What’s Up With Obama’s Selective Immigration Enforcement?

Retired INS Agent Micahel Cutler is back in The Morning Zone today at 7:07AM MDT

This week Michael Cutler's commentary for the CAPS (Californians for Population Stabilization) website focuses on the lunacy being foisted on our nation and our citizens by the Obama administration’s malfeasant use of prosecutorial discretion to achieve a political goal at the expense of the citizens of our nation.  I am providing you with a copy of that commentary below.
You certainly don’t ned me to tell you that our country is getting hammered from multiple directions from challenges and threats that impact the lives of our citizens on a daily basis and are of such concern that it is impossible to be aware of these threats and challenges that range from the potential for future terrorist attacks, the increasing presence of transnational gangs such as the highly violent and pernicious Mexican drug cartels in ever more cities around our country and the economic crisis that has contributed to a soaring unemployment rate.
However, it would certainly appear that the administration and all too many members of Congress are unable or unwilling to effectively grapple with these issues because in order to do so, they would have to make decisions that I suspect, would run contrary to the goals and desires of the deep-pocketed campaign contributors who bankrolled the political campaigns of these elected “representatives.”
The problem our nation faces is that all too many of these representatives represent their contributors and not their true constituents- the citizens of our nation who live within their states and districts!  Perhaps it truly is time to rename the House of Representatives the “House of Corporate Interests!”
While it would be an act of political suicide for a politician to proclaim that he (she) does not care about the creation of jobs, what is never discussed by the members of the media or by nearly every politician from both parties, is that it is worthless to create new jobs if, at the end of the day, Americans and lawful immigrants don’t get the jobs!
When you realize how many illegal aliens and other foreign workers on “temporary” work visas are employed in the United States, it should occur to these folks that most out of work Americans of every race, religion and ethnicity could have jobs tomorrow morning, without new jobs being created, if our nation’s immigration laws were effectively and honestly enforced!
The immigration laws are rarely enforced especially from within the interior of the United States.  ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) has roughly 7,000 special agents.  Half of those agents are not even working on cases involving the enforcement of immigration laws but are focused on Customs laws.  That means that perhaps there are about 3,500 ICE enforcement officers engaged in enforcing our nation’s immigration laws from within the interior of the United States.
To put this is proper perspective, the NYPD used to have approximately 40,000 police officers- because of the budget crisis, we are now down to about 35,000 police officers working for the NYPD to protect the City of New York which has a population of about 8 million residents.
ICE has about 10% the number of enforcement personnel as New York City has police officers.  While many claim that there are about 12 million illegal aliens in the United States, in reality there are probably 3 times as many illegal aliens.  Furthermore the enforcement of the immigration laws requires more than simply seeking illegal aliens and arresting them- it also involves complex investigations into fraud rings- those that produce fraud documents and those who are engaged in conspiring to defraud the immigration benefits program- often enabling criminals and even terrorists to acquire lawful immigrant status and even United States citizenship.  ICE is also supposed to conduct investigations into employers who intentionally hire illegal aliens, criminal aliens and transnational criminal organizations and seek to locate and apprehend aliens who had been deported and reentered the United States without authorization.  ICE also participates in various task forces such as the Drug Task Force and the Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF).
It is estimated that there are anywhere from 4.5 million to 10 million visa violators in the United States (illegal aliens don’t only run our nation’s borders many come through ports of entry and then, in one way or another, violated the terms of their admission).  ICE has allocated approximately 3% of its meager resources to locate and apprehend these illegal aliens.  To put this in another way, at present fewer than 300 ICE agents are seeking to apprehend millions of illegal aliens who have violated the terms of their admission. You should know that the terrorists of 9/11 were visa violators!
Additionally, foreign workers, as might be expected send their paychecks home to their families in countries around the world.  Every year this amounts to well over one hundred billion dollars that is not spent in the United States and not invested in the United States.  Meanwhile unemployed Americans are now facing foreclosure on their homes because their jobs have vanished.
If we could remove illegal aliens from the workforce and if we could make certain that there was real integrity to the various nonimmigrant visa programs that enables foreign workers to take jobs in the United States, millions of jobs would suddenly be freed up for Americans to take!
Instead, the administration has just announced that they will use “prosecutorial discretion” to stop efforts to deport hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens- often on the thinnest of excuses.  The administration is even declaring that aliens who would have qualified for lawful status under the auspices of the “DREAM Act” will not be removed from the United States and given work authorization!  This absolutely leaves me speechless!
Under our Constitution and under our system of government- a government that is often described as being a government “Of the people, by the people and for the people,” Congress is supposed to represent the will of the people.  Several unsuccessful attempts were made to enact “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” and the “DREAM Act.”
Those bills are dead and gone- yet the administration in a move that defies reason and, to my knowledge, precedence, has declared that aliens who would have qualified for lawful status will be essentially treated as though those ill-fated and wrong-headed laws had actually passed the legislative process and were enacted!
Wow!
I am greatly concerned that this could be the start of something awful!  Imagine if, from now on, every time a law the administration liked fail to pass the legislative process and the administration simply issued “Executive Orders” that had the equivalent impact of the laws that failed to be enacted!
That would be the end of our democratic republic as we know!
It is important to know that the enforcement of our nation’s immigration laws have enabled specific cases to be placed in “deferred action” but not because of the reasons that the administration is now using as justification.  In my experience- and as an INS special agent I adjudicated such cases a number of years ago, an alien who had been admitted into the United States would not be compelled to leave the United States if he(she) or an immediate family member became ill or injured or there was some other unforeseen emergency that would have made it unfair to demand that such alien depart the United States in the midst of a family or personal crisis.  Generally we did not grant employment authorization to such aliens, we simply permitted them to remain in the United States to complete medical treatment, participate in the care of a loved one or finalize funeral arrangements or deal with other such immediate family emergencies.
The immigration current policy makes a mockery of our nation’s immigration laws and of our legislative processes.  This is an outrage and utterly unacceptable!

