ASA HUTCHINSON MEETS HOT TALK
And gets burned big time. Dale Franks at QandO has a great summary and analysis of the Homeland Security Undersecretary’s appearance yesterday on KFI-AM’s John and Ken show in Los Angeles. These guys are doing what the Los Angeles Times editorial page ought to be doing: holding government officials accountable when they make pander-driven decisions that jeopardize public safety and encouraging citizens to get involved. (Guess the Times is too busy spreading disinformation and issuing non-apology apologies to pay attention to anything that actually matters to Californians.) KFI listeners have apparently burned up DHS phone lines and forced the bureaucracy to respond to questions about the department’s lack of support for southern California Border Patrol illegal alien sweeps. In an interview yesterday, John Kobylt pressed Hutchinson hard on why DHS has retreated on interior enforcement. Hutchinson squirmed.
Dale reports:
A month ago, immigration activist groups like La Raza (The Race. How’s that for a nice inoffensive name?) were howling in uproar because the 12 Border Patrol officers of the Temecula office were conducting sweeps in Temecula, Escondido, and Corona, all of which are cities located in Riverside and northern San Diego counties.
Complaints about these sweeps aroused the ire of not only the activists, but the Mexican government, whose LA consulate expressed its displeasure in no uncertain terms. Members of Congress also got involved, berating Homeland Security for the sweeps as well.
About a week after the complaints, spokesmen for the Border Patrol said that Asa Hutchinson the undersecretary responsible for the BP, ordered them to stop the sweeps. So, John got an interview with Hutchinson, which aired live this afternoon in the 4:00 hour.
John, who is not a tactful guy, bluntly asked Hutchinson why he ordered the patrols stopped. Hutchinson began droning on about the need for coordination, and about how many illegals (16,000 per week, according to Hutchinson) were being stopped from coming into the country in Arizona.
John cut him off and began demanding to know how many illegals were being rounded up in California. Hutchinson didn’t know. John then began grilling him about how many employers had been indicted in Southern California for hiring illegals. Hutchinson said he didn’t know. (John did. The answer: 0) John asked if interior enforcement sweeps would begin again. Hutchinson said he couldn’t give away specifics about planned operations, for, you know security reasons.
John then pointed out that, if we were unable to stop economic refugees from pouring across the border, how could we possibly stop al-Qaida? Hutchinson said that, yep, that was a pretty important question. You betcha. John asked how Hutchinson planned to react when, after the next 911, we learn that the terrorists came through the Mexican border in California. Hutchinson said that it was really important to stop them.
At the end of the interview, John kept demanding a yes or no answer to the following question: “Can I tell my listeners that Asa Hutchinson assured me that the interior sweeps by the border patrol would begin again?” Hutchinson refused to answer.
In a white-flag response to non-enforcement advocate Rep. Joe Baca, Hutchinson ingratiatingly assured him “that we will enforce these laws in a reasonable manner and will consider the sensitivities associated with interior enforcement of our immigration laws,” he said.
Invertebrate!
Just a reminder that there are a mere 2,000 interior enforcement agents assigned to enforce the law against upwards of 13 million illegal aliens. Across the country, local and state cops are handcuffed and barred from assisting in interior enforcement by open-borders city councils, mayors, and governors. If the Border Patrol can’t help out with interior enforcement, it’s not going to get done.
If President Bush expects to convince voters that he is better on national security than the John-Boys, not enforcing the law out of deference to “sensitivities” is a funny way to prove it.
Update: American Patrol has put up links to the interview on RealPlayer and Windows Media. Excerpt:
Kobylt: You want intelligence tips? We have your telephone number and e-mail address. I can have thousands of intelligence tips sent to you in minutes. Everybody knows where the illegal aliens are and everybody knows where the employers are. But no employers have ever been indicted in California in my memory for harboring illegal aliens and for employing them. You simply have chosen not to enforce this,
Hutchinson: You know…I…
Kobylt: Facts are facts. I’m sorry, facts are facts and they are not going to go away. You haven’t indicted any employers. You stopped the Border Patrol in Temecula.
Hutchinson: That’s an incorrect… That’s an incorrect statement.
Kobylt: What’s an incorrect statement? It’s in all the news stories!
Hutchinson: That we haven’t indicted the employers.
Kobylt: In California, where? Are you going to tell me about the Eastern European janitors back east again for Wal-Mart? OK, We’ll grant you that. Now in the state of California. California-based companies. California illegal aliens. Because you didn’t round up any illegal aliens here in California at those Wal-Marts.
