Forget Abolishing ICE, Biden Admin May Have Found Key to Destroying It from the Inside

By Jack Cowhick February 22, 2021 at 3:45pm

Why abolish, when you can just reorganize?

Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas reportedly has a plan that would essentially abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement without actually doing so, according to The Washington Times.

The article states that Mayorkas leaked his plan in a telephone conversation with “agency personnel in Texas,” in which he supposedly suggested converting ICE enforcers into “criminal investigators.”

This, of course, means thousands would no longer work to enforce illegal immigration laws, effectively slashing arrests and deportations in the effort.

Deportation officers reportedly said the plan was similar to “converting [a police department’s] beat cops to detectives, leaving nobody to patrol the streets for basic crimes.”

Director of ICE Tae Johnson “agreed with Mr. Mayorkas’ direction,” according to an unnamed source from The Times.

As great as a “promotion” to investigator sounds, though, it’s frankly all a spin on a much worse idea.

The Biden administration is attempting to keep up appearances, making it seem as though worse offenders like murderers, sexual predators and human traffickers are being focused on. Meanwhile, everyday illegal immigrants can go about their day because no “beat cops” are around to deal with smaller problems.

However, while those everyday immigrants seem like no trouble, America has seen the positive effect of beat cops working against petty criminals.

Do you support Immigration and Customs Enforcement?

Two decades ago, in 1990, New York City subway systems were hubs for crime and disorder, with over 20 people losing their lives waiting for the trains. That changed with the arrival of William Bratton, the new head of the Metropolitan Transportation Agency.

Bratton understood that petty criminals and worse offenders weren’t totally disconnected; in fact, he believed they might be extremely related. With this thought in mind, Bratton changed the focus of the MTA entirely.

Rather than trying to free the New York subway system of its immense squalor, Bratton instead focused on enforcing policies against actions such as turnstile-jumping and public urination.

Granted, police couldn’t begin immediately. Criminologist George Kelling noted that although 250,000 people were beating subway fares, “there were not 250,000 criminals,” according to the New York Post.

According to a report on the policy, in just 3 years of Bratton’s policies, underground crime rates decreased by 35.9 percent.

This proves one relatively major idea: policing petty crime works.

Don’t be fooled by semantic differences; most illegal immigrants are criminals. According to the ICE 2020 Fiscal Year report, of the 185,884 illegal immigrants removed, 118,949 had “criminal convictions or pending criminal charges.”

That figure is also a downward trend from 2019, where 143,099 immigrants were some form of criminal offender. The fact is, put simply, reorganizing ICE in the way Mayorkas plans to will have a massive impact on law and order in America, and no doubt in our border cities.

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