don’t give us the reason why I’m detained in here. I never thought that I would be detained here for such a long time.”

Her son came to her one day asking her why other families were allowed to leave but not them. “That was really triggering her,” Amy Fisher, RAICES’s policy director, told HuffPost. “She was crying and really depressed. And she went into this thought process, when she was really low, thinking, ‘Well, if I’m no longer here, maybe my children can be free.’” Kids cannot be held without their parents or guardians in family detention.

After she made an effort to take her own life, she woke up in the medical unit of the detention center and was taken to a nearby hospital, where two members of the detention center staff sat with her continuously.

“I told them, ‘I’m just crying for my children, please,’” she said in a recording with one of her legal providers. “I’m not sick. But they gave me medicine. And they told me take this every four hours, but I didn’t take it anymore.”

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Read the full story at the link.

Don’t think that a few (or even many) attempted suicides or preventable deaths in immigration detention are going to change the Administration’s plans to establish an “American Gulag.” After all, what better “deterrent” than death to put a dent in migration.

No, the only thing that might get in the way is if Democrats start winning elections and wielding some political power in Washington. (Not that Democrats have been particularly enlightened when it comes to immigration detention, either. After all, Dilley, Karnes, Berks County, and other “family residential prisons” were Obama initiatives. But, that’s another story.)

But, as I just pointed out in an earlier blog, Dems appear lost in the political wilderness with no path out.

PWS

05-26-16

POLITICS: Dems Fail Again To Make A Dent — GOP Wins Montana House Seat N/W/S Candidate’s Pending Assault Charge!

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/25/us/montana-special-election.html?emc=edit_nn_20170526&nl=morning-briefing&nlid=79213886&te=1

The NY Times reports:

“BOZEMAN, Mont. — Greg Gianforte, a wealthy Montana Republican who was charged with assaulting a reporter on Wednesday, nonetheless won the state’s lone seat in the House of Representatives on Thursday, according to The Associated Press, in a special election held up as a test of the country’s political climate.

Mr. Gianforte, 56, was widely seen as a favorite to win against Rob Quist, a Democrat and country music singer. But he seemed to imperil his own candidacy in the final hours of the race after he manhandled a journalist for The Guardian.

Addressing the altercation for the first time late Thursday night, Mr. Gianforte apologized to the Guardian reporter, Ben Jacobs, by name, acknowledged he “made a mistake” and vowed to the state’s voters that he would not embarrass them again.

“You deserve a congressman who stays out of the limelight and just gets the job done,” he said to a group of supporters at a hotel in Bozeman, who repeatedly yelled out that they forgave him.

Voters here shrugged off the episode and handed Republicans a convincing victory. Mr. Gianforte took slightly more than 50 percent of the vote to about 44 percent for Mr. Quist. (President Trump won Montana by about 20 percentage points.) Mr. Gianforte’s success underscored the limitations of the Democrats’ strategy of highlighting the House’s health insurance overhaul and relying on liberal anger toward the president, at least in red-leaning states.”

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Forget all the Trump hoopla, public opinion polls, marches, demonstrations, town halls, court cases, Russia, and the GOP’s cruelty, deception, and proven inability to govern. None of it appears to make any difference to the folks who count: voters!

There is no reason to believe that if the national election were held today, the results would be any different from November 2016: a GOP win at all levels.

Dems need 1) some dynamic leadership (sorely lacking since the departure of Obama from the national scene), and 2) a program that appeals to voters, at least some of whom pulled the lever for Trump.

The 2016 mistake was running a campaign based almost entirely on the strategy that Trump and the GOP would “self-destruct.” Didn’t work then, and it’s not working now.

How are Democrats, in the few areas of the country they control, improving things for the majority of folks, where the GOP isn’t? How could this be extended to “red areas?” How can immigrants actually create better economic opportunities for folks in red states and rural areas? Democrats need real life results, not just “wonkie” charts, statistics, and articles. How are Democrats going to get the message to folks who get their news from Fox, Breitbart, and their local GOP Representative’s newsletter?

Unless somebody is thinking creatively about the foregoing issues, it’s going to be a long four (or eight) years for Democrats and our country.

