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Might as well say the same thing here that I said on Twitter: this is a waste of government resources for the sake of being mean. ICE has a charter - to investi

Might as well say the same thing here that I said on Twitter: this is a waste of government resources for the sake of being mean. ICE has a charter - to investigate and infiltrate border-crossing crime groups. Drugs, human trafficking, money laundering, that kind of thing. This particular op had no chance of finding anything like that. It was targeted at people who posed no harm to anybody. Yes, maybe it could have caught a few of the people ICE is supposed to be looking for, but almost by accident. The price in both dollars and in liberty was too high for that to be a strategy, and there's no way that was even in the minds of the people who planned or implemented it. ICE as it exists should be abolished. Even some ICE old-timers who were doing its real work say so. A new agency with ICE's original charter would be a reasonable thing to have, but there's no way to get that under the current structure.

nahzgah 8y ago
>A new agency with ICE's original charter would be a reasonable thing to have, but there's no way to get that under the current structure. One of the strong points of the current president is kicking out illegals, so it could be argued that abolishing the ICE would be simply antidemocratic.
- throwaway98121 8y ago
  Illegals? You mean undocumented residents? Personally I don’t think the president has any strong points other than being a racist, misogenoist, pathological liar, and narcissist.
  - yasp 8y ago
    If you're committing visa fraud you're no longer undocumented and you are indeed there illegally.
    - mcphage 8y ago
      If your visa expires, wouldn't that mean that you're here without valid documentation, ie, undocumented? You were formerly documented, and you have been undocumented.
  - i_am_nomad 8y ago
    Few of them are undocumented. There’s plenty of documentation on them - in schools, emergency rooms, police reports. As you well know, your term “undocumented” is designed to trivialize the border and deprecate the very concept of American citizenship. At a minimum, refer to them as unauthorized immigrants, since that is the distinguishing factor from a public policy perspective.
    - throwaway98121 8y ago
      Labeling people as illegals is merely meant to dehumanize them. I wasn’t trivializing the border and so your response is no more than a straw man.
      - nahzgah 8y ago
        No it's not. They are humans who are breaking the law and who shouldn't be in the US. Nobody is saying they are not humans. Just that they don't get to stay in the US without following the process.
        throwaway98121 8y ago
        This is a political talking point to scare poor and uneducated white people. It’s why we are willing to penalize folks who were brought to this country as children and use this future for political gains.
        wuyelubo 8y ago
        Actually, yours is. So far nahzgah & i_am_nomad made logical points, while you just keep writing argumentum ad passiones content. As a legal refugee (not immigrant), I find your comments dehumanizing, racist, pathological lies, and narcissist. I have no idea what is "misogenoist", and I speak several languages. Additionally, you are a classist with your "scare poor and uneducated white people", presuming "poor white people" unable to comprehend complex political talking points. Let's get back to the article, shall we?
      - 8y ago
  - trothamel 8y ago
    "Undocumented resident" is an even worse euphemism - it's not like these are people who simply lost their papers, or people who were entitled to those papers and just forgot them. These are people who are inside the US in violation of immigration law.
    - throwaway98121 8y ago
      I don’t think it’s a worse euphemism. The people who I see angry about “illegals” are the same ones who think blacks are all criminals and it would be great if we could to to the good old days when blacks were segregated, women didn’t have the right to vote, and white men ruled supreme.
      - i_am_nomad 8y ago
        Now who’s dehumanizing people?
      - wuyelubo 8y ago
        Could you please stop being a sexist & racist?
xamuel 8y ago
Complaining about the executive branch enforcing the law is like complaining to an umpire about the rules of baseball. Want to change the law? That's what legislators are for! The laws in question were put in place long before the current administration took the executive seat.
- microcolonel 8y ago
  The best way to change a law that reasonable people disagree with, is to enforce it effectively.
  - philipov 8y ago
    So what you're saying is, if a law is enforced and doesn't get changed, the people who disagreed with it were unreasonable all along? How convenient!
    - microcolonel 8y ago
      What I'm saying is that while I don't necessarily agree with the full extent of the policy, I recognize that reasonable people can disagree with it as a whole, and that enforcing it is the best way to demonstrate what's wrong with the policy, rather than demonstrating what's wrong with the enforcement (the effect of selective enforcement).
      - philipov 8y ago
