Acting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) director suggested a revolutionary new approach to dealing with the millions of people living illegally in the United States: Commonsense. Testifying before the House Appropriations Committee on June 13, Acting Director Thomas Homan shot back at the naysayers who have long argued that we just have to accept the phenomenon of mass illegal immigration because it is not feasible to deport that many people.
In his testimony, Homan asked for an additional $1.9 billion to increase deportations from the anemic levels of the Obama era, while making it clear that the realistic aim of his agency is to discourage people from coming and remaining in the U.S. illegally. “If you’re in this country illegally and you committed a crime by entering this country, you should be uncomfortable,” Homan said. “You should look over your shoulder, and you need to be worried.” You know, kind of like how we convince people to obey other civil laws. “The IRS doesn’t audit everybody, but we all know it’s a possibility,” Homan continued. “The highway patrol can’t arrest everybody for speeding, but if we speed, we know it’s a possibility we [could]get stopped. It should be no different with immigration enforcement. We’re a law enforcement agency that enforces the law and we shouldn’t play favorites.”
Wow, what a concept? Rather than making people who violate our immigration laws feel at home and protected from any threat of enforcement, Homan wants illegal aliens to feel a bit “uncomfortable” or “worried” that breaking the law could have consequences just like tax cheats and lead-foots. In the hyperbolic rhetoric of the illegal alien advocacy network, of course, which prefers the alternative adjectives “traumatized” and “terrorized,” Homan’s suggestion borders on the incendiary. Frank Sharry, executive director of the George Soros-funded America’s Voice and a long-time practitioner of alternative adjectives, responded predictably. “Wow. How revealing. Homan makes it clear that the ICE strategy is to indiscriminately target the entire undocumented population in America and to intentionally spread fear throughout millions of deeply rooted families.”
Equally shocked and dismayed were Democratic members of the Appropriations Committee. Maryland Representative C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger cautioned Homan not to increase the anxiety level of otherwise harmless illegal aliens, even those who engage harmless larks like driving under the influence. “DWI or traffic is not really considered to be the type of people that are hurting our country,” he said. (At least until these “type of people” actually kill somebody while driving drunk.)
But the real problem for the naysayers is that making lawbreakers uncomfortable and worried is a highly effective law enforcement strategy that is used to deter people from breaking laws – which is precisely why they don’t want ICE adopting it.