You can't be more open in stating your wholehearted support for illegal immigration as a politician than to actually send a letter to the head of the Department of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff, stating that because of illegal alien busts you will no longer work with federal immigration officials.
That's just what happened with Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack and the head of the Iowa National Guard, Major General Ron Dardis.
They sent a letter to Michael Chertoff stating that they will no longer work with the feds because state law enforcement wasn't involved in recent raids at the Swift & Company meat packing plants. But wait, isn't immigration a federal issue? I keep hearing that from all of these governors and state officials across the United States. I don't remember Iowa declaring that they would be cracking down on illegal immigration. If that is the case then Iowa needs to start enforcing immigration laws on its own.
I'll be expecting an announcement any day from Governor Tom Vilsack that they are going to be investigating and deporting any illegal aliens found in the state and prosecuting all who aid, abet and hire them. This includes during any traffic stop, any booking for any reason and daily general sweeps of known day laborer hiring locations
Des Moines Register
Gov. Tom Vilsack and Maj. Gen. Ron Dardis, in a letter Tuesday to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, said they will not cooperate with federal immigration officials in the future unless they act more responsibly and provide better coordination with state officials.
Immigration officials "chose to pursue a solitary path that limited the operation's effectiveness, created undue hardship for many not at fault, and led to resentment and further mistrust of government," Vilsack and Dardis wrote.
...
Vilsack and Dardis said ICE officials failed to advise the Iowa National Guard of the size and scope of the raid, which "could have led to unacceptable risks to Guard personnel and property."
The raids could have compromised continuing local, state and federal law enforcement undercover operations, they said.
That's funny, I didn't know that the National Guard was casing the Swift meat packing plant and that there were current undercover operations going on that are such a high priority that all other laws should be ignored. Are they suggesting that they were tracking terrorists at Swift? Because that's the only potential threat to this nation that is of a higher priority to ignore all other law enforcement. If they are talking about drug stings, well thy just arrested all of your drug traffickers and dealers, so that's not an argument either.
Although the Iowa National Guard's only role was to provide a temporary space to hold detainees, ICE's operations and lack of coordination thrust the Guard into the national spotlight "without the sufficient information or authority to plan or respond."
I don't remember reading anywhere that the Iowa National Guard was all of the sudden the center story in these busts. As a matter of fact this is the first time I've heard the Iowa National Guard even attached to this story. How they feel that the nation all of the sudden has a bad view of the Iowa National Guard is beyond me.
"The complete lack of an adequate media plan in the age of 24-7 news coverage is completely unacceptable," they wrote. "These systemic failures to communicate with the public and news organizations created an information vacuum that was filled with unreliable and unverifiable rumors that further undermined the public's trust and confidence in both the state and federal government."
Rather than working with local, state and federal law enforcement branches in Iowa, ICE worked alone, they said.
"This lack of coordination among law enforcement and military authorities is completely unacceptable in this post 9/11 and (Hurricane) Katrina world," they wrote.
*shaking head in disbelief*
Now they're comparing the busting of illegal immigrants to a major disaster area like ground zero and Hurricane Katrina. That is absolutely preposterous! This is an agency charged with enforcing interior enforcement of our immigration laws, not disaster preparedness. We hear time after time how the state and local government supposedly doesn't have the resources to enforce immigration laws, yet ICE is supposed to coordinate these busts with them. The arguments put forth should obviously make you think that they don't want any raids conducted at all.
They ended the letter with this warning:
"In order to prevent similar or greater problems in the future, please note that the Iowa National Guard, at both Camp Dodge and throughout our state, will now require proper notification to the governor and appropriate law enforcement personnel, as well as a thorough and synchronized media plan, before we again agree to provide any space for future actions or operations by ICE."
That's right. You didn't read that wrong. The Iowa National Guard will no longer assist ICE in any way unless they can take a portion of the credit. Never mind that it's a "federal issue".
The reality is that Tom Vilsack wants illegal immigration to continue and for companies like Swift & Company to continue hiring them and bringing in the artificial "profits" they are making through the use of illegal low wage workers. Somehow they feel they are benefiting by this continued breaking of the laws of the United States and they're not going to take it anymore!
I feel this is enough grounds to call for the termination of both Tom Vilsack and Major General Ron Dardis for openly stating that they will not enforce the law because they feel they were marginalized or overburdened by federal laws being enforced. What's next, deciding to ignore other federal laws that they feel aren't "in their best interests?"