        It is a tempting premise: if something is wrong, taking it to its full extent will demonstrate just how wrong it is, causing everyone to unite in striking it down. Justice wins in the end! It is too optimistic to think that being right is enough to effect change. I think that framing the discussion this way will allow people who want to keep the status quo to use survivorship as a basis for legitimacy. When idyllic justice fails and the change doesn't happen, that becomes proof that the status quo was correct all along.
- watwut 8y ago
andrewmcwatters 8y ago
> A new agency with ICE's original charter would be a reasonable thing to have, but there's no way to get that under the current structure. It seems to me that you can run ICE without necessarily having figures like Joe Arpaio or Donald Trump as ideological sponsors while accomplishing the same job. I've read on a few occasions that immigration was even more strictly enforced under Obama's administration, but it was done without xenophobic rhetoric, which seems ideal.
- microcolonel 8y ago
  > ...but it was done without xenophobic rhetoric, which seems ideal. To anyone who is listening rather than assuming, it seems that the Trump administration has done it without xenophobic rhetoric as well.
Cenk 8y ago
The cruelty is the point.
- microcolonel 8y ago
  > The cruelty is the point. No, it isn't. If you took any time to talk to any of the tremendous number of reasonable, empathic people working at ICE, you could not say that with a straight face. The mandate of ICE is to enforce immigration and customs laws, not to "be cruel to foreigners" or some such. Making a dehumanizing moral caricature of people you disagree with is not helpful to anyone who needs help.
  - perfmode 8y ago
    Cruelty is the point. ICE is not on the right side of history. ICE impersonates the LAPD, making their jobs more difficult. The LAPD has requested they stop doing this. Homeland wants to be separated from ICE because ICE is hurting the broader org’s reputation and making it harder to keep the country safe. ICE is so far off the rails, it is indefensible. Please link me to the tremendous number of reasonable, empathic people working at ICE who are speaking out against the injustices committed by their organization. I'll wait.
  - belltaco 8y ago
    Nice strawman, barely anyone is accusing the rank and file of ICE of cruelty, there might be a few bad apples here and there though. But the cruelty is coming from higher up political appointees like Stephen Miller. Which results in ridiculous bullshit like this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-uscis-policy-will-carry-harsh-consequences-for-applicants/#c64759d4615d https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-u... Can you tell me how the above situation is not cruel?
    - microcolonel 8y ago
      > https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-uscis-policy-will-carry-harsh-consequences-for-applicants/#c64759d4615d* https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-u... USCIS is not ICE. When USCIS refers people to ICE (the topic of this article), ICE has their own procedures which have more to do with carrying out immigration and customs law than "cruelty".
belltaco 8y ago
Well said. I wish they would actually go after the fraudulent diploma mills and sham universities that exist only for visas. Why not run sting ops against them by posing as students instead of against fricking students trying to maintain immigration status? I lost it at this: >The Department of Homeland Security’s list of certified schools where international students can enroll includes the University of Farmington. I don't know the specifics but can someone explain why this is not entrapment? What next, leave warm blankets near the homeless saying they're free to take and then arrest them for theft? Also DHS's list of certified schools just lost all its meaning and legitimacy. If MIT is on that list it might as well be a fraudulent university for all we know. This kind of shenanigans will just further plummet the already lower university enrollment.
- humantiy 8y ago
  If you are setting up a sting, wouldn't you want it to look legit as possible? ICE is part of DHS so it makes sense they would add it to their own list if the goal was to catch people attempting to exploit the program. If a student enrolled in this institution, it wouldn't have taken long for them to realize this was a sham and transfer out if they were truly seeking education. I believe it wasn't entrapment because ICE only set up the fake university, they didn't actually recruit people to it. That was other "students/recruiters" who were enrolled and helping others out to join (hence the indictments of the 8 recruiters). Also in there was this in the article: >Khaalid Walls, a spokesman for ICE in Detroit, told local news station WXYZ that the students had entered the United States legally on F-1 visas after being accepted to legitimate schools and had later transferred to the University of Farmington. If they were accepted to legit schools and then transferred to this one it seems likely that they weren't seeking education, but a means to stay here, which would be in violation of the visa.
- yasp 8y ago
  Enrolling in the school ostensibly isn't illegal per se.
  - belltaco 8y ago
    Can there be civil suits against the government for time and money wasted in enrolling into fake universities that are fraudulently certified as legit? I am struggling to find a good analogy here. Like a fake cop that is certified as legit by the police department? Wouldn't that make him a real cop as far as the law is concerned? How is this a fake univ if it's certified as legit by ICE?

