One of the few bright spots in the recent immigration debate-such as it is- has been Senator Ted Cruz, of Texas. Unlike the spineless Republican leadership-which has been shepherding the Gang of Eight scheme through the Senate-he has resolutely stood against any attempt at legalizing the 10-20 million illegal aliens granted amnesty under the terms of this bill.

Tomorrow afternoon he’ll be traveling to New York City and will most likely be greeted by an antagonistic open borders mob. NY ICE, on the other hand, is planning to stage a show of support for one of the few members of the U.S. Senate worth more than a bucket of warm spit. You can find details explaining how to join them below.

Hi NY ICers,

The report-backs from today’s counter protest are trickling in, and I will post them on NY ICE’s website here when I get them all, but,  from the initial report-backs, it sounds like a handful of NY ICers made a very successful counter protest of the D.R.E.A.M. amnesty that shook things up!

NY ICE will be having another counter protest tommorow, which is Wednesday, May 29th.  Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who has been on our side, will be in NYC tomorrow, and the other side is planning on protesting his appearance.

Here are the details:

WHAT:  NY ICE Counter Protest of amnesty-Seekers who are protesting Senator Ted Cruz’s appearance in NYC

When: Tomorrow (Wednesday) May 29, 2013, at 5:30 PM

Where: Grand Hyatt Hotel, 109 East 42 St., between Lexington and Vanderbilt

As always, bring cameras and signs, which should be simple and bold-faced. Signs specific to supporting Senator Ted Cruz are encourage. For example, “Thank you, Ted Cruz, for defending U.S. Sovereignty. 

Contact: Joanna Marzullo at progressrose@yahoo to let her know you are coming. 

P.S. Those of you living or working in the D.C./Metro Area might be interested in listening to a genuinely bipartisan discussion of immigration reform, which is slated to take place tomorrow morning at the Bipartisan Policy Center. You can find details about how to attend on their website. 

With the resignation of Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, it’s instructive to take a brief look over the Obama administration’s  labor policy priorities these past four years. Although the prime objectives of organized labor, such as the enactment of card check legislation, never saw the light of day during President Obama’s first term, labor unions did achieve some significant administrative victories. What’s more, the battle over labor regulations and law-both executive and legislative-was a focal point of national political discussion leading up to the 2012 presidential election.

What did not attract as much notice, unfortunately, was the systemic dismantling of immigration enforcement, especially during the last two years of Barack Obama’s first term, which arguably will have a significant impact upon the American economy in the years ahead. Even though I continue to believe that the negative consequences of mass immigration-especially of the largely unskilled sort we’ve seen since the 1965 Immigration Act-can’t be reduced to mere economic concerns, the cumulative cost of this wave includes a significant economic impact.

In addition to taxing already overburdened social welfare programs-to say nothing of the public education, criminal justice and health care distribution systems-the hundreds of thousands of low skilled immigrants we accept every year often displace the most economically insecure Americans, including some of the President’s most reliable political supporters.

Barack Obama’s immigration and labor policies seem designed to exacerbate the latter problem, a view confirmed by looking at recent job gains, which seem to have accrued solely to the benefit of immigrant workers. The tenure of Secretary Solis dovetailed nicely with this agenda, which included international agreements protecting the labor rights of illegal aliens from Latin American nations. While ensuring that workers are paid a wage rate consonant with the laws of the land is an admirable stance, one wonders why this administration did not deem it worthy of its ambition to deport these  workers, who-like their employers-are breaking the law.

It’s not as if these individuals are unknown to federal immigration officials. After all, Solis visited illegal day laborers in this very borough in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. However, holding illegal aliens accountable for their actions seems to be inimical to the political needs of the President and his political machine, which has expanded the vast administrative amnesty that has existed for the past two years to encompass everyone he or Janet Napolitano deems to be non-threatening, including virtually everyone who can feign interest in being a student and those who’ve committed multiple misdemeanors, i.e. criminals.

Like the highly politicized distribution of economic stimulus funds, this administration’s labor and immigration policies are not designed with the interests of Americans in mind so much as the best results for itself and its political and financial benefactors. Although Hilda Solis set a pretty low bar to clear, if past is prologue don’t expect her successor to be much of an improvement.