PWS

05-26-16

Fox, Breitbart, and

Noah Feldman In Bloomberg View: 4th Circuit’s Stunning Rebuke Of Trump — Court Basically Calls Prez A Liar!

https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2017-05-25/court-essentially-says-trump-lied-about-travel-ban

Feldman writes:

“In a remarkable 10-to-3 decision, a federal appeals court on Thursday affirmed the freeze on the second iteration of President Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration from six majority Muslim countries. The court said that national security “is not the true reason” for the order, despite Trump’s insistence to the contrary. It’s extraordinary for a federal court to tell the president directly that he’s lying; I certainly can’t think of any other examples in my lifetime.

The decision and the breakdown of the judges voting against the ban — which includes Republican appointees — presages defeat for the executive order in the U.S. Supreme Court, should the Trump administration decide to seek review there. Faced with this degree of repudiation from the federal judiciary, Trump would be well advised not to go to the Supreme Court at all.

The decision for the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals was written by Chief Judge Roger Gregory, who has the distinction of having been appointed to the court first by Bill Clinton, in a recess appointment that would have expired, and then by George W. Bush — a reminder of bipartisanship in the judicial nomination process that seems almost inconceivable today.

Gregory’s opinion had three basic parts, of which the middle one was the most important.

First, Gregory found that the plaintiffs in the case had standing to challenge the executive order as a violation of the First Amendment’s establishment clause. He pointed out that under the “endorsement test” first offered by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, the establishment clause is violated when the government sends a message to some people that they are insiders, favored members of the political community, or a message to others that they are outsiders, disfavored as citizens.

In O’Connor’s analysis, feelings count. As the 4th Circuit put it in the passage quoted by Gregory, “feelings of marginalization and exclusion are cognizable forms of injury” under the endorsement test. Thus, Muslim plaintiffs who alleged that they experienced a sense of exclusion and harm have the constitutional right to bring a lawsuit. 1

Although the 4th Circuit dissenters objected plausibly that this reliance on emotional experience would allow anyone “who develops negative feelings” to bring an establishment clause case, their objection isn’t really to Gregory’s reasoning, but to the endorsement test itself. And that’s part of constitutional doctrine.

That led Gregory to the heart of his opinion — and the condemnation of Trump as a liar. The strongest legal argument available to the Trump administration was based on a 1972 Supreme Court case called Kleindienst v. Mandel.

In the Mandel case, immigration authorities denied a visa to a Belgian Marxist who had been invited to give lectures in the U.S. The professors who invited him argued that his exclusion violated the freedom of speech.

The Supreme Court denied the claim, stating that when the executive branch excludes a noncitizen from the country “on the basis of a facially legitimate and bona fide reason,” the courts would not “look behind the exercise of that discretion.” That holding looked pretty good for the Trump executive order, which on its face asserts a national security interest in denying visas to people from the six majority Muslim countries.

Here’s where the opinion got personal. Gregory acknowledged that the executive order was “facially legitimate.” But, he said, “bona fide” literally means “in good faith.”

And here, he reasoned, the plaintiffs had provided “ample evidence that national security is not the true reason” for the order. That evidence, the court said, came mostly from Trump himself, in the form of his “numerous campaign statements expressing animus towards the Islamic faith.”

This was really the punchline of the opinion: Trump’s own statements show that he lied when he said the purpose of the executive order was national security. Once that conclusion was on the table, Gregory easily went on to show that such animus violated the establishment clause by sending a message to Muslims that they are outsiders in the political community.

One other George W. Bush nominee, Judge Allyson Duncan, joined the opinion. The three dissents came from Judge Paul Niemeyer, appointed by George H.W. Bush, and two court’s two other George W. Bush nominees. Thus, the breakdown was mostly partisan.

As a result, it’s plausible that Trump might get a few votes for the executive order at the Supreme Court. But he isn’t going to win. Justice Anthony Kennedy will be moved by the argument that the executive order was adopted in bad faith. And even conservative Justice Samuel Alito is likely to be unsympathetic, given his strong record as a defender of religious liberty.
Trump’s lawyers should be telling him right now that it would be a mistake for him to seek Supreme Court review. Not only is he likely to lose, he is likely to lose in a way that undermines his legitimacy and credibility. But it’s doubtful whether he will listen. If Trump had been listening to his lawyers, he wouldn’t be in the situation he’s in now, where the judiciary is telling him to his face that he has bad faith.”

