The editors of the Washington Post and Wall Street Journal have reacted to the killing of Alex Pretti in Minneapolis by a Border Patrol agent:
Washington Post
It’s essential that federal immigration officers don’t think they can act with impunity, because that will only encourage more fatal encounters. An independent probe of this shooting is an important step. On Saturday night, a federal judge ordered DHS not to destroy evidence related to Pretti’s killing in response to a lawsuit filed by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison (D).
Democrats will prevail if they focus on a narrow set of reasonable demands. The president will gain the upper hand if the left clamors for abolishing ICE. They already tried that during Trump’s first term, and it backfired. At the same time, that agency needs to be bound by laws, oversight and accountability. Most of all, U.S. citizens need to be secure in exercising their First and Second Amendment rights without worrying they’ll get gunned down.
Most Americans want a secure border, and they think violent criminals should be deported. That’s a large part of why Trump returned to the White House. The overreach of the past year, however, could consume his presidency and lead to more tragedy. If Trump won’t change course on his own, can Republicans in Congress save him from himself?
Wall Street Journal
Pretti made a tragic mistake by interfering with ICE agents, but that warranted arrest, not a death sentence. The agents may say they felt threatened, but it’s worth noting the comments over the weekend by police around the country who say that this isn’t how they conduct law enforcement.
Either many ICE agents aren’t properly trained, or they are so on edge as they face opposition in the streets that they are on a hair trigger. Either way, this calls for rethinking how ICE conducts itself, especially in Minneapolis as tensions build.
I materially agree with both of those statements with a few provisos.
The context of the killings in Minneapolis includes:
The initiating policy signal
Candidate Biden literally urged those seeking to enter the United States to “surge to the border”. They did. That signal functioned as an invitation in practice.
This was not metaphorical language. In every domain where the word “surge” is used whether logistics, medicine, military operations it denotes a deliberate increase in volume designed to stress a system’s capacity. The predictable result was a mass inflow that overwhelmed border processing and shifted the enforcement problem into the interior of the country.
Statements by mayors
The mayors of Portland, Minneapolis, and Chicago, all “sanctuary” cities, have made the following statements:
Enforcement of civil immigration laws by militarized forces has no legitimate role in our community, no support from local elected leaders, and little public support
and
Local and state law enforcement must remain the jurisdiction of local law enforcement authorities…
We are demanding that ICE leave the city and state immediately.
and
We stand by our immigrant and refugee communities — know that you have our full support
…we remain opposed to militarized immigration enforcement that runs afoul of the Constitution in our city.
If you think that the key word in the statements above is “militarized”, please provide evidence that the mayors support federal enforcement actions within their jurisdictions so long as they are not militarized. I have searched and found no such statements. They do not oppose tactics; they oppose jurisdiction.
Note that a) the federal government’s role in the enforcement of immigration laws has been fully litigated and is unchallenged; b) all three mayors reject it. The mayors’ position is functionally indistinguishable from nullification: the claim that federal law is valid everywhere except where local officials disapprove of it.
While I recognize that neither the mayors nor the editors have any legal responsibility to do so, I think that under the circumstances they have an ethical responsibility to propose a workable method for enforcing immigration law within those jurisdictions without deploying federal law enforcement agents within them. Otherwise, their position is not reform but abdication.
1) Biden specifically limited it to people seeking asylum. This coincided with a shortage of labor during covid and as we know illegal immigration correlates with labor opportunity.
2) I spent some time looking at sanctuary cities and immigration and they have always allowed ICE to function within their cities. They do not help ICE do their jobs. Note that you dont find statements opposing ICE doing their job before they became militarized. (Militarized is actually a sanitized version of what is going on. What people oppose is a group of poorly trained, anonymous, unaccountable group of agents who do not act within traditional policing norms and seem to have little regard for the safety of the community. The have been encouraged to crate a spectacle and cruel behavior seems to be encouraged.)
Anyway, I think you are asking people to prove a negative. What you should be asking is if before the current version of ICE those cities were engaging in actions that stopped ICE from functioning. I dont think that exists.
3) Your Portland citation refers specifically to when Trump was going to send military troops to Portland. Unless I missed it they said nothing about ICE per se. they just opposed military troops being sent without their consent ie asking for military to be deployed.
4) The Minneapolis statement is specifically in reference to the shooting. They are asking that a bunch of poorly trained, anonymous and unaccountable agents be removed. As a mayor’s responsibility is to the safety of the people of that city it seems reasonable. In retrospect it seems prescient. Note that it also tells people they cant engage in activities like blocking traffic, throwing stuff at agents, etc. IOW, they want ICE to leave but knowing they wont they dont want people to take actions that would actually impede ICE.
Steve
Out of 3000 counties 9 account for almost all the violence, and all are in sanctuary cities. And those are located in Minneapolis, Chicago and Los Angeles. NYC is a distant 4th.
I guess untrained or triggered ICE only exist in those 9 counties……………
And before the contortions start, just cut the high school level BS. We all know who and where professional and egged on protestersare located
The surge of ICE agents has largely occurred in sanctuary cities and the larger surge has been in Minneapolis. Most sources place Chicago and LA next. Also, everyone has cameras now and nearly all of these acts of “violence” are being filmed. It’s notable that I’m many/most of them there is no violence observed or its initiated by ICE agents who dont want people filming them. Note that very few people are actually having charges placed against them for violence. People repeatedly get arrested and then released without charges being filed.
Also, we should note that the people claiming all of this violence are the same people who claimed that the Pretti guy approached agents with a weapon with the goal of killing as many as possible while every video shows he had no weapon in hand when taken down by ICE agents.
Steve
https://open.substack.com/pub/jameshowardkunstler/p/had-enough-9ec?r=1f0f6t&utm_medium=ios
Nine counties. That’s because none of this is happening in a vacuum, it’s more organized than you might think.
Also any person who goes out to fight the cops with a gun on him is suicidal or a fool. also had extra clips of ammo.
@grey
So Ruby Ridge was, what, justified?
@Dave
Please show where it is not allowed for local LEOs to be ordered to not support federal enforcement of federal civil laws.
scout
I will admit that I have a pro law enforcement bias. I have friends who serve in law enforcement. In normal circumstances, I think they have an incredibly tough job. They go into situations where the worst people are having their worst days. They have to remain professional with people who are often completely out of control.
For ICE agents, they are having to do all of the above while crowds shout at them, curse them, spit at them, throw things, blow whistles, etc. From a human perspective, I would find it incredibly difficult to remain professional in that environment.
Dave Schuler: I think that under the circumstances they have an ethical responsibility to propose a workable method for enforcing immigration law within those jurisdictions without deploying federal law enforcement agents within them.
Why would they be responsible for enforcing federal policies they reject?
Zachriel:
In a liberal democracy, elected officials are not free agents; they occupy institutional roles. One of the defining obligations of those roles is to enforce duly enacted law, even when they disagree with it. Without that role obligation, law collapses into personal preference, which is the negation of the rule of law.