We don’t often cover the sporting news at American Rattlesnake, but after Cain Velasquez’s decisive victory over mixed martial arts rival Junior Dos Santos yesterday I thought it appropriate to revisit a post from last year where we examined the identity politics behind these fighters’ first matchup. Although MMA pioneer and uber-promoter Dana White would like us to believe that the  ’Brown Pride’ tattoo emblazoned upon this fighter’s chest is nothing more than an innocuous expression of ethnic pride-akin to the collective sense of accomplishment felt by those in Little Italy or Chinatown when a native son succeeds on the national stage-you have to wonder if this is truly the case. After all, this tattoo doesn’t express “Mexican-American Pride,” or even “Mexican Pride,” but is instead an explicitly racial affirmation.

Granted, I’m by  no means an expert in the minutiae of MMA, and his explanation of the reasoning behind this marking strikes me as benign as far as it goes-but the inherent double standard of publicly touting the achievements of one race while execrating another for things that might be completely devoid of racial context seems a bit hypocritical, at the very least.

Nonetheless, congratulations to Mr. Velasquez on his victory in a spirited contest. It should be noted that his financial success and surging popularity probably would not exist if his father had decided to remain in his homeland, rather than come to Salinas, California and marry an American woman of Mexican descent. Perhaps Cain Velasquez will find a place on his skin for the phrase “American Pride” during his next tattoo session. If for no other reason than perhaps enlarging his burgeoning fan base. Just a thought.

This month’s Rattle brings us a host of stories that the mainstream media didn’t cover sufficiently-preferring instead to shower accolades upon the man responsible for abandoning immigration enforcement in the name of political opportunism. We’ll cover everything from the latest spate of violent crimes committed by illegal aliens to Barack Obama’s continued roll out of administrative amnesty, which now includes directives to ignore both interior enforcement and border security.

But first, we’ll examine this administration’s ongoing obstruction of Congress’s investigation into the ever-broadening gun-walking scandals. Courtesy of Sipsey Street Irregulars-whose coverage of Fast and Furious is non pareil-we learn that the White House is blocking testimony from Kevin O’Reilly, a former staff member of the National Security Council who wants to speak with the Senate Judiciary Committee and House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. This administration’s invocation of executive privilege is just the latest example of obstruction of justice  relating to Fast and Furious.

It should be recalled that last July the acting head of the ATF told Congress that his agency was paying FBI agents to ignore the law in pursuit of this administration’s bizarre and opaque political goals. Immigration control, not gun control, is a solution that Barack Obama’s Justice Department dismisses out of hand. We can only hope that, as Katie Pavlich reports in Town Hall, Chairman Darrell Issa pursues this investigation to its conclusion, which hopefully will result in a more than a few stiff prison sentences. Speaking of Katie Pavlich, she has a fantastic new book about Fast and Furious entitled-appropriately-Obama’s Bloodiest Scandal, which I urge you all to read.

Obfuscation and evasion are hallmarks of this administration, especially as it pertains to immigration and border security, as an insightful commentary from Michael Cutler published by Fox News Latino illustrates. The former INS agent and current immigration watchdog points out that Janet Napolitano’s Department of Homeland Security is effectively “cooking the books” by relying solely upon  documented arrests-a misleading statistic-in order to pretend that this administration is cracking down upon illegal entry into the United States. FAIR’s Legislative Update further dissects this policy, which is drawing increasing scrutiny from Congress-particularly Chairman Darrell Issa and Rep. Jason Chaffetz- notwithstanding what Tom Tancredo accurately describes as a bipartisan conspiracy to hobble border security and immigration enforcement. By not logging and tracking the number of illegal border crossers who were not detained, Customs and Border Protection is painting a rosy picture of a much more dire situation.

The deceit of this administration extends beyond the CBP and encompasses virtually every aspect of immigration enforcement, both at the border and inside of the United States. Even though ICE is touting the Cross Check raids it initiated earlier this month-intended to apprehend ostensibly violent criminals, absconders and  fugitives from justice-this is merely a political expedient designed for election year consumption. The truth is that Barack Obama’s administrative amnesty proceeds apace, with four cities ordered to halt deportations, according to the Dan Stein Report. Remarkably, the Executive Office for Immigration Review has closed San Francisco’s immigration court and plans to completely halt its proceedings for the entire summer. Jim Kouri reports on yet another component of Barack Obama’s administrative amnesty, the decision to suspend deportations of illegal aliens with “families,” inside of the United States.

