Immigration and Customs Enforcement became the political punching bag for a hearing at the Cook County Board over a local ordinance in which the County no longer cooperates with ICE detainers. The hearing comes in the aftermath of the case of Saul Chavez.
Chavez, an illegal alien with a drinking and driving conviction, allegedly was driving under the influence in Chicago when he is charged with hitting a pedestrian, Denny McCann, last July with his Dodge Neon.
According to a police report, Chavez dragged McCann two hundred feet when Chavez attempted to flee. McCann died shortly thereafter.
Chavez was released on bond in November. ICE had a detainer on Chavez but it was ignored because of the ordinance. As a result, Chavez was released rather than being handed over to ICE. Chavez missed his next court date and hasn’t been seen since.
ICE detainers are holds, up to two business days, that ICE places on municipal inmates that are also flagged for immigration violations. Rather than releasing these inmates, either because their sentence is done or they’ve posted bond, they are held for two more days so that ICE can come pick them up and process them for immigration violations.
The hearing held today was open to the public and the biggest target was ICE. While ICE officials were invited to the hearing, they declined and many took notice.
“I’m ashamed that ICE is not here, they should be here,” said Republican Cook County Commissioner Pete Silvestri.
This was a thought echoed by his fellow Commissioner, John Daley. “It is a disgrace that ICE is not here,” Daley said.
The Cook County Commissioners weren’t the only ones slamming ICE for its failure to provide a representative. Rodney Craig, mayor of suburban Hanover Park, echoed their thoughts. “For Homeland Security not to be here is an insult.”
Failure to appear at the hearing was only one criticism leveled at ICE. Democratic Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart slammed ICE for imposing a chaotic and nebulous immigration policy.
“There’s such chaos out there, because ICE has abdicated its responsibility, that everyone is trying to wing it,” said Dart.
Democratic Cook County Commissioner Deborah Sims agreed with that assessment. “The federal government isn’t getting it right, and there’s a lot more of them then there is of us.”
It wasn’t only Democrats slamming the federal immigration policy. Silvestri made a similar assessment. “The root of the problem has always been the federal government’s failure to deal with this issue.”
According to immigration attorney Isaul Verdin, who practices out of Dallas, ICE detainers have been around for years with little controversy. They became controversial as a result of another ICE program called Secure Communities.
Secure Communities started out as a way for local communities to share their databases with federal agencies, namely ICE. It also became a staple of President Obama’s deportation policy which has led to record numbers of deportations. In the process, many liberal groups have complained that Secure Communities have unfairly targeted otherwise law abiding illegal aliens.
These groups have complained that Secure Communities investigations are often started against individuals who commit traffic violations like speeding.
ICE detainers are often the result of investigations against those suspected of being in the country illegally. Liberal groups have also raised the specter that these ICE detainers are unconstitutional.
Speaking at the hearing, a lawyer, Adam Schwartz of the American Civil Liberties Union claimed that ICE detainers violate the fifth amendment to the Constitution, the right not to be detained without a hearing in front of a judge.
“ICE detainers violate our fifth amendment right to be detained without a hearing from a judge.”
That’s because, said Schwartz, ICE doesn’t share their investigation with local authorities. As such, no other agencies are given access to the evidence against any detainee that is deemed to be suspected of violating immigration law.
Sheriff Dart largely echoed that criticism. “Everyone is operating in the dark.” Dart continued, “We don’t know what it is that leads them (ICE) to the County jail to pick up a detainee.”
While many of the speakers complained about ICE and immigration policies, Denny McCann’s brother, Brian, made it clear that the Cook County Board deserves plenty of responsibility for allowing his brother’s killer not to face justice.
Brian McCann said, “Public safety is paramount to policy, and this ordinance, in my opinion, was not about public safety.”
Another speaker, George Blakemore, also criticized the ordinance. Blakemore said that this ordinance along with the County’s overall sanctuary policy promote the economic and physical well-being of illegal aliens at the expense of the economic and physical well-being of legal residents.
Initially, the hearing was supposed to conclude with a vote of the Cook County Board on an amendment introduced by Republican Cook County Commissioner Tim Schneider. Schneider’s amendment would mandate that the County would cooperate with any detainer of an inmate charged with a violent crime and give the Cook County Sheriff’s Office discretion to cooperate with other detainers.
That vote was cancelled and instead the Cook County Board will vote on the amendment at its next hearing. The largely Democratic board passed this ordinance on September 7, 2011, on a largely party line vote. The Cook County Board is comprised of thirteen Democrats and four Republicans. At least two Commissioners indicated their votes may change at this hearing.
Democratic Commissioner John Fritchey said, “There are changes that may need to be made to this policy.”
Democratic Commissioner Earlean Collins made similar comments, “There are problems with this ordinance, and it should be amended.”
Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart refused to take a position on the original ordinance, but at this hearing, he said that he generally backed Schneider’s amendment.
