We live in interesting times, in the "ancient Chinese curse" sense.
President Trump made illegal immigration and the masses of people illegally in our country already a major cornerstone of his 2024 campaign. Within hours of taking office, he started making sure that our immigration laws would be vigorously enforced, and yes, that's what many of us voted for. We are a nation of laws, supposedly, and the previous administration ignored immigration law and border security. So there's a big mess to clean up.
There's now another problem: That mess is getting messier, in part because some local politicians are stirring people up. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Homeland Security (DHS) officers are now being confronted by mobs when trying to apprehend illegal aliens. It is belaboring the obvious to note that this kind of thing is intolerable and can't continue. There are a couple of particular problems:
First, as my colleague Nick Arama informs us, local elected officials are openly defiant of federal authority. Nobody wants to see the federal government cut back to its constitutional restrictions more than I, mind you, but enforcing border security and immigration law is actually a proper function of the national government.
Nick writes:
This is what Mayor Bass has countenanced with her statement, acting as though there's something wrong with federal law enforcement to detain illegal aliens. The wrong here is how the Democrats are responding and demonizing enforcing the law. They've completely gone around the bend at this point defending illegal aliens.
Mayor Bass is arguably engaging in incitement here. In Los Angeles in the last few days, ICE agents have been confronted by mobs, thugs determined to interfere with federal agents in the legal performance of their constitutional duties. The city and county of Los Angeles have no authority when it comes to illegal immigration or the enforcement of immigration law, even if Mayor Bass doesn't seem to have assimilated that information. Now, with that statement of hers still lighting up X, ICE agents are confronted by mobs.
It's not just elected officials, either; the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) local president tried to physically interfere with an ICE raid, and he, as the parlance of the day would have it, found out. My colleague Jennifer Oliver O'Connell brought us that news:
Jennifer writes:
As saints made of clay are wont to do, "St. Kilmar" has crumbled. But fear not, dear readers, Democrats have already teed up their latest icon: David Huerta, President of the California Chapter of Service Employees International Union (SEIU). On Friday, Huerta decided he needed to stop a lawful raid on a worksite in Los Angeles. As the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) vehicles approached, Huerta attempted to get in their path. Very stupid and dangerous, but done for this very reason: he wanted a confrontation:
A local union leader was hospitalized during a confrontation in response to immigration raids in downtown Los Angeles Friday.
David Huerta, president of the Service Employees International Union California (SEIU) and SEIU- United Service Workers West, was injured during his arrest. According to Rep. Gil Cisneros (C-31), Huerta was also tased.
There's no way this ends well.
Not all that long ago, a mass illegal assembly would be dealt with by the reading of the Riot Act, followed by the command, "Disperse or be fired upon." Nobody wants to see a return to those days. But the current situation has to end. We cannot tolerate local politicians inciting mass unrest, nor can we tolerate mobs interfering with law enforcement. The problem is, escalation may well lead to escalation.
There probably aren't enough federal law enforcement officers to match the numbers in possible mobs; the problem in dealing with mobs is that they are mobs. While the typical crowd of goblins we are seeing trying to disrupt ICE raids today probably numbers in the dozens, but we need look back no further than 2020 to see mobs measuring in the hundreds, or thousands. Such a mob is capable of overwhelming any police presence.
One possible way to deal with this is to identify and arrest any leaders; cut off the head of the snake, so to speak. This would be much like a combat situation, in which one identifies the leaders and takes them out; anyone shouting orders is isolated, arrested, and vigorously prosecuted, pour encourager les autres.
Another possible means would be to levy federal incitement charges against local officials, elected and otherwise - people like Karen Bass and David Huerta.
One way or another, this has to end. The current situation cannot be tolerated. We are a nation of laws, not men. If this doesn't end with the enforcement of laws, not only immigration laws but also laws against fomenting and participating in interference and civil unrest, then sooner or later, it will end in a much less organized and pleasant manner. Nobody on the right wants that, but if the left keeps pushing this, they will find out that this undesirable alternative will not be in their favor.
