Ban Sanctuary Laws
Your kids aren’t safe even in broad daylight. An Ecuadoran migrant held a boy and a girl, both 13, at knifepoint in a park near their Queens school last week, molesting the girl and robbing them of their cellphones.
There is a remedy.
In November, voters everywhere, including New York City, will get to choose between the Democratic Party’s open border policy and Republican former President Donald Trump’s promise to crack down on illegal immigration and deport millions who are here illegally.
But New York City voters deserve to have an additional choice in November — between keeping the lunatic “sanctuary city” laws that shield migrant criminals from deportation or repealing those laws. Repeal would allow migrant criminals to be deported after their first offense before they go on to rape and murder.
Kicking the Can
Last week, eight members of the New York City Council’s Common Sense Caucus fired off a letter to the Charter Revision Commission — the body with the power to put questions on the ballot in November — explaining that the City Council refuses to repeal sanctuary city laws. Since the City Council won’t act, let voters decide.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams is ducking the issue. This despite previously voicing support for cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials. Now his office says it’s the Charter Revision Commission’s job to decide what ballot questions go before New Yorkers.
Blame Biden for allowing ruthless criminals to come across the border. But sanctuary city laws are to blame for the epidemic of crimes by repeat offenders.
Wrong, Mr. Mayor. It’s your job, as the city’s top official, to stand up against the loony lefties in the City Council and support deporting migrant criminals after their first offense.
The Ecuadoran molester was nabbed on Monday when good Samaritans recognized him from sketches circulated by police. Jeffrey Flores pounced on the creep and dragged him to the floor with help from others. “I got two little sisters, and I’m about to have a daughter on the way,” Flores said of the assault. “I don’t like that.”
A Growing Problem
Across the nation, gruesome crimes are fueling opposition to illegal migration. On Monday, Trump blamed President Joe Biden for the murder of Rachel Morin, a 37-year-old mother of five. She was raped and killed on a hiking trail in Maryland, her naked and bludgeoned body found in the woods nearby. A 23-year-old illegal immigrant from El Salvador is charged. He is believed to have murdered a woman in El Salvador previously and attacked a 9-year-old girl and her mother in a home invasion in Los Angeles.
Only a tiny fraction of migrants are dangerous criminals, but the migrant-advocacy-industrial complex — including the American Civil Liberties Union — insists criminals deserve sanctuary from deportation even after they commit a crime.
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Blame Biden for allowing ruthless criminals to come across the border. But sanctuary city laws are to blame for the epidemic of crimes by repeat offenders.
Not to mention New York’s over-the-top generosity. The Ecuadoran mugger gave a shelter as his address, as do many arrested migrants. He was walking around the Queens neighborhood, enjoying the good life, on our tab until he was recognized and captured.
The Great Lakes State Gets It
Michigan Republicans are renewing efforts to ban sanctuary cities statewide after an illegal immigrant murdered a 25-year-old woman, Ruby Garcia, in Grand Rapids in March. The illegal who confessed to the murder had multiple arrests. Republican lawmaker Matt Hall explained that sanctuary laws “invite proven criminals like Ruby’s killer, to come where they can hide from deportation even if they’re arrested for another crime.”
Amen.
When Biden and Trump debate next week, expect Biden to vilify Trump’s deportation plans. Substack’s Radley Balko blasts Trump’s deportation promise as the “cruelest, most illiberal, most openly authoritarian campaign promise in modern U.S. history.”
Truth is, Trump’s promise may be his most powerful political weapon. And it’s the opposite of authoritarian. Deporting illegals is what the law — enacted by the people’s elected representatives — requires.
The Immigration and Nationality Act requires that when someone crosses the border, claiming to seek asylum, the alien “shall be detained until their claim is adjudicated.” Most never qualify — only 14% in past years. But Biden is waiving in millions of pretend asylum seekers.
Biden is the authoritarian. But he’s ignoring public opinion at his peril.
A whopping 62% of registered voters favor deporting anyone living in the U.S. illegally, according to a CBS poll.
Trump has yet to lay out his deportation plan. But deporting criminals is the place to start. That will require the cooperation of local law enforcement and an end to sanctuary city policies that coddle lawbreakers.
It’s time to give the law-abiding public sanctuary and safety, not migrant criminals.
Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and chairman of the Committee to Reduce Infection Deaths. Follow her on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey. To find out more about Betsy McCaughey and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.
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