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I’m not even sure the Supremes will take this case.

First, it’s in an odd procedural posture of a preliminary injunction. No trial has ever been held.

Second, the “urgency” — which was fake anyway — clearly doesn’t exist.

Third, there is no Circuit split that needs to be resolved.

On the other hand, it is an interesting constitutional/separation of powers issue, and the Court is now back to “full strength.”

Trump and Sessions would be well advised at this point to heed the advice of the “Supreme Court pros” in the Solicitor General’s Office. But, based on performance to date, that’s unlikely to happen.

PWS

05-25-17

Lisa Rosenberg: Trump Administration’s Misinformation Campaign Targets Immigrants!

http://augustafreepress.com/trump-administration-using-campaign-disinformation-secrecy-target-immigrants/

Rosenberg writes in the Augusta (VA) Free Press:

“The Trump administration has yet to break ground for its promised border wall to keep the undocumented out of the United States, but by embarking on a campaign of misinformation and secrecy, it is rapidly moving forward with efforts to target and deport immigrants already here.
To advance the false narrative that the undocumented community includes an outsized and particularly dangerous set of criminals, the Administration ignores data that shows that high rates of immigration actually coincide with reduced crime rates, and that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than those born in the United States. As Alex Nowrasteh of the libertarian Cato Institute noted, “It is absurd to highlight the crimes committed by a small group of people without reporting on the crimes committed by everybody.” The misleading use of crime data not only results in questionable policy decisions, but also could lead to unwarranted fear of immigrants and an uptick in hate-crimes against them.
Such fear-mongering appears to be behind the new office for Victims of Immigration Crime Engagement (VOICE) recently launched by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). VOICE will share selective data about alleged criminals’ immigration and custody status, but will omit information on other crimes, including crimes in which immigrants are victims. VOICE stems from the President’s Executive Order on internal safety and immigration enforcement, which also decreed that Privacy Act protections do not apply to the undocumented. The result is that when VOICE shares information about immigrants, their right to legally challenge potentially erroneous disclosures may be curtailed. The implications could be devastating for individuals who are wrongly targeted, especially given administration’s track record with the facts.
The launch of the VOICE office comes on the heels other efforts by the administration to manipulate facts to support misleading conclusions about immigration enforcement. In an apparent effort to name and shame, the White House ordered ICE to release weekly reports highlighting jurisdictions it claimed did not comply with requests to keep undocumented individuals in custody for up to 48 hours beyond their scheduled release—so-called “detainer requests.” Law enforcement officials in counties nationwide described the data as “unfair and misleading” and openly disputed ICE’s claims. Because complying with detainer requests has been held to be unconstitutional, jurisdictions also objected to the reports’ mischaracterization that they were not complying with federal law. Responding to pressure, ICE has temporarily suspended publication of its misleading weekly reports, but is now concealing data about its own immigration investigations and enforcement with its illegitimate decision to withhold information previously released under Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests.
To be sure, the immigration enforcement and deportation machine grew to new levels under a cloak of secrecy during the Obama administration, with serious policy consequences that resonate today. Rights groups litigated with ICE for years to obtain information about its controversial deportation and fingerprint program, known as Secure Communities, which required local law enforcement to forward the digital fingerprints of everyone they booked, regardless of citizenship. ICE then used the information to determine who could be deported. To this day, the FBI continues to expand the massive biometrics database that grew dramatically under the Secure Communities program, and ICE’s ability to issue detainer requests continues because local law enforcement still forwards biometric information about suspects in custody.”

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One of the biggest lies repeated by the Trump Administration and many GOP politicos is that the Obama Administration “didn’t enforce immigration law.” On the contrary, as those of us who served during that Administration know well, Obama enforced the heck out of immigration law — sometimes wisely, sometimes not. Most of today’s real immigration problems (such as the total mess in the U.S. Immigration Courts) stem from over enforcement, not any type of mythical “under enforcement.”

PWS

05-25-17

POLITICS: David Leonhardt In The NYT: Don’t Get Distracted From GOP’s Dishonesty & Cruelty!