Hutchinson: Well, let me just first of all assure you interior enforcement is a priority for us. Protecting the border is a priority for us. We’re allocating…
John: Those are words. Those are words. I’m talking about actions. Where are the actions?
In the 10+ years I’ve been writing about illegal immigration, this is the best interview on the topic I’ve heard. Listen to the whole thing while you surf the Net.
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Categories: Border Patrol
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Galling, is it not, to stand still for the way a miserable little pissant republic like Mexico gets away with outrages like interfering with the American political and immigration process?
Past time to spank the Mexicans, I say.
Mr. James, the Mexican government interferes in the internal affairs of the United States all the time. It is attempting to use the World Court to stop the execution of illegals who’ve committed heinous murders here. In fact, the Bush administration twisted the arm of the Oklahoma governor to commute the death sentence of one such killer to life just to appease the Mexicans a couple of months ago.
The Mexican government considers anyone of Mexican ancestry a Mexican citizen and thus has set up consulates all over the United States to issue the infamous “Matricula Consular.” Of course, with the Mexican army having crossed the border in 120 documented incidents, including the armed kidnapping of US citizens on their own property (Candellaria, TX – Nov. 2003), what do we expect?
Just remember the “Rank and file” employees of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) want to do their jobs. They know the extreme danger the USA is in with the unchecked illegal alien problem. They are not allowed to do their jobs!
Remember the two illegal alien snipers in the Washington DC area and how much trouble they caused? Just think if 1/2 of one percent of the illegal aliens currently in the USA forceably resisted the enforcement of immigration laws!
It may already be too late!
The irony here will be that when the next 9/11 happens and it’s determined that the perpetrators (sp?) came through the collander that is the U.S./Mexico border, all of the foaming-at-the-mouth Moonbats will be screaming WHY DIDN’T THE GOVERNMENT STOP THEM. The only thing anyone will be able to do it point to this and say we TOLD you so.
Unfortunately, sarcasm isn’t much to work with when Americans are threatened as we are today.
I agree that the Bush administration is doing a lousy job of differentiating itself from John-John on the immigration issue, but I strongly suspect that if John-John win(s?) in November, things will get much worse on the ground beginning in January. The unpleasant reality is that Bush is trying hard not to alienate any voters, so nothing controversial will be tried by the administration until after the election. Then, win or lose, Bush will suddenly reacquire his backbone.
Ex Rat – but as we noted in a discussion last week, Hispanic voters in 2000 only made up of 5% of the vote, and many of those were in three states that were not really up for grabs (California, Texas, and New York). Even if you figure that the majority of the Hispanic vote went for the Democrats, Bush would still be wise to ignore this block and do the right thing. The result, I feel, would be a much higher level of support from his base and independents who may be thinking of withholding their vote for Bush because of this very issue. It’s not good enough just to be “not as bad” as the Democrats.
Plus from what I have read, one block of people that are really opposed to illegal immigration are legal residents of Hispanic descent. Schwarzenegger won a landslide election (over a Hispanic candidate) by promising to not issue driver’s licenses to illegals. A position I believe he has wavered on, but I could be wrong.
Marshall – Sorry, I missed the discussion last week. 5% intuitively seems low to me but I have no information to argue with. Where did that number come from? Notwithstanding, because of the Electoral College system, a relatively small number of votes in the right place can make the difference in a Presidential election — viz. Florida, 2000. And there are undoubtedly non-Hispanic swing voters who might be put off by what would be described in our allegedly unbiased media as a heavy-handed crackdown on poor Mexicans who are just trying to feed their families.
As to sitting out the vote, it seems to me to be counterproductive for people who think Bush isn’t doing enough unless they think John-John will do better. “None of the above” is a valid choice, but if the effect of that choice is to put into office the candidate who least represents the abstainer’s opinion, it doesn’t make sense to me. Better to hold one’s nose and vote for the candidate who most closely fits the voter’s ideal.
You’re right about Gov. Ah-nold, but I don’t think too many of those who voted for him did so solely on the driver’s license issue. California had, and still has, a myriad of difficult problems, and an election-proof Democratic majority in the legislative branch (thanks to gerrymandered safe districts). As dumb as I think issuing driver’s licenses to illegals is, I can see that it might be useful to cede the point for the time being in order to make headway on such issues as financial stability and breaking (or at least loosening) the stranglehold that the unions have on California politicians.
ExRat – all good points. We can only pray that MichelleMalkin.com is a site viewed daily by the President.
Michelle must have removed the blog entry from last week that had the number. It was 5.4% of the 105 million votes cast, but now I can’t seem to find it anywhere.
