Democrats continue to compare Immigration and Customs Enforcement to the Gestapo. Even setting aside the important question of whether this contributes to the wave of violence against ICE personnel, it certainly shows that Democrats have learned nothing from President Joe Biden’s border crisis and are incapable of enforcing immigration law.
Last Wednesday, a young man named Joshua Jahn allegedly opened fire on an ICE facility in Dallas, killing a detainee and injuring two others. Jahn, who friends say was “passionate” about the desperation of illegal migrants, left a note reading, “Hopefully this will give ICE agents real terror, to think, is there a sniper with AP [armor piercing] rounds on that roof.”
Jahn’s anti-ICE attack was not an isolated incident. In July, 11 anti-ICE activists set an ambush at another ICE facility, in Alvarado, Texas, and shot an officer in the neck. Fortunately, he survived. This comes after a fire bomb was thrown at ICE officers in Portland, Oregon, a Border Patrol officer was shot in McAllen, Texas, and an ICE building in Yakima, Washington, was burned.
Democrats say they oppose violence against ICE, but their rhetoric is reason to doubt. Vice Presidential candidate Tim Walz and Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) have called ICE “the Gestapo,” Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA) and Delia Ramirez (D-IL) have called ICE a “terrorist organization,” and Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX) has compared ICE to “slave patrols.” How should good people be expected to react to the presence and actions of Nazis, terrorists, and slavers?
Shouldn’t the Gestapo and slave patrols be met with forceful resistance? If so, how is comparing ICE to such people not a call to violence?
Democrats have blurred what used to be an obvious and bright line between speech and violence. Holding signs and shouting at ICE agents is protected speech. Standing in front of ICE vehicles and preventing the transportation of detainees is obstruction of justice. House Democratic candidates now compete to see who can obstruct ICE agents the most. Blocking cars is just a step away from throwing rocks and slashing tires. Once some violence against ICE is normalized, lethal violence is not far behind. Both these candidates have called for the abolition of ICE as a law enforcement agency.
As bad as the link between Democratic rhetoric and anti-ICE violence is, the larger problem for Democrats is that they still don’t accept that ICE is a necessary part of immigration policy.
Since former Vice President Kamala Harris’s election loss last November, some Democrats have tried to address the party’s immigration problem by embracing tougher standards for asylum-seekers and paying to hire more Border Patrol agents.
But what is still verboten among Democrats is support for ICE and its mission, deporting illegal aliens. Democrats say they support the deportation of illegal immigrants who commit violent crimes such as rape and murder, but they cannot bring themselves to accept that those who broke the law to enter the country should be kicked out. Even if bipartisan legislation were to be passed fixing the asylum system, fixing high-skill immigration, and fixing guest worker programs, the federal government would still need a law enforcement agency to deport people here illegally. Before Biden’s illegal immigrant invasion, more than half of illegal immigrants entered legally and then overstayed their visas. Without ICE, we would have no way of sending them back to their home countries. If we build a system without ICE that allows people to stay forever, we don’t really have an immigration policy at all.
TRUMP PROTECTS AMERICAN WORKERS WITH H1B REFORM
President Donald Trump’s goal of 3,000 deportations a day is causing unnecessary strain in immigrant communities, driving down his approval on immigration as an issue. But as unpopular as aggressive deportations are, poll after poll shows Democrats are less trusted on the issue. They deserve it. Their anti-ICE rhetoric shows they still reject the agency’s core mission and lack the will necessary to enforce the law.