And while illegal aliens are not being deported, they will be able to enjoy state-of-the-art detention facilities, including some new amenities such as beach volleyball and cable TV. Lamar Smith excoriates this administration for its skewed priorities in a must-read op-ed published in The Hill. Although this new detention manual  might seem farcical, it’s far from a laughing matter. As Jim Kouri points out in his Examiner column, the Department of Homeland Security has taken virtually no action against foreigners who overstay their visas. This negligence persists over a decade after the September 11th massacres, which were committed by a cadre of jihadists whose visa applications are symptomatic of our country’s dysfunctional immigration bureaucracy. This is not merely an hypothetical problem, even after the destruction of the World Trade Center, as the case of illegal alien Amine El Khalifi demonstrates. The fact that this indifference to the lives of American citizens continues unabated, despite repeated pressure exerted by the GAO serves to illustrate this administration’s fundamental lack of accountability.

Even as it lags behind in locating and detaining criminal aliens, the administration of Barack Obama has deigned to grant Temporary Protected Status to thousands of Syrians living in the United States. As we’ve pointed out in the past, Temporary Protected Status is anything but temporary. In fact, it is merely another expedient used to grant de facto amnesty to a group of illegal aliens who can prove “hardship” circumstances, most of which persist indefinitely-making their stay in the United States permanent. This is even more disturbing when juxtaposed against the State Department’s recent decision to bar inspection of a visiting Egyptian delegation consisting of Muslim Brotherhood officials. Of course, Egypt isn’t the only country where the Ikwhan has a strong foothold.

The problem is that Barack Obama’s ostensible opposition, i.e. congressional Republicans, are doing virtually nothing to investigate the egregious overreach of his administration on immigration matters. Quite the contrary, some are hard at work developing proposals that would only worsen the situation, such as DREAM Lite, in hopes of  cultivating the ever-elusive Hispanic vote. Republican leaders in the states are not faring much better in this regard, as the difficult struggle in New Hampshire to prevent illegal aliens from capitalizing upon in-state tuition benefits demonstrates.

In an update to a story that we’ve covered recently, the North Carolina General Assembly held another hearing on illegal immigration and potential enforcement mechanisms. Unfortunately, according to NC Listen, it was dominated by illegal aliens and their supporters in the legislature, including some of the very people who had disrupted a previous hearing about these problems. Heading further south, we learn that the Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhood Act has been killed in the Mississippi State Senate. Apparently, Judiciary Chairman Hob Bryan has caved knuckled under to the Mississippi Poultry Association and its desire for cheap labor, notwithstanding the harm such a decision may inflict on innocent Mississippians. Its neighbor to the East, Alabama, has revisited HB 56, the landmark legislation that targeted illegal aliens living in that state. Rep. Micky Hammon has decided to alter some of the provisions that have been enjoined by a federal court, but maintains that he and his fellow Republicans will not repeal the law, which is welcome news.

In not so good news, Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle has decided to defy Immigration and Customs Enforcement and refuse detainer requests for criminal aliens housed in her county’s jails. Saul Chavez is one beneficiary of Preckwinkle’s benevolence, having fled the country upon being released from jail after killing William McCann. The carnage our government’s policies wreak is not limited to the odd vehicular manslaughter though, as the massacre at Oikos University in California makes clear to any impartial observer. Limits to Growth has an insightful story about mass-murderer One L. Goh which explains the circumstances surrounding his rampage which the main stream media willfully ignores. Oikos was apparently more concerned with harvesting tuition payments by foreign students-often with loans backed by American taxpayers-than ensuring the safety of its student body. It brings to mind  9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, whose entrance to the United States was facilitated by a campus administration eager to recruit students from the Middle East, heedless of the potentially deadly repercussions.

The fact that there are visa mills exploiting the F-1 Visa program should come as no surprise to people who are aware of the extensive fraud and exploitation present in the legal immigration system. Just as in Canada-which recently charged attorney Sandra Zaher with inventing false refugee claims-the United States is plagued by immigration fraud so pervasive that the conviction of Earl Seth David, aka Rabbi Avraham David, head of a New York law firm, headlines an ICE press release. The irony of an agency headed by John Morton-who’s tasked with expediting illegal immigration-spotlighting the conviction of someone for immigration fraud is apparently lost on this administration.

