Immigration and Customs Enforcement have demonstrated again in the last week why the president could declare California, along with its counties and municipalities, in a state of insurrection.
From Sept 28 through Oct 2, the agency reported Wednesday, the agency collared 125 illegal-aliens criminals whom state or local law enforcement freed despite lawful immigration detainers.
Almost all were convicts or faced criminal charges when arrested.
These latest arrests, and California’s record of releasing illegal-alien criminals, show that state and local officials will not voluntarily stop defying federal immigration law.
That observation applies to all sanctuaries that defy or subvert federal authority over immigration. Sanctuaries are, as a legal matter, in open rebellion and insurrection.
Two Murderers
Because of its dangerous sanctuary law, California has become a principal example of the insurrectionary activity federal immigration authorities routinely face.
“In the Los Angeles-area alone, officers arrested nearly 100 unlawfully present individuals with criminal histories that include homicide, sexual assault, sex crimes involving children, assault, robbery, domestic violence and DUI,” ICE reported.
State and local sanctuary authorities simply don’t care whether these criminals continue to prey on law-abiding Americans.
Among the estimable “undocumented immigrants” caught who, as pro-illegal immigration advocates claim, “do the jobs Americans won’t do” were these two individuals:
• On September 29, ICE collared a 40-year-old Salvadoran in Los Angeles. In November 2009, a court convicted him of first-degree murder. “Despite an immigration detainer lodged with the Los Angeles County Jail (LACJ),” ICE reported, “the jail declined to honor the detainer and instead released him into the community.”
The murderer will now be deported.
• The day before, ICE bagged a 50-year-old Mexican murderer in Long Beach, California. He was convicted of second-degree murder in June 1994. “Despite an immigration detainer lodged with the LACJ, the jail declined to honor the detainer and instead released him into the community,” ICE reported.
ICE apprehended him and packed him off to Mexico the same day.
Yet the news that authorities in California permit convicted illegal-alien murderers to run free is nothing new. As The New American reported in February, ICE lodged 1,507 detainers for illegal-alien criminals in Orange County jails. California law forced the county to release more 1,000 without notification to ICE. Cops rearrested 238.
In 2018, the county freed 1,106 illegal-alien thugs without notifying ICE, again, despite lawfully lodged detainers. Cops rearrested 173.
Illegal aliens freed despite detainers routinely commit rape, murder, and other crimes, yet the victims cannot hold state and local officials responsible for their losses. San Francisco has twice escaped punishment for releasing illegal aliens who murdered after the city helped them evade immigration authorities.
Detainers Ignored, Fiscal 2019
Last year, ICE issued 165,487 detainers on illegal-alien thugs whose criminal histories included 56,000 assaults, 14,500 sex crimes, 5,000 robberies, 2,500 homicides, and 2,500 kidnappings.
But sanctuary states and localities ignore thousands of those duly-filed detainers.
Like Orange County, California, Chicago ignored more than 1,000 detainers in fiscal 2019. Result: An illegal alien freed despite a detainer molested a little girl. Mayor Lori Lightfoot blamed the federal government.
Remarkably, however, President Trump has not taken action against officials who pass and enforce laws that supposedly supersede federal authority over immigration, though Attorney General Bill Barr has three possible avenues of approach.
He could charge municipal leaders such as Lightfoot with obstruction of justice for refusing to cooperate with ICE and purposely releasing illegal aliens.
He could also charge sanctuary authorities who ignore detainers with harboring illegal aliens or aiding and abetting federal felons. Federal authorities have often deported illegal-alien felons multiple times, and re-entering the country is itself a felony.
Last, Trump could declare sanctuaries to be in rebellion and insurrection, then move to arrest them with National Guard troops.
