Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), the self-described representative of America’s illegal alien population, is calling it a career (at least for now) and retiring from Congress. What he lacked in legislative accomplishments during his 26 years in Congress, he made up for by honing the fine art of street theater – being the first to be arrested at numerous protests demanding amnesty and other rewards for illegal aliens.
For a while, it seemed like Washington might be rather dull without him. But, never fear, a replacement is on the way. After her upset victory over the fourth ranking House Democrat, Joe Crowley, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez promises to be the P.T. Barnum of the abolish borders movement. Street theater is about to give way to the three ring circus.
Abolishing the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency was a pillar of her primary campaign (the November general election being a mere formality in New York’s heavily Democratic 14th congressional district), and she means it. Appearing on Democracy Now! with Amy Goodman, Ocasio-Cortez pledged a “rapid response” to any and all ICE enforcement actions. Not just rapid, but apparently by any means necessary to prevent U.S. immigration laws from being enforced.
“We have to occupy all of it. We need to occupy every airport. We need to occupy every border. We need to occupy every ICE office until those kids are back with their parents, period,” Ocasio-Cortez pledged. Forget shutting down the occasional street in the nation’s capital, or blocking the entrance to a local Federal Building housing ICE offices. The open borders radicals, soon to be led by a member of the United States House of Representatives, may be shutting down the country on behalf of their cause.
As Ocasio-Cortez amply demonstrated in a recent appearance on PBS’s Firing Line, mastery of issues and facts matters little among the radical wing that has infiltrated the Democratic Party. It’s all about emotional outbursts. And, as The New Yorker magazine warns, the fringe can quickly become the mainstream. “Ocasio-Cortez’s victory, and her quick embrace by the Party afterward, repeated a pattern, which has been happening since the middle of the Obama years, of Democrats adopting, rather than shunning, left-wing protest movements: Occupy, Black Lives Matter, and now Sandersism.”
If the Democratic Party’s wholesale refusal to stand behind ICE and its mission is any indication, abolishing immigration enforcement may be next.