In another prime example of abuse, a lawsuit by two former employees of Larsen & Toubro InfoTech Limited Inc alleges systemic fraud at the India-based IT firm for which they once worked. Joining an earlier class action filed against the firm, this suit asserts that the plaintiff was forced to not only forge documents related to H-1B visas-a program rampant with corruption and fraud-but told not to report the crime to outside authorities. Read the sickening story for yourself, if you feel you have the requisite stomach. The baffling purposes of the H1-B visa program weren’t illuminated by a recent decision by Judge Gregory Frost, who ordered suppressed almost all information related to the case of  Geza Rakoczi, who is described thusly,

…a young alien man with a mysterious legal status, probably an illegal alien, who has a bachelor’s degree from a marginal educational institution, a private one that accepts all applicants, and his employer, a mortgage finance company in trouble in two different states.

Putting the lie to the idea that these visas are reserved for “highly-skilled” immigrants. More often than not they are merely convenient bodies used to replace the more demanding, highly-compensated Americans who they’ve made redundant. If you don’t believe me, just ask the wife of unemployed semiconducter engineer Darin Wedel, who is still waiting to hear back from President Obama. But do not fear, the virtual border fence is back on track,which I suppose is small comfort to the thousands of hard-working Americans like Mr. Wedel.  However, India is not the only nation to take advantage of the nebulous, easily exploitable H1-B visa program. As Phyllis Schlafly  points out, the Islamist Gulen movement in Turkey has used these same visas in order to indoctrinate Muslim students in American charter schools. The dangers posed by the Gulen movement have been explored ad nauseam in other forums, but it should be noted that even if you ascribe the most benign of intentions to the Gullenists, the idea that fundamentalist Muslim teachers are somehow highly skilled workers is implausible on its face.  Focusing on yet another rising Asian power, the New American has an interesting story about the PRC’s use of the EB-5 immigrant investor visa program in the state of Idaho which is well worth reading.

Returning to more timely issues, we discovered this past week that it’s not all that difficult to register to vote using a fabricated identity, or even assuming the persona of the current Attorney General  of the United States. Thanks to James O’Keefe we’ve discovered how simple it is to game the system, although officials at the increasingly misnamed Justice Department don’t seem to agree. Of course, acknowledging that vote fraud exists would require the Obama administration to prosecute those responsible for it, which wouldn’t bode well for the electoral prospects of Barack Obama’s party. From New York to Florida, from Indiana to Arizona, stealing elections has become quite commonplace, even as the White House-and its complaisant cronies in the media-scoff at the notion. Some Democrats, though, readily admit that trying to manipulate the outcome of elections is a routine practice, and a few even have the integrity to support measures that would rectify this betrayal of democracy.

In an ironic twist, labor unions-which were some of the most vehement supporters of President Obama’s Stimulus plan-are now complaining about some of the jobs stemming from stimulus projects going to Korean workers. I suppose the lesson is to be careful what you wish for, especially if it is over 700 billion dollars worth of taxpayer-financed boondoggles.

In more border violence, two illegal immigrants were murdered just northwest of Tucson on Thursday by two camouflaged gunman, echoing an attack that occurred  near the same city in 2007. This sort of bloodshed is rare but not unheard of in Arizona, especially in the Tucson sector, where over forty percent of this nation’s  illegal aliens come through. It is yet another reason why the constitutionality of SB 1070 must be upheld by the Supreme Court, in spite of the hostility of open borders dogmatists such as the misleadingly named Democrats in the House of Representatives.

Our final story is related to our relationship to the state as individuals, and how that relationship is changing as a result of our government’s decades-long recalibration of this country’s demographics. Courtesy of the Pew Hispanic Center, we now know that over seventy percent of Latinos want the government to provide more services to Americans, not less. Limits to Growth has a fascinating summary of the survey’s other findings, which include a belief among Hispanics that they should learn English in order to succeed in the United States, but not in order to integrate into the broader society. The findings about faith in government are worth exploring though, because they reinforce something that our side has been saying for a very long time. Namely, that Hispanic voters’ support for Democrats and generally left wing political candidates has very little to do with the GOP’s position on immigration, but a lot to do with their endorsement of redistributive economic policies.