Please take the time to read my commentary that I have posted below.
A country without secure borders can no more stand than can a house without walls!
I f  our country is to survive and if our children and their children are to get their share of the “American Dream” the citizens of this nation must take their citizenship seriously! We the People must be the best citizens we can be, citizens who are worthy of the gallantry demonstrated by our valiant men and women in the military, law enforcement and firefighters, who routinely go in harm’s way in defense of this nation and our citizens.   My goal in writing this and other commentaries is to point out our nations many failings before more victims pay the ultimate price for the incompetence and ineptitude of our government. The first step in problem-solving is to first identify the problems and vulnerabilities and then devise strategies to overcome them. If you find yourself to be in agreement with this commentary, I ask that you forward it to as many of your friends and family members as possible and encourage them to do the same.  We need to create a “Bucket Brigade of Truth!” The practice of good citizenship does not end in the voting booth, it only begins there. The large scale apathy demonstrated by citizens of this nation has emboldened elected representatives to all but ignore the needs of the average American citizen in a quest for massive campaign funds and the promises of votes to be ostensibly delivered by special interest groups. There is much that we cannot do but there is one thing that We the People absolutely must do- we must stop sitting on the sidelines! The collective failure of We the People to get involved in make our concerns known to our politicians have nearly made the concerns of the great majority of the citizens of this nation all but irrelevant to the politicians.  I implore you to get involved! I believe our nation’s is greatly benefited by the rich diversity of our people which is why I could never imagine living anywhere except New York City, arguably the most diverse city in our nation if not, in fact, the world.  However, my idea of diversity most certainly does not include members of MS-13, the Mexican drug cartels or members of other transnational gangs or members of al-Qaeda! If our government’s failures to secure our nation’s borders and effectively enforce our immigration laws concerns you or especially if it angers you, I ask you to call your Senators and Congressional “Representative. This is not only your right- it is your obligation!  All I ask is that you make it clear to our politicians that we are not as dumb as they hope we are! We live in a perilous world and in a perilous era. The survival of our nation and the lives of our citizens hang in the balance. This is neither a Conservative issue, nor is it a Liberal issue- simply stated, this is most certainly an AMERICAN issue! You are either part of the solution or you are a part of the problem! Democracy is not a spectator sport! Lead, follow or get out of the way!