Gregory D.

Lee

Read Greg's bio and previous columns here

July 24, 2009

Will Janet Napolitano Arrest an Illegal Alien for Any Reason?

The Department of Homeland Security, under the direction of Secretary Janet Napolitano, recently announced that it will modify a highly successful program that allows local police officers to enforce federal immigration law. Apparently the program was becoming too successful and something had to be done to stop it, pronto.

It seems that civil liberties and illegal alien advocacy groups don’t like illegals being arrested for immigration violations when they commit only minor offenses such as urinating in public and speeding. Immigration law-trained police officers, who encounter someone drunk in an alley relieving himself or a speeder, use their federally provided training to determine if the guy is here illegally. Officers take these people into custody and turn them over to immigration authorities for deportation. So what’s the problem?

The problem, as seen by Secretary Napolitano, is that these advocacy groups have thrown down the race card alleging that police officers are using the dreaded “racial profiling” technique to arrest these people. This is absurd, but she bowed to their demands and has given police departments 90 days’ notice to accept new restrictions on who can be arrested.       

Apparently the intent of the law allowing local police officers to enforce U.S. immigration law is to target "criminal aliens" who commit violent crimes, as opposed to your garden variety illegal alien who commits infractions like speeding and urinating in public. But by virtue of someone’s mere presence in this country illegally, they are subject to arrest. Nothing in immigration law says that someone here illegally who does not commit a violent crime isn’t eligible for deportation. Establishing a policy that ignores someone's immigration status for fear of being accused of racial profiling is not only bad government policy, but serves as an incentive for more people of all nationalities to flock here and take American jobs.

Racial profiling is a myth. Police encounter illegal aliens overwhelmingly because they have done something stupid like speeding or urinating in public, not because they belong to a particular racial group. If in the course of a police encounter the officer determines that the alien is in the country illegally, should he ignore this because the alien only committed a minor infraction? Should a police officer who has been trained to enforce immigration law ignore that Mexican nationals illegally residing here perfectly fit the profile of, say, a Mexican? Immigrant rights groups want the bar set so high before a police officer can question someone about their immigration status that it can seldom be reached. That’s exactly what Napolitano’s new policy does, and it’s contrary to our national interests and makes a mockery of the law.

Half of all illegal aliens are non-Mexicans who are in this country longer than their visas allow. They seek employment, housing, government benefits and sham marriages to U.S. citizens to justify not being deported. These “overstays” are well documented as being here illegally, and accusations of racial profiling generally do not apply because they lack political action groups. These people also need to be sent home. 

When illegal Mexican aliens sit on a curb drinking beer in front of your home, listen to loud mariachi music blaring from their unregistered and uninsured vehicle and then relieve themselves on your front lawn, your quality of life suffers. When they get into their car, leaving their empty beer cans on the street, and drive away intoxicated, it becomes a public safety issue. If they run over someone and flee the scene, is that criminal enough for Secretary Napolitano to deport them? Or will she only do that if the person they run over dies? At what point will this administration say it won't tolerate any crimes committed by illegal aliens? Because they have no legitimate roots here, when the heat is on, illegal aliens flee to their home country where they resume their normal life without taking any responsibility for their actions here.

These people are exploiting DHS’s politically correct policies. Secretary Napolitano needs a spanking for not standing up to these special interest groups and allowing them to dictate immigration enforcement policy.

Where’s Sheriff Joe Arpaio when you need him?

Gregory D. Lee can be reached through his web site: www.gregorydlee.com.

© 2009 North Star Writers Group. May not be republished without permission.

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