The findings of the Pew Hispanic Center demonstrate that the cause and effect most often cited in declining Republican Party affiliation among Hispanics-embodied by the specious narrative about Pete Wilson and the waning fortunes of the California GOP-is reversed. Hispanics do not support the Democratic Party because it advocates open borders, the Democratic Party supports open borders because it enhances its ability to win future elections. In effect, what is happening is that the political elite is electing a new people. This dynamic needs to be remembered whenever we hear mealy-mouthed Republicans exhorting us to abandon any attempt to impose reason upon an anachronistic immigration system that is designed to thwart the wishes of the vast majority of the American public.

It’s going to be a long, tumultuous election year.

To listen to the Democratic Party, Latinos have political tunnel-vision, caring only about immigration issues.   Latinos, like the rest of their fellow Americans, care about a broad array of issues.
A quick look at the Univision homepage bears this out.  That may be a bad example — a quick look at the Univision homepage suggests Latinos are obsessed with women in bikinis.

Fox News has just released a poll of American Latino voters, and the results are worthy of careful consideration.

Latinos’ first concern, like the rest of us, is the state of the economy.  They care about immigration, but more from a personal point of view:

“The question for most Latinos is not whether they want more immigration or less immigration,” said Allert Brown-Gort, associate director of the Institute for Latino Studies at the University of Notre Dame. “It has to do not so much with the (candidate’s) stance on immigration, but the attitude that Latinos perceive that Republicans have of Latinos when they talk about immigration.”

And while Latinos currently support some amnesty programs like the DREAM Act, they are also against open borders:

In the poll, many Latinos showed support for enforcement of immigration laws – 56 percent say that having “open borders” would be detrimental to the United States, hurting the economy. Slightly more than 30 percent differ, believing open borders would help the economy.

As American Rattlesnake has documented, getting tough on violators of immigration laws is a winning political strategy, even in states with a large Latino population.

The Fox News poll is a valuable snapshot of the current mood of the 12 million Latino voters in this country, and worthy of direct perusal by American Rattlesnake readers.

Our last Rattle of 2011 runs the gamut, all the way from an immigration enforcement success in Pennsylvania to a disappointing judicial setback in South Carolina. However, we begin the final roundup of the year with a must-read essay in The American Conservative by W. James Antle III. It looks at the immigration scorecard in a sober, realistic analysis that takes into account the substantive victories of immigration reformers-such as continued nationwide support for SB 1070 and its clones-to the unquestionable failures, including a seismic change in the language of the immigration debate, which has turned the phrase “immigration reform” into a synonym for wholesale amnesty. It’s a piece that anyone who is concerned about this subject-as I know most of you are-should read in its entirety. 

We continue by highlighting a great post over at the American Thinker that poses several questions that Newt Gingrich has yet to satisfactorily answer about his dubious proposal to create a tiered system of permanent non-citizen workers out of the pool of 11-20 million illegal aliens currently living here. Be John Galt  expresses some other concerns that have yet to be addressed by Newt while emphasizing the points made by Mickey Kaus in his own analysis of Newt’s plan. Something that conservatives supporting Gingrich-but who are ostensibly opposed to amnesty-need to answer is why they’re backing a candidate whose immigration platform mirrors the one put forward by open borders, libertarian economist Bryan Caplan.

Staying in the field of presidential politicking, American Rattlesnake wholeheartedly endorses the statements of Mitt Romney, vis-a-vis President Obama’s illegal alien uncle, Onyango Obama. For those of you who might not recall, Omar Onyango Obama is not only residing in this country illegally-much like the President’s beloved Aunt Zeituni-but is the owner and operator of a liquor store in Boston, despite his recent DUI conviction.

Meanwhile, Mitt Romney’s opponent Rick Perry continued his tough on the border pantomime in Iowa, decrying the inability of the federal government to control our southern border with Mexico, as well as declaring that he would withdraw the Justice Department’s lawsuits against states like Arizona and Alabama. The pull quote from this article is “the border has to be shut down for the future of the United States of America.” One wonders what he would do with the estimated forty percent of illegal aliens who overstay their visas. I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see how serious Governor Perry is about his newfound posture of immigration hawk.

