Sen. Bernie Sanders, the socialist from Vermont running for president in 2020, has a brilliant idea: Get rid of of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency that enforces America’s immigration laws and counters transnational crime.
That’s a terrible idea, according to one law enforcement official on the border.
Sheriff Mark Dannels, who protects the border between Arizona and Mexico, said if the senator’s plan were enacted, it would lead to “disaster.”
“If we don’t have a secure border in this country, we will have a different country. We need to stand united and the plan that Senator Sanders is putting forward is a disaster for this country,” he said on Fox News on Saturday.
Dannels said Sanders’ plan would be like a state’s governor abolishing all sheriffs and police chiefs. “It’s no difference at the federal level,” he said.
The sheriff’s comments came after members of a powerful drug cartel in Mexico massacred nine Americans, including women and children. In fact, Dannels presides in Cochise County, just across the border from where the massacre occurred.
Of the drug gangs now ruling Mexico, Dannels said: “They’re violent, they’re ruthless, and again, they’re core evil.”
On the campaign trail for the Democratic nomination, Sanders touts a plan to “break up” immigration enforcement agencies like ICE, end all deportations of those illegally in the United States, and grant full welfare access to illegal immigrants. He also wants to allow at least 50,000 “climate migrants” into the U.S.
Other Democrats vying for the nomination have similar plans. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) said Friday that she’s open to a placing moratorium on all deportations.
“I am open to suspending deportations particularly as a way to push Congress for comprehensive immigration reform,” Warren said. She said she thinks “that when ICE comes into our communities, takes our neighbors, our friends, our family members, that they do not make this country safer.”
Meanwhile, an action taken earlier this year by President Trump has greatly reduced the number of illegal aliens in the U.S.
The Trump administration enacted the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), which became known as the “Remain In Mexico” policy. The protocols require that foreigners who enter the U.S. illegally be processed, then released into Mexico — not the United States — to await their hearings.
Instead of waiting, though, thousands of migrants who were returned to Mexico gave up their asylum claims and went home, Fox News reports.
So far, the administration has returned more than 55,000 migrants to Mexico. The assessment describes the policy as an “indispensable tool in addressing the ongoing crisis at the southern border and restoring integrity to the immigration system.” It says that it has completed almost 13,000 cases as of Oct. 21.
The new assessment, significantly, cites estimates from Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that approximately 20,000 migrants are currently being sheltered in Mexico near the U.S. border as they still seek entry to the U.S. The assessment says that number, though, suggests “a significant proportion of the 55,000+ MPP returnees have chosen to abandon their claims.”
In an assessment of the Migrant Protection Protocols filed last week, the government said “At peak of the crisis in May 2019, there were more than 4,800 aliens crossing the border daily — representing an average of more than three apprehensions per minute.”