Congressional Democrats thought the recent hysteria and hyperbole surrounding the Trump administration\u2019s \u201czero tolerance\u201d policy was an October surprise that came months early. Photos of illegal alien mothers with agitated children, unverified secret recordings of crying toddlers and a servile media pushing the narrative of the no-border interest groups made a \u201cblue wave\u201d election more than a possibility.<\/p>\n
Last week, Democratic Socialist\u00a0Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez\u00a0used an \u201cAbolish ICE\u201d platform to win an upset victory, in New York\u2019s Democratic Primary, over 10-term Rep. Joe Crowley and rock-star status among liberals and anti-Trump activists.<\/p>\n
Perspective 2020 Democratic presidential candidates Sens. Kamala Harris of California and Kirsten Gillibrand of New York also hopped on the open border bandwagon hoping to cement their activist bona fides.<\/p>\n
\u201cAbolish ICE\u201d was no longer a whisper at fringe gatherings, it was now the spoken \u2013 and more often screamed – mantra of the Democratic Party. While avoiding questions about the policy implications, some politicians and consultants appeared to be having difficulty trying to tame the mass-amnesty beast unleashed in recent weeks.<\/p>\n
But, the masses were demanding heads in the streets, others were \u201cmoderating\u201d their rhetoric (just not their actual policies).On Sunday, former Obama official and frequent Trump critic Walter Shaub tweeted<\/a> that he had \u201cdeleted all tweets about my concerns over the potential ineffectiveness of \u2018Abolish ICE\u2019 because people are unfairly attacking me as though I support ICE. If our cause can\u2019t tolerate questioning, we\u2019ve got a heck of an uphill climb in store for us.\u201d<\/p>\n Then, in an apparent attempt to walk back its radical stance, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus circulated a memo among Capitol Hill Democrats calling not to abolish ICE but for \u201cincreasing transparency and accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n The memo<\/a>, obtained by The Daily Beast<\/u> concluded that \u201cabolishing ICE without changing President Trump\u2019s disastrous immigration policy will not solve the problem.\u201d<\/p>\n In a Sunday interview on CNN<\/a>, Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Hawaii) maintained that without a change in administration policies, there would be no point to abolishing ICE.<\/p>\n \u201cYou abolish ICE now, you still have the same president,\u201d said Duckworth, adding that \u201cthere are a lot of other things we can do before we get to that point.\u201d<\/p>\n Her colleague, Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), ran from the question of whether he favored abolishing ICE when asked directly<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cMy priority is to abolish this administration’s policy on immigration that separates parents from children and that denies people coming to this country to seek asylum for domestic abuse or gang violence,\u201d Cardin said.<\/p>\n Pressed to provide a \u201cyes\u201d or \u201cno\u201d answer, Cardin weakly responded, \u201cWe have to have an agency at the border;\u00a0I want that policy to reflect not what President Trump has done.\u201d<\/p>\n