It does seem that the current crop of presidential candidates is being forced to address the concerns of Republican voters, however reluctantly and haltingly. That said, VDare has a fascinating piece exploring the damage that refugee resettlement has caused in Manchester, New Hampshire, and why the national GOP has been completely AWOL on this issue, despite its ritualistic paeans to the role of New Hampshire as the first state in the nation to hold its presidential primary. The politically courageous current mayor of Manchester is standing up for his constituents, even if the federal government and parasitical members of the refugee resettlement industry won’t. Perhaps the boldness of Ted Gatsas will serve as an example for his timorous counterparts in the national GOP to emulate. We can all hope.

The internal strife caused by the U.S. State Department in Maine is mirrored in Florence, Italy, where the tragic deaths of two Senegalese street merchants is being exploited by media organs to condemn the “racism” of ordinary Italians. Sadly, the exploitation of tragedies like this for political purposes is nothing new to the multicultural zealots spearheading the militant, Gramscian left. Nor is the equation of patriotic, reasonable opposition to mass immigration to racism an anomaly, unfortunately. It seems like these sorts of ad hominem attacks come with the territory, as Peter Brimelow pointed out in yesterday’s post.

Heading down to Washington D.C., we find that the usual rogue’s gallery of open borders demagogues is trying once again to foist amnesty upon an American public, and a Congress, that has consistently rejected it since it was first introduced over a decade ago.  The tireless efforts of Dick Durbin to give the bird to American taxpayers and hard-working students wouldn’t be newsworthy in itself, if not for the fact that a Philippine newspaper is now leading the charge to see the enactment of the DREAM Act. Media bias in reporting of immigration issues is nothing new, especially from foreign newspapers who hold no reverence for American law. However, the fact that a member of the United States Senate is cribbing notes from a newspaper overseas in order to undermine the country he’s ostensibly representing is a sad commentary on the state of politics in America in 2011.

Taking a short jaunt to Baltimore, we say farewell to WBAL institution Ron Smith. Before being struck down by cancer at the age of 70, Smith was a resonant voice of reason and integrity in a world where too may fall prey to the lure of the D.C. cocktail circuit. Gregory Kane has a fitting tribute to him in the Washington Examiner. Michelle Malkin testifies to the humanity of Ron on her website as well. Like the late, great Terry Anderson-another immigration patriot who died last year-Ron Smith will be missed by many people across the country, most of whom never knew him personally. Rest in Peace, Ron.

In slightly cheerier news, the Pennsylvania House of Representatives has approved a bill that would penalize employers who hire illegal workers. Fox News Latino has the entire story, which touches upon similar bills that were eventually enacted in states like Alabama and Arizona. On the other hand, the drive for immigration enforcement suffered a blow in South Carolina, where a federal judge has enjoined a law that cracked down on human smuggling and gave law enforcement officers the opportunity to detain those arrested for unrelated crimes if they were illegal aliens. As Governor Nikki Haley’s spokesman has said, the ultimate resolution of this case rests in the hands of the Supreme Court.

Our neighbor to the north is having its own immigration problems, which  have been amply documented by American Rattlesnake in previous updates. Canada’s capable Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is tackling them in stride, initiating the largest crackdown on citizenship fraud in recent memory. Of course, his proactive initiatives-including an innovative tip line ordinary Canadians can use to report cases of immigration fraud-have earned scorn from the usual suspects. Notwithstanding the carping from bottom-feeding immigration attorneys and radical, open borders socialists, Kenney has earned respect from the public and his adversaries across the aisle, as this National Post article demonstrates.

If only our president had cabinet members willing to stand up for their fellow countrymen. Instead, we have Hilda Solis, the U.S. Secretary of Labor, doing everything in her capacity to empower illegal aliens instead of the Americans who are struggling beneath a crushing unemployment rate and prolonged recession. Even as the unemployment rate plummets in the Yellowhammer State because of HB 56, Solis tries to find ways to double down on the failure of the Obama administration to provide economic opportunities for American citizens. Combined with the administration’s decision to remove the last remaining National Guard troops from our southern border, Barack Obama has demonstrated his disdain for the concerns of the American electorate.