nahzgah 8y ago

>A new agency with ICE's original charter would be a reasonable thing to have, but there's no way to get that under the current structure. One of the strong points of the current president is kicking out illegals, so it could be argued that abolishing the ICE would be simply antidemocratic.

throwaway98121 8y ago
Illegals? You mean undocumented residents? Personally I don’t think the president has any strong points other than being a racist, misogenoist, pathological liar, and narcissist.
- yasp 8y ago
  If you're committing visa fraud you're no longer undocumented and you are indeed there illegally.
  - mcphage 8y ago
    If your visa expires, wouldn't that mean that you're here without valid documentation, ie, undocumented? You were formerly documented, and you have been undocumented.
- i_am_nomad 8y ago
  Few of them are undocumented. There’s plenty of documentation on them - in schools, emergency rooms, police reports. As you well know, your term “undocumented” is designed to trivialize the border and deprecate the very concept of American citizenship. At a minimum, refer to them as unauthorized immigrants, since that is the distinguishing factor from a public policy perspective.
  - throwaway98121 8y ago
    Labeling people as illegals is merely meant to dehumanize them. I wasn’t trivializing the border and so your response is no more than a straw man.
    - nahzgah 8y ago
      No it's not. They are humans who are breaking the law and who shouldn't be in the US. Nobody is saying they are not humans. Just that they don't get to stay in the US without following the process.
      - throwaway98121 8y ago
        This is a political talking point to scare poor and uneducated white people. It’s why we are willing to penalize folks who were brought to this country as children and use this future for political gains.
        wuyelubo 8y ago
        Actually, yours is. So far nahzgah & i_am_nomad made logical points, while you just keep writing argumentum ad passiones content. As a legal refugee (not immigrant), I find your comments dehumanizing, racist, pathological lies, and narcissist. I have no idea what is "misogenoist", and I speak several languages. Additionally, you are a classist with your "scare poor and uneducated white people", presuming "poor white people" unable to comprehend complex political talking points. Let's get back to the article, shall we?
    - 8y ago
- trothamel 8y ago
  "Undocumented resident" is an even worse euphemism - it's not like these are people who simply lost their papers, or people who were entitled to those papers and just forgot them. These are people who are inside the US in violation of immigration law.
  - throwaway98121 8y ago
    I don’t think it’s a worse euphemism. The people who I see angry about “illegals” are the same ones who think blacks are all criminals and it would be great if we could to to the good old days when blacks were segregated, women didn’t have the right to vote, and white men ruled supreme.
    - i_am_nomad 8y ago
      Now who’s dehumanizing people?
    - wuyelubo 8y ago
      Could you please stop being a sexist & racist?

xamuel 8y ago

Complaining about the executive branch enforcing the law is like complaining to an umpire about the rules of baseball. Want to change the law? That's what legislators are for! The laws in question were put in place long before the current administration took the executive seat.

microcolonel 8y ago
The best way to change a law that reasonable people disagree with, is to enforce it effectively.
- philipov 8y ago
  So what you're saying is, if a law is enforced and doesn't get changed, the people who disagreed with it were unreasonable all along? How convenient!
  - microcolonel 8y ago
    What I'm saying is that while I don't necessarily agree with the full extent of the policy, I recognize that reasonable people can disagree with it as a whole, and that enforcing it is the best way to demonstrate what's wrong with the policy, rather than demonstrating what's wrong with the enforcement (the effect of selective enforcement).
    - philipov 8y ago
      It is a tempting premise: if something is wrong, taking it to its full extent will demonstrate just how wrong it is, causing everyone to unite in striking it down. Justice wins in the end! It is too optimistic to think that being right is enough to effect change. I think that framing the discussion this way will allow people who want to keep the status quo to use survivorship as a basis for legitimacy. When idyllic justice fails and the change doesn't happen, that becomes proof that the status quo was correct all along.
watwut 8y ago

andrewmcwatters 8y ago

> A new agency with ICE's original charter would be a reasonable thing to have, but there's no way to get that under the current structure. It seems to me that you can run ICE without necessarily having figures like Joe Arpaio or Donald Trump as ideological sponsors while accomplishing the same job. I've read on a few occasions that immigration was even more strictly enforced under Obama's administration, but it was done without xenophobic rhetoric, which seems ideal.