Dart continued, “I’m willing to take on some discretion but I need some parameters so frankly we don’t walk into a lawsuit.”
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ARE WE NOT A NATION OF LAWS?
President Obama has shrunk away from enforcing immigration laws and must be remembered, when it’s time to vote in November for a new White House keeper. Using discretionary policies, Obama has underhandedly been selective of which illegal aliens can be deported, and who can walk away to live amongst us. When any person who enters the United States without legal status should be removed, with exception? Although under the present weak law, it’s only a civil matter, everybody who has taken a job utilizing a stolen Social Security number has committed a felony? On a voluntary basis at the present time, hundreds of thousands of businesses operate the E-Verify program, to distinguish illegal labor committing fraud by using an individual SSN, or an eligible worker. The future shows promise in Congress if voters demand a nationwide mandatory process, called “The Legal Workforce Act.” With easy access through any computer any person can be identified through federal data bases. With 9 percent unemployment, thousands of illegal aliens unable to claim a job, then thousands of Americans can be hired.
Mitt Romney has said on numerous occasions in his presidential campaign that this a much more efficient avenue, without major costs as a factor, with the effect of unlawful people self-deporting. This is truly ‘Attrition though Enforcement.’ Cannot be hired, you might as well go home? Every voter has the ultimate power to empower the incoherent Congress, to expedite this law. It is exactly the same with ‘Birthright Citizenship Act’ Smuggling babies by foreign women onto these shores, is by far the most expensive deficit engineered by the Liberal activist judges that every baby birthed in our nation receive immediate citizenship, even though the parents are nationals. By judicial law every American is coerced by the IRS, to pay for children and therefore the parents to supplement their income with your dollars.
When the Liberal, Democrats or Republicans talk about reducing the huge deficit of $15.Trillion, they fall short in discussing the illegal immigration occupation. However the TEA PARTY does and will not digress from the facts that the Southwest has been invaded. When the U.S. Census says the population has exploded over a short period of time. It’s self-explanatory that these people are spilling across the border, with limited personal at the border to stop the rush. The US government continuously lied to us, and the only gauge of reducing illegal immigration is to unite with the TEA PARTY. The Liberal pathfinders have infected this nation with their–“Political Correctness”–using every demonization to undermine our enforcement laws, using epithets, racial and restrictionist’s rhetoric with legislators cringing or saying nothing at all.
The attack always starts with the same shout of racial profiling, knowing full well the larger influx enters over our Southern border. Using the racial card or trying to pass laws, which put a harness on free speech. The Liberal progressives mostly own the editorial newsrooms, but perhaps not all cable news stations Illegal Immigration is illegal Immigration. Nothing more-nothing less and is ILLEGAL. This has nothing to do with people who come through the scrupulous channels, to enter America–LEGALLY, while illegal aliens fly into airline terminals and lying that they were just a tourist, smuggled in or just dodge the US border Patrol. No matter the state of the US economy, more money needs to be spent by building the real fence. Suffice to say most of the border remains unguarded and with wide areas, with nothing at all—not even a fence.
People don’t have any idea of the ramification of both Republican and Democratic platform on illegal immigration. It’s not just jobs and futures society becoming Balkanized? It’s not just about language, which has caused wars around the world? The major issue is OVERPOPULATION? The Southwest already suffers from a scarcity of drinking water? Then there are the serious energy issues, because of the spread of concrete? Overpopulation, traffic overcrowding, urban sprawl, pollution, environmental damage, water, oil, gas, energy diminishing resources, contagious diseases, lack of affordable housing, depressed wages of US citizens, an underground economy caused by illegal aliens, fraudulent documents, identity theft, Sanctuary cities, predatory businesses tax evasion, soaring nationwide crime rate growth , increased taxpayer burdens, 40 + billions of Dollars wired across the borders and overseas, congested schools, uneducated legal children, overcrowded prisons, insufficient health care for legal residents, but free health care for illegal immigrants and paying out Child Tax Credits for children of illegal aliens, who by faux are given citizenship. $10 billion dollars are returned to foreign nationals using IRS issued ITIN numbers or stolen Social Security numbers.
Since taking residence in the Oval office, the Obama Administration have dissolved key interior enforcement measures, including abandonment of the “Social Security Admin No-Match query to employers about their hires,” nurturing alterations weakening the 287(g) program, and the fading randomized I-9 audit checks. These acts have destabilized efforts to dissuade illegal immigration, in reality sending the message that once an illegal alien is in this country, it is effortless to find a job and stay. Immigration reform will only be durable if the government enforces the 1986 immigration law and not chip away at those statutes. A bill, newly introduced by Senator Robert Menendez (D–NJ) a Comprehensive Immigration Reform package, granting legal permanent residence status to the nearly 11 million illegal immigrants (more like 20 to 30 million) already present in the United States. Additionally, the bill’s language also fully incorporates the DREAM Act and the Agricultural Jobs Act, providing two further avenues to amnesty for illegal immigrants. What stays within the confines of the Obama administration is the whispered cost to afflict this nightmare? The fiscal consequences of this amnesty will vary depending on the time period analyzed, says the reputable “Heritage Foundation.” Overall, the net cost to taxpayers of retirement benefits for amnesty recipients is likely to be at least $2.6 trillion—and that’s just for the government accountability statistics.