In other administration news, the head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Alan Bersin, has resigned from his post. An unconfirmed recess appointment by President Obama, Bersin will be replaced by David V. Aguilar. But don’t worry open borders enthusiasts, Mr. Aguilar is four square in favor of amnesty, although he prefers to call it something else.

Finally, the ongoing congressional investigations into Operation Fast and Furious and this administration’s persistent coverup continue apace. We now have Senator Joseph Lieberman, previously known for his atrocious record on immigration issues, directing the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, which he currently chairs, to investigate the interagency “miscommunication” that lies at the heart of the Fast and Furious debacle. Let’s hope that he and Senator Grassley can elicit a more responsive reaction by administration officials than we’ve seen in the past. What is certain is that the men and woman who were killed, including Agent Jaime Zapata, as a result of the Justice Department’s and ATF’s negligence will never return to the warm embrace of their loved ones. If nothing else, let’s push for some measure of justice and accountability for those still alive.

Hat Tips: The Tea Party Immigration Coalition NCFreedom and NAFBPO

Speaking of Michele Bachmann, she’s released a comprehensive immigration plan that would incrementally deport the estimated 11 million illegal aliens currently living in the United States. In addition to implementing a policy of enforcement through attrition, she would construct a border fence along the Mexican-American border, mandate that English be this nation’s official language, and do away with birthright citizenship. In a must-listen interview with Laura Ingraham, she also takes Newt Gingrich to task for his amnesty lite plan, which couldn’t differ more starkly from the Bachmann platform.

In disturbing news, the House of of Representatives has rubber stamped a bill that would exacerbate one of the most damaging aspects of our current immigration policy, i.e. chain migration. While the useful idiots in the mainstream media have attempted to portray this bill as benefitting high-skilled immigrants from China and India who want to remain in the United States, the true beneficiaries of this-should it be enacted into law-will be thousands of distant relatives from countries like Mexico sponsored by newly minted American citizens. Any time you hear the word “bipartisanship” your attenae as American citizens should go up, and this is no different. When the leader of the National Immigration Forum-one of the legal and political spearheads of the open borders movement-and Chuck Schumer support something, it’s usually a good idea to oppose it. Unfortunately, that’s not what the Republican-led Congress did, and we’re so much the worse for it.

In a shameful example of the depths to which the fifth estate will stoop in order to promote their open borders agenda, the tragic suicide of a young man named Joaquin Luna is being manipulated by the mainstream media in order to promote the DREAM Act, which has been repeatedly and emphatically rejected by Congress since it was first introduced over a decade ago. The good folks at Newsbusters have an astute analysis of the despicable manner in which just one media outlet-in this case, CNN-has attempted to politicize this personal tragedy.

One of the real tragedies of the immigration debate-such as it is-that we’re having in this country is the distortive effect the media has when it comes to prioritizing issues. Instead of focusing on the potential illegal alien recipients of taxpayer largesse, why aren’t we discussing the amount of carnage illegals are cumulatively inflicting upon our society? Jim Kouri has a must-read piece highlighting a buried government report that examines the damage they have caused by creating some of the most destrutive forest fires in our country’s southwest, particularly Arizona. It’s rare that I compliment John McCain, but I agree with The Blaze’s assessment that the GAO report vindicates previous public statements he’s made on this matter.

In news closer to home, a New Jersey judge has ordered the deportation of a woman who is allegedly being targeted by a Guatemalan gang called Valle del Sol while allowing her sister to remain the United States indefinitely. The extent of gang influence in Latin America is staggering, demonstrated once again by the open declaration of war on American and Mexican authorities recently issued by Los Zetas, perhaps the most feared narco-cartel in the country of Mexico.

In a case eerily similar to Operation Fast and Furious, the United States government is now facing calls for investigation into a money laundering operation undertaken by the Drug Enforcement Administration in an attempt to find patterns among Mexican drug trafficking criminal syndicates.

Staying in Mexico, we find a claim by Mexican authorities that they’ve foiled an international conspiracy by one of the late dictator Mouammar Kadhafi’s fugitive sons to escape Libya through illegal passage into Mexico. This story would be worthy of mockery if the impact of Mexican illegal immigration-facilitated by the Mexican government itself-weren’t such a grave matter.