“David Leonhardt
Op-Ed Columnist
The Congressional Budget Office’s analysis of the House health care bill is a devastating indictment.
The report, released yesterday, showed that millions of Americans would lose health insurance and the quality of insurance for millions more would deteriorate. The savings from that carnage — to borrow a favorite word of President Trump’s — would pay for tax cuts for the wealthy.
And yet the immediate reaction to the C.B.O. report also shows why you should be worried that the Senate will nonetheless decide to pass a version of the House bill.
Here’s what I mean: Much of this initial reaction has missed the point. It has focused on the modest differences between the new C.B.O. report, which analyzed the final House bill, and a C.B.O. analysis from March of an earlier version of the bill. Among the differences, the final bill would deprive an estimated 23 million people of insurance, compared with the 24 million in the March analysis.
Don’t be distracted by these small differences.
Distraction is a tactic of the politicians who are trying to take away health insurance from people. These politicians can’t sell their proposals on the merits. That’s why both the House and, thus far, the Senate have refused to hold any hearings. They know that virtually every expert across the ideological spectrum — including groups representing doctors, nurses, hospitals, patients and senior citizens — opposes the bill.
Unable to win a debate on its merits, Republican leaders need to change the subject. They can’t let their proposals be judged on whether they improve the American health care system, because they don’t. They need to create a lower standard by which the plan will be judged.
The House did so in the frantic week that it passed its bill by pointing to a last-minute amendment that made a superficial improvement. House members then claimed they had fixed their bill.
Senate leaders are showing signs of following the same path — and the C.B.O. report gives them a chance to start down it. The report will encourage top Republicans to claim that their bill is already getting better and that the Senate will keep improving it in coming months.
In truth, the bill is fatally flawed. Its objective is to reduce federal spending on health insurance for the middle class, poor, sick, elderly and disabled in order to cut taxes for the wealthy. Maybe the final version, once the Senate has made its tweaks, will take insurance from 23 million people, or maybe 15 million people. But any law based on the House bill is guaranteed to worsen the health care system.
That’s the overwhelming message of the C.B.O. report.
The saddest part of this situation is that our health care system, including Obamacare, very much needs improvement. And there are solid bipartisan ideas out there, including some that would increase states’ flexibility or lower consumer expenses. The Senate has members from both parties with the savvy and the policy chops — like Lamar Alexander and Patty Murray — to turn those ideas into a bill.
Is it too much to hope that they cast aside the distractions from the House’s failed plan and start fresh?
The full Opinion report from The Times follows, including Abbe Gluck on the G.O.P.’s sabotage of Obamacare.”

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GOP’S WAR ON AMERICA EXPOSED — 23 Million Would Lose Health Coverage To Provide Tax Breaks To Fat Cat Cronies!

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/24/us/politics/cbo-congressional-budget-office-health-care.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

Robert Pear reports in the NYT:

“WASHINGTON — A bill to dismantle the Affordable Care Act that narrowly passed the House this month would leave 14 million more people uninsured next year than under President Barack Obama’s health law — and 23 million more in 2026, the Congressional Budget Office said Wednesday. Some of the nation’s sickest would pay much more for health care.

Under the House bill, the number of uninsured would be slightly lower, but deficits would be somewhat higher, than the budget office estimated before Republican leaders made a series of changes to win enough votes for passage. Beneath the headline-grabbing numbers, those legislative tweaks would bring huge changes to the American health care system.

In many states, insurance costs could soar for consumers who are sick or have pre-existing conditions, while premiums would fall for the healthy, the new estimate concludes.

The forecast by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office, Capitol Hill’s official scorekeeper, is another potential blow to efforts to undo Mr. Obama’s signature domestic achievement. Republican senators have said they will make substantial changes to the measure passed by the House, but even Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, sounds uncertain about his chances of finding a majority to repeal and replace the health law.”

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Read Robert’s complete article at the link. Decades ago, when we were both young, Robert covered the “immigration beat” for the NYT. In the days before Administrations of both parties went to war with the press, he used to call me on a regular basis to get the “official INS position” on various controversies, particularly those involving legal issues.

PWS

05-24-16

AMERICA’S WORST PUBLIC SERVANT: Read Patrick S. Tomlinson’s NYT Op-Ed: “I’m From Milwaukee And I Oughtta Know, Sheriff David Clarke Has Gotta Go” (Screw Up DHS Like He Did Milwaukee County)!