I remember the figures and Marshall is correct. But the bigger issues is not rather Bush and Kerry differ on illegal imigration…unless I remember wrong is not the sworn oath of the president to defend the constitution of the United States and the laws of this country?
Afyer 8 years of Clinton haven’t we learned the lesson that we have to start holding our leaders accountable for doing their jobs? I am by no means a Kerry fan but if Bush can not or will not perform his duties to the American people then why vote for him. Bush needs to prove himself to the American public or else he will not see a second term.
Listen here:
YOU CAN’T MISS THIS!
http://www.johnandkenshow.com/audio/files/asahutchinson.wmx
or
http://americanpatrol.com/WMV/AsaHutchisonJohnKJuly82004.wmv
or
http://www.americanpatrol.com/04-FEATURES/040709-HUTCH-FIBS-JON-KEN/HutchJohn-Ken040708-KFI.ram
or
http://www.johnandken.com
CHARMING. Yet again, immigration/Border Patrol has a wildly successful oepration – which means the ICE/BP HQ’s panicked, first reaction is “Kill it!”
Massive morale boosters, those guys in DC. Ignore what the community wants, and wholeheartedly approves of in favor of a shrill vocal minority of professional ethnics.
The question to be asked is not how Hutchinson feels when we learn that the next terrorist came through the Mexican border, but how that terrorist easily and comfortably lived in the community without so much as a questionable glance, and most importantly, without fear because interior enforcement affects “sensitivities.”
I’d like to come at this from another point of view. I have worked for the INS for eight years. Now I work for DHS under the same leadership as Border Patrol, we are called Customs and Border Protection. Besiders Border Patrol, we have a group called BICE, or the shortened version is ICE. They are our special agents that typically work with FBI, DEA, local police departments and other federal authorities to apprehend criminal aliens. They could really care less about the non-criminal aliens because they only have about 2000 agents nation wide and are much too busy with the criminals to worry themselves over the non-criminal illegal types (Ha! sounds like an oxymoron, doesn’t it?)
What typically happens in these cases with Border Patrol is that they step on the toes of the special agents. In other words, CBP officers are stepping on the toes of ICE officers. If Border Patrol starts getting all the credit/publicity for rounding up illegals it makes the big wigs in Washington start asking the ICE supervisors, “Hey, what are your guys doing? Why is Border Patrol doing your job?” Then everyone starts to fear for their job and their funding. It’s all statistically driven, as you might already know.
So then some upper level management types from ICE get together with some upper level management levels from CBP and they all agree to let ICE do ICE’s job and CBP should do their job.
At this point you might be asking yourself, “Isn’t it CBP’s job to round up illegals?” and you’d be right, it is. It is also CBP’s job to stop people from coming into the country in the first place. It’s like the stupid argument you always hear that we shouldn’t be spending money on Iraq when we have children not getting education in our own country. This is called a non-sequitor.
It doesn’t matter though, the point gets across to the upper level management folks that they should be concentrating on their specific task, keeping the illegals out in the first place.
So when I hear Asa Hutchinson saying to John over and over again that it is all about coordination between the agencies, my heart kinda, sorta goes out to the guy. Maybe i’m just putting the best spin possible on this for the sake of the administration, i’m an unashamed Bush supporter. But it seems to me that the red tape and beauracracy is so thick that even Asa Hutchinson has a hard time chewing through it.
For John, on the John and Ken show its pretty simple. Do the job and get it done. But for the politicians and the beaurocrats its much more complicated than that. I can only hope that our President is as dedicated to changing things as he has said that he is. I for one think that Bush is for legal immigration on a larger scale than we have now but not without more forceful enforcement of our current immigration laws.
I hope i’m right about that.
Oooops, I put my wrong email in the last message. This one is the correct one.
All of you “unabashed Bush supporters” who are defending his administration’s rotten record on immigration really need to get a grip. Bush has been pushing for amnesty since he came into office. He only shut up about it after 9/11 for obvious reasons, and now he has brought the issue back up again against the will of most members of his party. Face it, Bush WANTS amnesty. He WANTS America to blend demographically with Mexico as his own family has done through intermarriage (consequences be damned) because he wants to remake this country in his own family’s image. Just because he is a Republican doesn’t mean that he cares about you, or your safety, or our great nation. We need to dump this bum a.s.a.p.
Marc:
I agree with you. Dump Bush. Then rebuild the Republican party. Lets clean out the RINOs and send a conservative to Washington in 2008.
1964 produced Reagan 1980.
No More Bush!
Amen Peachy.