State Senate President Pro Tem Kevin de León, D-Los Angeles, is playing a dangerous game of chicken with President Donald Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions over California’s criminal aliens’ sanctuary status.
With his sanctuary state Senate Bill 54 bill, de León, to use his words, aims to “freeze out” Immigration and Customs Enforcement from California, proposes to limit assistance with ICE “to the fullest extent possible,” and wants to convert public schools, hospitals, courthouses and hospitals into no-go zones for federal immigration officials.
And de León, who is on record that half his family entered the United States illegally, then committed identity theft to get and keep jobs, charged Trump and Sessions as sympathetic with white nationalists’ principles.
According to de León, the Trump administration has engaged in unconstitutional “constant and systematic targeting” of California’s diverse cities. De León promised to lead California’s resistance to Justice Department threats to withhold up to $20 million in grant funding.
De León is one of Trump’s most outspoken critics. But his home city of Los Angeles is fraught with criminal aliens, and responsible elected officials should endorse and encourage, not demonize, efforts to remove dangerous hard-core felons.
While de León and others in the Legislature rail against Trump, a recent ICE action in Southern California underlined the urgency of deporting felony re-entries, fugitives from justice and other unlawful criminals.
Over a five-day ICE Enforcement Removal Operation, officers arrested 188 illegal immigrants from 11 countries. Most had prior convictions for drug offenses, drunken driving and sex crimes, including rape and sex with a minor. Ten were rounded up in Santa Barbara County.
Since earlier this year when Trump signed his executive order that prioritized deporting criminal aliens, ICE has arrested 41,000 offenders nationwide, a 40 percent increase over the same period last year.
In his statement, ICE representative David Marin said that taking the aliens off the street, and removing them from the United States, makes “communities safer for everyone.”
Marin’s logic is irrefutable. Everyone should agree that California is safer without cocaine traffickers and sex offenders. Yet, illogically, de León, many of his legislative colleagues, and the state’s sanctuary mayors in Los Angeles, Sacrament and San Francisco vow to battle Trump to the end.
But de León is locked in a losing battle, one that might have more dire consequences if the Legislature passes, and Gov. Jerry Brown defiantly signs, SB 54. Trump is on firm legal standing when it comes to cutting off funds to sanctuary cities, assuming the designated recipients fail to cooperate with immigration officials, and DOJ follows proper procedures.
Headline stories reported on a U.S. district court’s sanctuary ruling last month, and claimed the administration is barred from defunding noncompliant cities; those stories simply are wrong.
Assuming the administration limits itself to three federal Justice Department programs, money can be withheld. DOJ has set a June 30 deadline for sanctuaries to submit evidence that they’re compliant.
Penniless California can ill-afford to lose millions of dollars because of its misguided, illegal alien advocacy. Brown projects a $1.6 billion deficit by midsummer, with state and local governments owing $1.3 trillion.
With California’s population at 39 million and with an estimated 3 million illegal immigrants, citizens and legal permanent residents outnumber aliens at a 13-to-1 ratio. Sacramento should be focused on making California a sanctuary for the deserving, not the criminal.
— Joe Guzzardi is a senior writing fellow for Californians for Population Stabilization (CAPS) who now lives in Pittsburgh. He can be reached at joeguzzardi@capsweb.org, or follow him on Twitter: @joeguzzardi19. Click here to read previous columns. The opinions expressed are his own.