Tipsheet

On Deporting Gang Members and Preventing Non-Citizen Voting, the Left Again Reveals Itself

Guy Benson
Guy Benson  |  October 15, 2024 10:15 AM

One of the most preposterous propositions the Democrats are asking voters to accept ahead of this election is that Kamala Harris is somehow newly serious about securing the border.  She boasted recently that she'd put her record on illegal immigration up against anyone's, which is an genuinely astonishing thing to say.  As a Senate candidate, US Senator, and presidential candidate, Harris proposed decriminalizing illegal border crossings, furnishing illegal immigrants with taxpayer-funded healthcare coverage (including sex change operations for those in temporary detention), and abolishing ICE, which she compared to the KKK.  She demanded the banishment of terms like 'illegal alien,' and hectored Americans for daring to 'speak Merry Christmas' while illegal immigrants' status remained in flux.  As Vice President and Border Czar, we have experienced ten million illegal border crossings, an unprecedented explosion in lawlessness at the border.  That number includes millions of 'got-aways.'  Her record on border security certainly is unique, just not in the way she's attempting to convey.  

Her only argument is that she supports legislation that failed in the Senate, and would have failed in the House, for which she blames Donald Trump.  The bill in question had its merits, but was ultimately unacceptable to a broad swath of conservatives and others, and not just for petty partisan or political reasons. One of her favorite talking points on this front is that the Border Patrol union favored the bill.  How has that point settled with that organization, which she invokes in virtually every answer she gives on the subject?  Here's your answer:


Meanwhile, her allies are nitpicking everything Donald Trump says about violent illegal immigrant gangs seizing control of multiple apartment complexes in Colorado, to cite one confirmed example.  If you missed it, watch JD Vance push back hard on those slanted questions, and read this social media thread from one of the impacted building management companies.  This message was tweeted as a dark harbinger of frightening Trump overreach, but I'm not sure average people would see it that way:


Polling shows a clear majority of voters now favor mass deportations of illegal immigrants.  One can only imagine how much higher the support would be for prioritizing violent gangs of illegal foreign immigrants terrorizing American communities.   Fear-mongering over the US government doing just that almost feels like an unintentional recruitment drive for new Trump voters -- but they're so deeply ensconced in their tribal echo chambers that they don't realize it.  Similarly, the Biden-Harris Justice Department is now suing the state of Virginia for enforcing its law to remove non-citizens from voter rolls.  Gov. Glenn Youngkin cannot believe this nakedly political DOJ abuse, just prior to an election:

With less than 30 days until the election, the Biden-Harris Department of Justice is filing an unprecedented lawsuit against me and the Commonwealth of Virginia, for appropriately enforcing a 2006 law signed by Democrat Tim Kaine that requires Virginia to remove noncitizens from the voter rolls - a process that starts with someone declaring themselves a non-citizen and then registering to vote. Virginians - and Americans - will see this for exactly what it is: a desperate attempt to attack the legitimacy of the elections in the Commonwealth, the very crucible of American Democracy. With the support of our Attorney General, we will defend these commonsense steps, that we are legally required to take, with every resource available to us. Virginia’s election will be secure and fair, and I will not stand idly by as this politically motivated action tries to interfere in our elections, period.

As Youngkin and others have noted, the law being enforced was signed by then-Democratic governor Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton's 2016 running mate, who is currently a US Senator up for re-election.  Leftists who are siding with the DOJ and excoriating Virginia for following the law are pretending that Youngkin's action is somehow an affront to a period of pre-election neutrality on such things.  They also argue that this could disenfranchise eligible voters who are mistakenly stripped of their status.  Both arguments are bunk, per the governor's office:

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- The U.S. and Virginia constitutions, as well as state and federal laws, prohibit noncitizen voting. Virginia’s process for removing noncitizens from the voting rolls was signed into law in 2006—and has taken place under both Democrat and Republican governors.

- Federal law does not prohibit the removal of noncitizens from the voting rolls. The 90-day “quiet period” under the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) is not relevant to this process since Virginia conducts an individualized—not systematic—review per Virginia law in order to correct registration records.

- The process by which ELECT maintains the voting rolls regarding noncitizens is mandated by law and is not subject to the Governor’s discretion. This process starts when an individual themselves indicates they are a noncitizen during a DMV transaction.

- If upon review, a local general registrar approves a potential match, the registrar will notify the individual that their registration will be cancelled. See Va. Code § 24.2-427(C).

- The individual is then notified that they may submit a statement affirming that they are a United States citizen within 14 days to avoid this cancellation.

These are self-identified non-citizens who have literally told the government 'I am not a citizen of the United States' in an official capacity.  That's who is being removed from the voter rolls under this provision.  And in the event of a stray error, there is recourse for people to appeal.  The screaming about this very modest clean-up of Virginia elections, based on a Democrat-signed law, is revealing.  Congressional Democrats have repeatedly opposed GOP efforts to prevent non-citizens from voting in American elections.  It speaks for itself. Leftists want voters to believe that Kamala Harris, the Queen of illegal immigration, has suddenly seen the light, and would govern in a manner diametrically opposed to who she is, based on her long history of statements and actions.  These same people are objecting to Trump's promises to round up illegal immigrant gang members and remove them from the country, while cheering on her administration's lawsuit against a state that is adhering to a law that ensures self-identified non-citizens cannot vote.  

It's obvious who she really is, and who they really are.  There is no reason whatsoever for a single voter to buy into the pro-enforcement public relations charade they're foisting upon the electorate in the final days of a contested campaign.  They have shown us what they really believe for years -- and cannot help but continue to do so, even when it undermines their cynical, election-year performance.

UPDATES - Here is Youngkin addressing the issue on CNN, as well as me raising questions about the absence of The View clip in ads: