-As we predicted, the Senate passed the Gang of Eight amnesty yesterday, setting the stage for the final battle in the House of Representatives, which is ostensibly controlled by Republicans. You can view the roll call vote, which will serve as a handy reminder of which cringing Republicans need to be removed from office the next time they come up for reelection.

-The Senate debate over disassembling our republic was a thoroughly unedifying spectacle, from the senescent tirades of the Republican Party’s chief open borders pom pom twirler to the irrefragable idiocy that we’ve come to expect from his mini-me, Lindsey Graham. The only consolation is that some of us will be able to elect a new Senate before Congress elects a new people.

-You would think the threat of a bitterly fought, expensive primary-endorsed by no less than a former GOP Vice-presidential nominee-would cause skittish representatives to think twice before enacting a politically and economically ruinous amnesty. The promise by Rep. Steve King to depose Speaker Boehner if he moves forward on S.744-a move supported by powerful members of the House Republican caucus-seems to have instilled a measure of fear into La Raza enthusiast Luis Gutierrez’s BFF.

-Then again, the Republican leadership has never been known for its sagacity or political intuition. A fact demonstrated by comments made by RNC Chairman Reince Priebus after Senate passage of the Gang of Eight monstrosity. The elites have an entirely different conception of the public interest than that of most Americans, who tend to prioritize things like job security, safety, and upward mobility over the concerns of large corporate donors such as Big Agra and Silicon Valley lobbyists pleading for the importation of more high tech serfs.

-I tend to agree with Mark Levin, who believes that if amnesty is stopped in this session of Congress it will be in spite of John Boehner, not because of him. This man wants amnesty to be the law of the land, and the only thing preventing his wish from being fulfilled is the unified opposition of conservative Republican voters. The leadership of the Republican Party in the House needs to be reminded that they do not work for either Nancy Pelosi or Barack Obama, but for their constituents, i.e. patriotic  citizens who believe in American sovereignty and real border security. Even if the demise of the GOP as a national political entity is meaningless to them, these people should be reminded that they are placing their own political careers in jeopardy.

-With the abdication of leadership and abandonment of principle by so many Republicans, it’s reassuring to find a small glimmer of light in the struggle over amnesty in one of the least likely places. I refer to a fantastic piece published by The New Republic written by self-described liberal, opposing immigration reform. Much like Ted Rall, T.A. Frank sees the peril in naturalizing millions of workers-in addition to the hundreds of thousands who will imported over the same period-that will compete-at a decided advantage thanks to Obamacare regulations-with unemployed Americans who are already on the bottom rung of the economic ladder. The plight of American workers is something that the left cared about a scant two decades ago, but I suppose times have changed.

-We end today’s Rattle on a slightly humorous note. It appears that the Obama administration is not pleased with the way Hong Kong immigration officials  handled the departure of former NSA contractor turned leaker Edward Snowden, whose whereabouts have yet to be ascertained with any degree of certainty. Although this subject raises themes of constitutionality, privacy, foreign policy and other issues of grave import, what tickles the funny bone is the White House’s reaction to Mr. Snowden’s tour of the Eastern Hemisphere. In particular, the comments of White House Press Secretary Jay Carney:

The White House, which is typically much more restrained in its public remarks about the PRC, expressed a similar sentiment.

“We are just not buying that this was a technical decision by a Hong Kong immigration official,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said to reporters at a daily news briefing on June 24. “This was a deliberate choice by the government to release a fugitive despite a valid arrest warrant, and that decision unquestionably has a negative impact on the U.S.-China relationship.”

I completely agree, Mr. Carney. The notion that career bureaucrats would be responsible for momentous decisions that could have potentially grave consequences for national security is simply preposterous! I have no idea why someone would even consider deceiving the public with such an implausible scenario. People get the daftest notions sometimes.

The antidote to Chuck Schumer Republicanism can be found in a coalition of conservative activists opposing this bill that have created a site to voice their views, Stop The Gang Of Eight. You can add your name to the voices of opposition by signing their petition decrying S. 744. Let’s turn that voice in the wilderness into a raging clamor to defend the rights and interests of Americans.

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.

HR 3444, the Child Tax Credit Integrity Preservation Act, would require tax filers to provide a valid Social Security number to claim the credits, thereby preventing illegal immigrants from claiming them. A report from the Treasury Inspector General found that individuals who are not authorized to work in the United States received $4.2 billion in refundable credits in 2010. 

Currently, the Internal Revenue Service allows individuals filing with an Individual Tax Identification Number (ITIN) to access the child tax credit and the additional child tax credit. The vast majority of those who use an ITIN to file are illegal aliens who cannot obtain a valid SSN. Moreover, the report acknowledged this loophole encourages more illegal immigration: “The payment of Federal funds through this tax benefit appears to provide an additional incentive for aliens to enter, reside, and work in the United States without authorization, which contradicts Federal law and policy to remove such incentives.”

For information on how you can support this desperately need bill, head over to the action center for CAPS.

I’m always sceptical of open-borders politicians who suddenly have epiphanies related to immigration the minute their careers are imperiled. Such is the case with Senator John McCain, who’s decided to call out President Obama for his administration’s indifference to border issues.

As absurd as it may seem for someone who was the chief co-sponsor of the last major effort to enact amnesty to damn anyone for being insufficiently tough on border issues,  Senator McCain does deserve, at the very least, a golf clap for his efforts. Call me cynical, but something tells me that this hawkishness on the border will evaporate once he is comfortably re-elected. However, if he does decide to stick to his newly acquired convictions-again, an unlikely proposition-he wouldn’t be the first person to have changed course in recent years.

Bill Kristol-a man rightly criticized for his open borders stance in the past-has opposed recent attempts at enacting amnesty by men like Senator McCain, and has even gone so far as to endorse SB 1070 publicly.  Bill Bennett, one of the leading opponents of Proposition 187, has blurbed a brilliant book written by Mark Krikorian, the head of the Center of Immigration Studies, something that would have been unthinkable even a few years ago.

I think the salient point here is that people can and do change their previously held positions on hotly contested issues-such as mass immigration and securing our borders-even if doing so lends itself to charges of hypocrisy or political opportunism. In Senator McCain’s case, I do think his recent reversals on immigration are due almost exclusively to the recent electoral scare he has experienced. That being said, we should be willing to embrace anyone who sincerely reconsiders his or her open borders opinions.