By Bob Beauprez and Christopher Jaarda
The New York Times is reporting that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will begin conducting a review of all deportation cases in the immigration courts with the goal of “halting” the deportation “of many illegal immigrants with no criminal record.“ In other words, this is a back door amnesty by a President desperate to score political points with a constituency critical to his reelection.
“Many immigration offenses, including being present in the United States without legal status, are civil violations; they are not crimes,” wrote the NY Times citing communications from John Morton, Director of Immigration and Enforcement Services (ICE) at the Department of Homeland Security. That is simply not true. At a minimum, someone in the U.S. illegally has committed a criminal misdemeanor; in a great many cases, felony statutes of federal law have been violated.
Regrettably, the announcement by DHS is the latest in a long list of government inaction when it comes to enforcing America’s immigration and criminal laws. This form of selective enforcement also ignores the harm illegal immigration poses on citizens and legal immigrants alike.
First, it should be pointed out that under federal law, by virtue of being unlawfully present in the U.S., an illegal alien is committing (at a minimum) a misdemeanor crime. DHS is choosing to ignore the fact that all illegal aliens are actively committing a crime under federal law.
Second, consider that each year, the Social Security Administration (SSA) compiles a “no match” list for paycheck withholdings remitted to the government by employers in cases where the employee’s name and social security number reported by the employer do not match. Now admittedly, some of these “no match” discrepancies are a result of typographical errors but the majority of those are the result of withholdings from wages of illegal aliens.
Any individual who uses a social security number that was not issued to them is committing a felony. In cases involving the use of a number that has never been issued by SSA, the felony is identity fraud. In cases where the number has been issued to someone else, the felony is one of identity theft. Both instances are 5-year felonies under federal law.
An illegal alien who enters the U.S. illegally is not work authorized and, therefore, is ineligible to receive a social security number. The same is true for aliens who have entered the U.S. on a non-work visa and overstayed that visa. It is a felony under federal law for either classification of illegal aliens to provide their employers with a social security number in order to obtain work.
This form of identity theft or identity fraud is not a victimless crime. Citizens and legal immigrants are hurt every day by this crime. If you talk to one of the victims of these crimes and hear directly how their lives have been turned upside down, you would never, ever view illegal immigration the same again.
It should be troubling that the federal government knows exactly where most of these, as of yet un-convicted, felons are working but that SSA is doing nothing to share this information with law enforcement.
Third, it should also be troubling that the Department of Justice (DOJ) is not demanding this information from SSA as part of an effort to prosecute identity thieves.
When DHS says they are halting the deportation of non-criminal illegal aliens, this inaction by the federal government comes after:
(1) SSA has turned its back on victims of identity theft in order to protect the perpetrators of the crime;
(2) DOJ has failed to bring charges against illegal aliens who commit identity theft even though American citizens and legal immigrants are daily harmed by these crimes; and
(3) DHS has ignored the fact that the illegal alien’s presence in the U.S. currently constitutes the commission of a crime under federal law.
It is no wonder the American people are so frustrated by illegal immigration. Their government is daily ignoring the law and the harm illegal immigration is posing on the country.
***Bob Beauprez is Editor-in-Chief of A Line of Sight. Christopher M. Jaarda is the Editor-in-Chief of Prescription for Disaster, a blog operated by the American Healthcare Education Coalition (AHEC) dedicated to educating grassroots conservatives about the negative consequences of ObamaCare. Mr. Jaarda is a conservative who has formerly worked as a counsel for the U.S. Senate Republican Policy Committee, as the Director of Government Relations for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) and a former staffer with American Majority. He is also a Contributing Editor of A Line of Sight.
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