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/23/opinion/take-it-from-milwaukee-beware-of-sheriff-david-clarke.html?em_pos=small&emc=edit_ty_20170524&nl=opinion-today&nl_art=8&nlid=79213886&ref=headline&te=1&_r=0

Tomlinson writes:

“MILWAUKEE — When David A. Clarke Jr., the sheriff of Milwaukee County, announced last week that he’d been appointed to a senior position at the Homeland Security Department, Milwaukee residents like me felt two things: relief that we might finally rid ourselves of his disastrous leadership, and deep concern about what his reported new role will mean for the rest of the country.

Sheriff Clarke (whose appointment the Trump administration has not confirmed) has attracted national attention on several occasions over the past year. In July, he drew scrutiny when, writing for The Hill, he suggested there was a “civil war” between law enforcement officers and members of the Black Lives Matter movement. Last week, CNN reported that he had plagiarized portions of his 2013 master’s thesis from several sources, including the American Civil Liberties Union and President George W. Bush’s book, “Decision Points.” (Sheriff Clarke has denied this accusation, and called the CNN journalist who wrote the report a “sleaze bag.”) And with his image accompanying articles that have circulated online, Sheriff Clarke’s penchant for festooning his uniform with an abundance of pins and ribbons has drawn the ire of veterans and inspired comparisons to the over-adorned uniforms beloved by military dictators.

Locals have been aghast at his conduct for years, and our criticism goes far deeper than his outrageous statements, his bizarre fashion choices and even his academic dishonesty. Residents of this county have witnessed a series of embarrassing incidents and, much worse, human tragedy on Sheriff Clarke’s watch.

Many have seen the 2015 tweet in which he went as far as to say that the Black Lives Matter movement would “join forces with ISIS.” Less well known is the fact that a police union, on behalf of two deputies, successfully sued him in 2007 for religious proselytizing. A district court in Milwaukee found his actions unconstitutional, which a federal appeals panel upheld in 2009. Apparently, Sheriff Clarke thought it was appropriate to force his deputy sheriffs to listen to a Christian-themed presentation, without regard for the separation of church and state.

There’s more. Sheriff Clarke has exhibited petty vindictiveness in response to those who give him even the mildest rebuke. He’s been accused of harassment by Dan Black, a Riverwest resident who said he was detained and questioned by deputies after an interaction with the sheriff on an airplane in January. Mr. Black’s offense? Shaking his head as he walked by Sheriff Clarke, in his first-class seat, wearing Dallas Cowboys gear on the day the team faced Wisconsin’s Green Bay Packers in the playoffs.

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More familiar to the national audience and more disturbing, especially to residents of Milwaukee, one of the most racially segregated cities in the country, is the story of Terrill Thomas, a 38-year-old inmate with bipolar disorder who died in 2016 while awaiting trial in solitary confinement in a jail Sheriff Clarke oversees. Mr. Thomas had gone seven days without water.

But what most Americans outside the Milwaukee metro area may not know is that Mr. Thomas’s death hasn’t been the only suspicious death during Sheriff Clarke’s tenure. Several people have died at a county jail since Sheriff Clarke took office in 2002, including a newborn baby who perished after her mother, Melissa Hall, gave birth on her cell floor. According to a federal lawsuit, Ms. Hall was shackled as she gave birth.

Perhaps the most bizarrely unhinged moment in Sheriff Clarke’s sordid career in Milwaukee came in March when he used a Facebook post to personally attack the city’s mayor, Tom Barrett. After Mr. Barrett criticized Sheriff Clarke for neglecting his duties in favor of Fox News appearances and book promotions, Sheriff Clarke became unhinged. Using the official page of the sheriff’s office, he mocked Mr. Barrett, saying, “The last time Tom Barrett showed up at a crime scene he got his ass kicked by a drunk, tire-iron-wielding man who beat him within inches of his life.” He was referring to a 2009 incident during which Mr. Barrett stepped between a deranged, tire-iron-wielding man threatening a grandmother and a 1-year-old child. Barrett was beaten and hospitalized after the assault, but the woman and child were saved from harm and the man taken into custody.

The timing couldn’t be better for him to step down from his post here. Milwaukee residents are fed up with our homegrown sideshow act. His job approval ratings have tanked in recent months. Were he to run in next year’s sheriff election, he would face an almost insurmountable primary fight for the Democratic spot.