microcolonel 8y ago
> ...but it was done without xenophobic rhetoric, which seems ideal. To anyone who is listening rather than assuming, it seems that the Trump administration has done it without xenophobic rhetoric as well.

Cenk 8y ago

The cruelty is the point.

microcolonel 8y ago
> The cruelty is the point. No, it isn't. If you took any time to talk to any of the tremendous number of reasonable, empathic people working at ICE, you could not say that with a straight face. The mandate of ICE is to enforce immigration and customs laws, not to "be cruel to foreigners" or some such. Making a dehumanizing moral caricature of people you disagree with is not helpful to anyone who needs help.
- perfmode 8y ago
  Cruelty is the point. ICE is not on the right side of history. ICE impersonates the LAPD, making their jobs more difficult. The LAPD has requested they stop doing this. Homeland wants to be separated from ICE because ICE is hurting the broader org’s reputation and making it harder to keep the country safe. ICE is so far off the rails, it is indefensible. Please link me to the tremendous number of reasonable, empathic people working at ICE who are speaking out against the injustices committed by their organization. I'll wait.
- belltaco 8y ago
  Nice strawman, barely anyone is accusing the rank and file of ICE of cruelty, there might be a few bad apples here and there though. But the cruelty is coming from higher up political appointees like Stephen Miller. Which results in ridiculous bullshit like this: https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-uscis-policy-will-carry-harsh-consequences-for-applicants/#c64759d4615d https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-u... Can you tell me how the above situation is not cruel?
  - microcolonel 8y ago
    > https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-uscis-policy-will-carry-harsh-consequences-for-applicants/#c64759d4615d* https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/07/11/new-u... USCIS is not ICE. When USCIS refers people to ICE (the topic of this article), ICE has their own procedures which have more to do with carrying out immigration and customs law than "cruelty".

belltaco 8y ago

Well said. I wish they would actually go after the fraudulent diploma mills and sham universities that exist only for visas. Why not run sting ops against them by posing as students instead of against fricking students trying to maintain immigration status? I lost it at this: >The Department of Homeland Security’s list of certified schools where international students can enroll includes the University of Farmington. I don't know the specifics but can someone explain why this is not entrapment? What next, leave warm blankets near the homeless saying they're free to take and then arrest them for theft? Also DHS's list of certified schools just lost all its meaning and legitimacy. If MIT is on that list it might as well be a fraudulent university for all we know. This kind of shenanigans will just further plummet the already lower university enrollment.

humantiy 8y ago
If you are setting up a sting, wouldn't you want it to look legit as possible? ICE is part of DHS so it makes sense they would add it to their own list if the goal was to catch people attempting to exploit the program. If a student enrolled in this institution, it wouldn't have taken long for them to realize this was a sham and transfer out if they were truly seeking education. I believe it wasn't entrapment because ICE only set up the fake university, they didn't actually recruit people to it. That was other "students/recruiters" who were enrolled and helping others out to join (hence the indictments of the 8 recruiters). Also in there was this in the article: >Khaalid Walls, a spokesman for ICE in Detroit, told local news station WXYZ that the students had entered the United States legally on F-1 visas after being accepted to legitimate schools and had later transferred to the University of Farmington. If they were accepted to legit schools and then transferred to this one it seems likely that they weren't seeking education, but a means to stay here, which would be in violation of the visa.
yasp 8y ago
Enrolling in the school ostensibly isn't illegal per se.
- belltaco 8y ago
  Can there be civil suits against the government for time and money wasted in enrolling into fake universities that are fraudulently certified as legit? I am struggling to find a good analogy here. Like a fake cop that is certified as legit by the police department? Wouldn't that make him a real cop as far as the law is concerned? How is this a fake univ if it's certified as legit by ICE?