U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro brands it a cog in President Donald Trump\u2019s \u201cdeportation machine.\u201d ACLU lawyers call it profiling. Undaunted, the Texas Department of Public Safety is providing names of suspected illegal aliens to federal immigration agents.<\/p>\n
We call that public service.<\/p>\n
The DPS \u201ccitation lists\u201d came to light in the case of Gaspar Rodriguez Garcia, a Mexican national who has repeatedly entered the U.S. illegally.<\/p>\n
Detained in a traffic stop by a Texas Highway Patrol officer, Rodriguez could not produce a driver\u2019s license and, instead, presented a Mexican consular ID. The motorist was cited for driving without a license and failing to stop at a stop sign.<\/p>\n
Rodriguez\u2019s name was then put on a DPS citation list, which was forwarded to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Two and a half months later, ICE agents used the information to track down and arrest Rodriguez at his San Antonio apartment.<\/p>\n
With his immigration case pending, Rodriguez\u2019s experience is replicated across Texas as state law-enforcement officers provide crucial leads to ICE agents.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a standing request from ICE to provide them a statewide listing of DPS enforcement of DWI and no-driver-license offenses,\u201d DPS spokesman Tom Vingar told the San Antonio Express-News<\/a>.<\/p>\n The citation lists have been furnished by DPS since August 2016, providing thousands of leads to ICE. The number of immigration arrests attributable to the lists has not been disclosed.<\/p>\n Naturally, Castro and the ACLU are outraged.<\/p>\n The Texas Democrat disingenuously blasted the program as part of a nefarious \u201cdeportation machine that Donald Trump set up to deport people like young Dreamers who may get a traffic ticket.\u201d The ACLU, predictably, raises the specter of racial profiling.<\/p>\n In fact, DPS puts names on the citation list without regard to race, ethnicity or sex. \u201cThe information does not include, nor do we have, immigration status on the violators,\u201d Vingar said.<\/p>\n The DPS actions are consistent with Texas\u2019s anti-sanctuary law (Senate Bill 4<\/a>) that requires local law-enforcement agencies to cooperate with federal authorities on immigration matters.<\/p>\n So as officials from San Antonio and other large Texas cities continue to contest SB4<\/a> in court and Rodriguez\u2019s public defender maneuvers to suppress evidence in his case (all at taxpayer expense), let\u2019s cue up the sad old refrain: \u201cI Fought the Law, and the Law Won.\u201d<\/a>