The day we can finally rid ourselves of his malignant, sociopathic leadership can’t come soon enough. “Yippee, giddy up, and leave was my response,” said State Senator Lena Taylor of Sheriff Clarke’s possible appointment. But it’s little comfort because Sheriff Clarke’s power will only expand with his new role, which he has said will begin next month. As Representative Gwen Moore said of the sheriff in Mic, “I can think of few men more uniquely unqualified to liaise with local law enforcement at this juncture.”

The rest of the country should not have to suffer what Milwaukee residents have. David Clarke is not fit for public office. He is incompetent, dishonest, petty, vindictive and cruel. Take it from someone who has had a front-row seat to his antics: Do whatever you can to keep him out of public service, and public life, permanently.

Patrick S. Tomlinson (@stealthygeek) is a novelist, stand-up comic, and political commentator living in Milwaukee, Wis.”

*********************************************************

“Incompetent, dishonest, petty, vindictive, and cruel.” Hmmm, sounds like a perfect fit for the Trump Administration! On the other hand, he was elected to the position three times by the voters of Milwaukee County. So, someone out there must like his style.

PWS

05-24-17

The “Human Rights Free” Presidency — Trump Surrenders U.S. Leadership On Humanitarian Concerns — Embraces Some Of World’s Major Human Rights Violators!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2017/05/24/daily-202-trump-s-praise-for-duterte-s-drug-war-underscores-his-contempt-for-human-rights/5924d3dee9b69b2fb981db83/?utm_term=.7945757980b7

James Hohmann reports in the Washington Post:

“THE BIG IDEA: It’s one thing to not “lecture” foreign governments who abuse human rights. It’s something else entirely to praise them for it. And that’s exactly what Donald Trump did last month when he called Rodrigo Duterte.

The Post’s David Nakamura and Barton Gellman yesterday obtained a transcript of his April 29th phone call with the president of the Philippines.

“I just wanted to congratulate you because I am hearing of the unbelievable job (you’re doing) on the drug problem,” Trump told Duterte at the start of their conversation, according to the document. “Many countries have the problem, we have a problem, but what a great job you are doing and I just wanted to call and tell you that.”

“Thank you Mr. President,” replied Duterte. “This is the scourge of my nation now and I have to do something to preserve the Filipino nation.”

Trump, who affectionately referred to Duterte as “Rodrigo” during their chat, then took an unsolicited dig at Barack Obama. “I … fully understand that and I think we had a previous president who did not understand that,” the U.S. president said. “You are a good man … Keep up the good work. … You are doing an amazing job.”

With Breanne Deppisch

Duterte called Obama the “son of a whore” during a press conference last September. When he promised to curse out the then-president if he brought up his death squads, the White House canceled a bilateral sit-down that had been scheduled. When Obama later raised concerns about his human rights record, Duterte replied that he could “go to hell.” (He often uses unprintable profanity.)

— The context of Trump’s comments matters: Duterte is an authoritarian thug. He has overseen a brutal extrajudicial campaign that has resulted in the killings of thousands of suspected drug dealers. His abuses are well documented, including in reports by the U.S. State Department and Human Rights Watch.

Duterte has publicly compared his campaign to crack down on drugs to the Holocaust, saying he would like to “slaughter” millions of drug addicts just like Adolf Hitler “massacred” millions of Jewish people. “Hitler massacred three million Jews. Now, there are 3 million drug addicts. … I’d be happy to slaughter them,” he told reporters last September. While Hitler (who actually killed closer to six million Jews) spoke of a “final solution,” Duterte says his campaign of mass killings is the only way to “finish the problem.”
He has said he would kill his own children if they ever took drugs.

One victim of Duterte’s crackdown was a 5-year-old girl, who was shot in the head last summer when armed men came to her house in search of her grandfather.

Eleven days before Trump phoned him, Duterte told a group of Filipino workers in the Middle East that if they lose their jobs because of the falling price of oil they can always come home to work for him. “If you lose your job, I’ll give you one: Kill all the drug addicts,” he said, according to the Philippine Star. “Help me kill addicts … Let’s kill addicts every day.”