For 30 years this country has been a very large sponge, for anybody who can easily slip by the underfunded border fence? Our compassion for the poor has turned into a parody and now we are forced by the IRS to pay government entitlements that are essentially unfunded mandates for those who came here illegally. WE think it’s bad now, but if President Obama, Sen. Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi Chuck Schumer, Janet Napolitano, Sen. Gutierrez and of course Eric Holder, John Morton and a whole host of Democratic Liberals Progressives, could force through another AMNESTY? The volume of indigent humanity waiting in every tin shack across the Southern border, the visa overstays from Europe and any other destitute society will rush for America, once the–BLANKET AMNESTY–bell tolls. We think we have a problem now, with hundreds of thousands of homeless? I see an insatiable need for legal immigrants who guarantee the advancement of our country and its economy, but not those who come with calculated motivation to soak every penny of taxpayers, as we have in huge numbers now.
NOTHING WILL PREVENT THIS TRAVESTY, UNTIL AMERICANS WAKE UP AND CUT OFF BENEFITS FROM PEOPLE WHO ARE UNLAWFUL ENTRANTS. America has also become a dumping ground of human criminal garbage of every poor country in the world. In the last 10 years criminal activity involving illegal migrants and immigrants has escalated, and one of the prevalent crimes is drunken driving and hit and runs. In California this is a daily occurrence, spiraling out of control. The Secretary of Homeland Security says the border is secured, then why are drug cartels taking over land adjacent to the Mexican border fence?
According to the Liberals–American citizenship has no meaning anymore, as they are involved in turning our country adrift from its principle values as assigned to us by the U.S. Constitution and on a society based on the ‘rule of Law.’
It’s about the special interest lobbyists that corrupt the whole environment in the Capitol. Illegal immigration is by far the largest expenditures to this nation, other than the defense bill. The costs will stagger the prudent mind, because the dollar figure is off the scale. This is not just in federal dollars, but state, county and city dollars? If politicians cannot be honest in telling us the truth about the illegal population in this sovereign nation, then they will certainly not inform us about the crippling financial price to support them. GOOGLE–NUMBERSUSA for enforcement grading of your politicians in federal or state government and begin filling their seats in Congress with Tea Party leaders? Read about corruption and sanctuary city policies at JUDICIAL WATCH. AMERICAN PATROL.
Hunt down you politician either over the phone at , or go their office in person. Insist that they are–OUT–if they vote for any kind of AMNESTY or that they disguise a Comprehensive Immigration Reform. Tell them E-Verify must be made permanent, to start “ATTRITION” by enforcement procedure for every illegal worker in America? Find out what can you do for this Representative Republic called the US that this administration wants to alter into a Socialist nation. We cannot afford overpopulation growth, we are broke and our corrupt politicians are pandering to illegal immigrant open-border fanatics? The Obama administration is very silent on their push for another blanket amnesty, to commence if he is reelected.
All legal voters must be warned that Democratic groups such as Acorn, have in the past and will again register to vote non-citizens and illegal aliens. We must insure that there is stringent oversight in the voting stations and even Absentee ballots. Illegal aliens are voting and will again, with Liberal backed Democrats, aware of this crime against our election laws?
What is America coming to when the Mayor of Los Angeles county Antonio Villaraigosa, who took the Oath of the Allegiance was conspiring and thanking President Ernest Zedillo and the current President for meddling in our Immigration laws. President Zedillo for using his influence derail the California voters Proposition 187, designed to deny welfare benefits and public assistance to illegal aliens, who sneaked into California from across the border. Many voters still believe that Sacramento severed the path of this law, from reaching the Supreme Court. Mayor Villaraigosa should be asked where his loyalty lies, as it’s certainly not the legal population of California. Mayor Villaraigosa is just one of thousands of anti-American activists, more interested in open border succession, than protecting the billions of dollars are handed over eagerly by California lawmakers to millions of foreign nationals in welfare payments. Voters should zero their attention on every pro-illegal immigrant Governor, Mayor Judge, Chief of police and a combination of elected officials and replace them with TEA PARTY political soldiers.
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The whole hearing was about dumping on ICE. They are not the problem boys and girls. Don’t you get it? They avoided their responsibility and even got the pro ICE commissioners and a mayor and even the sheriffs in the anti ICE crusade.
ICE my friends was never formally invited as is required by protocal and they will always meet any time any where privately for meaningful discussion. I could go on and on. The public was duped! The McCann family will keep on keepin on my friends
Brian McCann