We need some clarity on the details.
President-elect Donald Trump on Monday confirmed he would declare a national emergency to carry out his campaign promise of mass deportations of migrants living in the U.S. without legal permission.
Interesting ambiguity there. Which without legal permission? Migrants living in the US or Trump carrying out mass deportations?
Already, he’s tapped several immigration hard-liners to serve in key Cabinet positions. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem was picked to be homeland security secretary, pending Senate confirmation. Former Acting U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Director Tom Homan was named “border czar.”
Homan previously discussed his vision for mass deportations, saying they would first concentrate on expelling criminals and national security threats. He didn’t rule out deporting families together.
It’s not clear how they plan to distinguish among criminals and non-criminals. It’s not clear how they will know which are which, or even how they think they will know that.
There are an estimated 11 million unauthorized migrants living in the U.S. without legal immigration status. Removing them could cost billions of dollars per year, according to estimates from the American Immigration Council.
If that’s true, why not issue them legal immigration status? Why have it both ways? Having it both ways just gives the trumpists ammunition.
Comments
9 responses to “Without legal permission”
Such good Christians we have to look forward to.
Simple. They’ll compare them to 8×10 glossy head shots from central casting.
“expelling criminals and national security risks”
So will Trump be leaving for Moscow on a commercial jet or private plane with golden toilets?
I searched the guy up, trying to find out just what the hell position he had been promised*, and found an article in which he explicitly stated he was all for it:
“In an interview in late October, Homan shrugged off concerns about families being separated through Trump’s plans for mass deportations.
“Families can be deported together,” Homan told “60 Minutes.””
* pet peeve: why the hell does US media call officials ‘czar’ nowadays? Do they not realise this is just the political framing started by conservatives in order to pretend the US government was full of commies??
Here’s a report (PDF) on the Emergency Powers that the president can invoke in the U.S. They are sweeping, and pretty much are a path to remove the onerous obstacle of civil rights that we have come to rely on. Don’t tread on me, indeed. It’s from the Congressional Research Service.
https://sgp.fas.org/crs/natsec/98-505.pdf
The first “Czar” I remember was Bill Simon, who was named Energy Czar by Nixon, but according to Wikipedia it goes back at least to the Wilson administration. I think if they were trying to accuse people of being commies, they’d call them “Comrade” or “Commissar”.
That’s one language pet peeve I don’t share. It’s just a nickname/shorthand, and for some reason it fails to get on my nerves. On the other hand I do prefer the UK “boffin.” [NB: not a synonym for fuckin. Or is it?]
Ophelia, you need to have a g on the end of boffin for the other meaning. They’re unrelated words, unlike fuckin’ and fucking, which are the same word.
It was a joke.