The New York Times won a Pulitzer Prize this year for a series of powerful photographs “showing the callous disregard for human life in the Philippines brought about” by Duterte’s policies.

A witness has testified that before Duterte became president, when he was a mayor of Davao City, he paid a squad of hit men to carry out summary executions that involved feeding a body to a crocodile, chopping up corpses and dumping slashed bodies into the sea.

Duterte has boasted to a group of Manila businessmen, on camera, about killing criminals in cold blood when he was mayor: “In Davao I used to do it personally, just to show the (cops) that if I can do it, why can’t you?”

He joked last year that the victim of a gang rape was “so beautiful” that he wishes he had “been first.”

Yesterday he declared martial law on the southern island of Mindanao, as his security forces battled heavily armed militants linked to the Islamic State.
— Trump caught his own aides off guard during his phone call to Duterte by extending an open invitation for him to come visit the White House at any time, with no preconditions. “I will love to have you in the Oval Office,” Trump said, per the transcript. “Seriously, if you want to come over, just let us know.”

— A senior administration official, who confirmed that the quotes in the transcript produced by the Philippines government are accurate, said that the president was not condoning Duterte’s “individual tactics.” Rather, the official said, this was Trump’s “way of expressing solidarity over a common scourge.” But that’s not at all clear from the transcript, and it’s certainly not the impression any reasonable person on the other end of the line would have been left with.
— Trying to advance our national interest, previous presidents of both parties have certainly looked the other way instead of confronting human rights abuses. But they felt they had no choice, especially during the Cold War, and none seemed to relish this dark side of realpolitik.

— As part of his so-called “America First” agenda, Trump seems not just content but determined to have America abdicate its moral leadership in the world. It’s hard to claim American Exceptionalism when Trump praises Duterte this way. It’s hard to say we’re a shining city upon a hill when the American president consistently treats despotic strongmen with greater respect than democratically-elected allies.

— The president’s sometimes over-the-top praise for totalitarian leaders has been covered extensively, from Russia’s Vladimir Putin to Chinese President Xi Jinping, Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Thailand Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha.
— Coincidentally, Duterte was meeting with Putin at the Kremlin yesterday around the time that the Post’s story about the transcript broke. He’s referred to the Russian president as his “favorite hero.” This is from the write-up by RT, the government-financed propaganda network: “Duterte, who called Russia a ‘reliable partner,’ also emphasized that Manila is ready to develop relations with Moscow and is looking forward to purchase Russian arms.” Putin also lavished him with praise.

— Words matter: Autocrats have heard Trump loud and clear, and they’re emboldened. Abby Phillip and David Nakamura note that almost no attention was paid to the concerns that have made Saudi Arabia rank among the most repressive nations on Earth during the president’s visit this weekend. “Political protests in Saudi Arabia can be punishable by a death sentence and freedom of expression is severely limited. But Monday, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross highlighted the absence of dissenters as a sign of the ‘genuinely good mood’ during Trump’s visit. … And Sunday, a lone event on Trump’s schedule aimed at bolstering civil society in Saudi Arabia was scrapped.”
“We are not here to lecture,” Trump said during his Sunday speech in Riyadh, speaking to about 50 political leaders of Muslim nations, many of which are led by strongmen. “We are not here to tell other people how to live, what to do, who to be or how to worship. Instead, we are here to offer partnership, based on shared interests and values.”

— The foreign policy establishment was collectively horrified by the transcript of the Trump-Duterte call.

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Read the complete story at the link.

Let’s see, dissing US civil servants, promoting xenophobia and racism, shafting the poor and vulnerable, abandoning the sick and chronically ill, enriching his family and cronies, and emboldening anti-democratic autocrats throughout the world. Trump is the antithesis of almost all of the values many of us thought America stood for. Yet, he was elected to lead us. Go figure!

PWS

05-24-17

DHS Reports 740,000 Visa Overstays! — Oh, Those Canadian Businessmen & Tourists, Threatening Our National Existence By Hanging Around & Spending Their Dollars Here — Will A Wall Along The Northern Border Be Next?