In yet more news of immigration fraud that endangers our nation, a woman living in Rancho Cucamonga  has been arrested for bringing in unauthorized foreign students to train at her flight school under fraudulent visas. For those of you who are regular followers of American Rattlesnake, this story will sound very familiar. Apparently, our government has learned very little from September 11th.

In contrast, the government of Israel seems to be learning very rapidly how much damage an open door policy can inflict upon a nation’s sovereignty. That’s why Israeli Interior Minister Eli Yishai has come out publicly and stated that African economic migrants-from predominately Muslim nations like Eritrea and Sudan-will no longer be welcomed with open arms by the Jewish state. The national identity of Israel may very well be imperiled by overly generous asylum policies, a lesson that we in North America  have yet to absorb.

Last but not least, we’re pleased to bring you another incisive, amusing take on the skewed priorities of our federal government, courtesy of Anthony Bialy. Even as this administration waves the white flag on illegal alien border jumpers, it continues its war against hippie drug paraphernalia. Only in America, and only under the Obama administration.

I normally wouldn’t devote an entire post to mixed martial arts, especially when there are such vital issues to discuss-including the Obama administration’s continued war against the State of Arizona. The sport doesn’t particularly appeal to me as a spectator, and I’m of the opinion that if I wanted to watch men who didn’t know how to throw a punch properly do battle, I’d watch boxing. However, I believe that an exception must be made for the much-anticipated UFC fight that will be broadcast by Fox Sports shortly. The reason being that this fight involves a fighter, Cain Velasquez, of Mexican heritage who I think embodies some of the more problematic aspects of this country’s immigration and acculturation policies with respect to Latinos. 

Mr. Velasquez hails from Salinas, California, the birthplace of John Steinbeck, who immortalized his majestic, dry home in many of the 20th Century’s greatest novels. As this story points out, Velasquez takes great pride in his ethnic heritage, and exults in his ability to inspire other young boys who come from similar circumstances. Yet, I couldn’t help but note the discordance of someone who is a native Californian-a person from a state that’s been a part of the union for well over a century and a half-uttering these words:

“I’m proud to be Mexican, and if I can be a role model for some people, I’m happy to be that person. I’m glad I’m in this position.”

Now, I have no problem with someone displaying pride in his heritage. I certainly don’t take issue with Americans of Mexican descent or recently immigrated Mexicans expressing pride in an athlete whose family comes from Mexico. Just as Irish-Americans in the past rooted for Jack Dempsey, or those of Japanese extraction today cheer on MLB stars like Ichiro Suzuki, it’s to be expected that MMA fans whose parents or grandparents are Mexican would take an especial interest in the success of someone who looks and speaks like them. The fact that he serves as a source of inspiration for boys who might otherwise channel their aggression in unproductive, potentially illegal, avenues is something praiseworthy indeed. Yet the fact remains that Mr. Velasquez does not acknowledge-even in the form of a fleeting aside-the value of being raised in the United States, ostensibly his place of birth.

Perhaps this attitude of indifference is to be expected in a state where the distinction between illegal aliens and citizens has been blurred, if not erased altogether. Maybe it’s merely another sign that culturally we have recognized California as an extension of Mexico, effectively nullifying the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, just as some public schools seem to have acknowledged. As our past coverage of Mexican sporting events hosted in the Golden State makes clear, the United States can no longer play a friendly on home soil. But I can’t help but asking, just as Adam Carolla did in a subtly perspicacious scene in his film The Hammer, why Cain Velasquez is so proud of a country that his parents abandoned, yet so utterly dismissive of the country where he and his family have prospered beyond the wildest dreams of most Mexican nationals.

It’s a question that you might want to ask yourself as you watch him compete tonight against underdog Junior Dos Santos, who has no problem expressing pride in his country.

What happens when you launch a boycott and people still come? I guess you’ll have to ask La Raza, considering its attempt to bankrupt Arizonan commerce has turned into a colossal bust. Mark Krikorian has all of the juicy details in a  post at CIS  which explains why the NCLR has been forced to retreat from its ill-conceived boycott of the Grand Canyon State. Yet more proof, on the heels of anti-illegal, pro-enforcement candidate Bob Turner’s  recent election win, that standing up for your values will eventually be rewarded.

Keep up the good work, Jan Brewer and Russell Pearce! You’re doing a phenomenal job, even if some people don’t appreciate the efforts you’ve expended to protect your state.