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/us-nearly-740000-foreigners-overstayed-visas-last-year/2017/05/22/f70bea2e-3f16-11e7-b29f-f40ffced2ddb_story.html?tid=hybrid_content_2_na&utm_term=.db2c42f1f0db

The AP reports in the Washington Post:

“SAN DIEGO — Nearly 740,000 foreigners who were supposed to leave the United States during a recent 12-month period overstayed their visas, the Homeland Security Department said Monday, detailing a crucial but often overlooked contributor to the number of people in the country illegally.

President Donald Trump has proposed spending billions of dollars to erect a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico and hire more border agents, but those measures would not address people who arrive legally and stay after their visas expire. An estimated 40 percent of the roughly 11 million people in the country illegally stayed past their visas.

There were 739,478 overstays from October 2015 through September 2016 among visitors who arrive by plane or ship — more than the population of Alaska.

The total number of overstays is much larger but has not been quantified because the statistic doesn’t include how many people leave by land.

The cost and technological hurdles to develop a checkout system at congested land crossings are enormous because the sites are so busy. Last year, Homeland Security tested facial scans at a San Diego border crossing but has npt said if the technology works or will be expanded.

Homeland Security last year published the number of overstays for the first time in at least two decades, saying 527,127 people who came by air or ship stayed past their visas from October 2014 to September 2015.

This year’s report added student and foreign exchange visitors and many visa categories for temporary workers, while last year’s only counted business travelers and tourists. Homeland Security said it will make additional improvements in future reports, including more data on people who cross by land.

Overstays accounted for 1.5 percent of the 50.4 million visitors who arrived by plane or ship in the latest period, Homeland Security said. Canada occupied the top slot for overstays among business travelers and tourists, followed by Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela and the United Kingdom. Germany, Colombia, China, India and Italy rounded out the top 10.”

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Read the complete,article at the link.

Immigration is a much more complex and nuanced subject than this Administration will acknowledge. But, I’m not sure that these raw numbers, without more analysis, are anything we should be losing sleep over.

PWS

05-24-17

Only 6% Of Trump Immigration Arrests Involve “Violent Crimes!”

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/trump_administration_arrests_noncriminal_immigrants_150_percent_20170523

Truthdig reports:

“For the most part, the Trump campaign was transparent in its xenophobia, playing to the anti-immigrant sentiments of Trump’s base with promises to increase deportations of the undocumented. But on one point, Trump pretended to care about nuance: He would not, he stated on multiple occasions, target undocumented immigrants indiscriminately, but would focus on those with criminal records—the “bad hombres,” to use the president’s own ridiculous words. Predictably, this has not been the case in practice. A new report shows that amidst a staggering increase in undocumented immigrant deportations overall, arrests of law-abiding undocumented immigrants shot up the most, by a whopping 150 percent.

A report by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement boasts that between January 29 and April 22, agents arrested 41,318 undocumented immigrants. That figure, which breaks down to roughly 400 arrests per day, represents an increase of 37 percent over arrests made during the same period under President Obama, who previously held the title of Deporter-in-Chief. Seventy-five percent of those taken into custody have criminal convictions, but even that notation is potentially misleading. As Vox notes, “it’s not clear how many of those were for crimes that might be considered minor, or for crimes that are the result of being an unauthorized immigrant in the U.S. (such as driving without a license in a state that doesn’t permit unauthorized immigrants to get drivers’ licenses).” In fact, as the outlet points out, just 6 percent of those arrested had been convicted of violent crimes such as “homicide, rape, kidnapping and assault.”

The number of non-criminal undocumented immigrants arrested more than doubled, going “from approximately 4,200 in 2016 to more than 10,800 in 2017.” The ICE reports highlights this statistic as a point of pride, stating that while “convicted criminals are an immigration enforcement priority, Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly has made it clear that ICE will no longer exempt any class of individuals from removal proceedings if they are found to be in the country illegally.”

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Disrupting communities across America, pushing the U.S. Immigration Courts to the brink, burning through taxpayer dollars, without accomplishing much of anything useful. That’s the Trump way!

Contrary to the GOP fantasy hype, the Obama Administration was certainly no slouch at apprehending and removing serious criminals. So, the Trump enforcement charade has increased misery, deepened divisions, and created unnecessary commotion, while, by most reliable accounts, actually making us less safe by eroding years of hard-earned trust and cooperation between migrant communities and local police in reporting and solving crimes! Talk about a “built for failure” program!

PWS

05-23-17

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