Immigration Reform and Infrastructure or Impeachment -- the "Mirror, Mirror on the Wall" Will Give the Democrats the Answer They Won't Now Accept -- in November 2020

WAKE UP, DEMOCRATS, THE REAL ISSUE IS IMMIGRATION, NOT IMPEACHMENT. The humanitarian crisis and makes-shift response of President Trump and his administration is DIRECTLY CAUSED by the Democrat refusal to cooperate with him on anything, even the border crisis. Shame !! • • • THE DEMOCRAT HOUSE REFUSES TO FUND BORDER ACTIVITIES. Reuters reported on Tuesday that the Trump administration is considering tapping US Transportation Security Administration funds for southern border operations. Reuters says : "The US Department of Homeland Security is considering tapping more than $230 million from the TSA to fund operations on the US-Mexico border if Congress fails to approve additional funding, a person briefed on the matter said. NBC News reported the plan earlier, citing documents of a contingency plan to fund $1.1 billion in southern border efforts. The US House of Representatives’ Appropriations Committee said on Tuesday it had not received any notification from DHS that it plans to shift existing funds. NBC News said TSA could shift $50 million that had been set aside to buy advanced airport screening equipment and $64 million from a workers’ compensation fund for injured TSA employees." • The White House way back -- by southern border standards -- on on May 1 asked Congress for $4.5 billion in emergency funds to address the rising number of people crossing the southwestern border with Mexico. Reuters says : "DHS spokesman Tyler Houlton said Tuesday in a statement the agency 'is considering all options to address the humanitarian and security crisis at our southern border. We will continue to work with our workforce to find dynamic solutions and funding to address this very serious problem.' Houlton said the agency was exploring 'fiscal mechanisms that will ensure the safety and welfare of both our workforce and the migrant population, which is also reflected in the supplemental request submitted to Congress.' " • Reuters reported that the American Federation of Government Employees that represents TSA workers, said in a statement that shifting TSA funds would cause “another Trump administration manufactured ‘crisis' : “TSA is already underfunded and understaffed, and diverting its resources just as we enter the busiest travel season will be an operational disaster,' said the group’s president, J. David Cox Sr. • According to Reuters, last week, "TSA confirmed it planned to redirect staff to the US southern border to assist with immigration duties and migrant flows. A TSA spokesman said the agency was looking for volunteers to support efforts at the border with Mexico, where the government has said it is grappling with record numbers of people. TSA staff will include 175 law enforcement officials, including air marshals, and as many as 400 security staff drawn from six unnamed US cities, but will not include airport screeners, CNN reported last week, citing two additional unnamed sources." • "Trump administration manufactured crisis"??? If David Cox would read even the mainstream media, he would know this -- Reuters states that : "Officers apprehended nearly 99,000 [see below for the official figure of 109,000] people crossing the border with Mexico in April, the highest figure since 2007, the US government reported earlier this month. More than two-thirds of those were children or people traveling as families. THAT IS WHY Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said it is deploying an additional 186 CBP officers to assist Border Patrol agents at sectors on the southwestern border, after earlier shifting more than 300 officers from airports, northern border checkpoints and other locations. • If there is a "Trump administration manufactured crisis," it is being caused by the Democrats who receive contributions from Cox's AFGE union. • • • AND, MEXICO IS NOT PROVIDING MUCH HELP. Politico reported on Tuesday that President Trump threatened to take action against Mexico in the near future, claiming the country’s southern neighbor is doing “virtually nothing” to curb illegal migration to the United States. The President tweeted : "I am very disappointed that Mexico is doing virtually nothing to stop illegal immigrants from coming to our Southern Border where everyone knows that because of the Democrats, our Immigration Laws are totally flawed & broken....Mexico’s attitude is that people from other countries, including Mexico, should have the right to flow into the US & that US taxpayers should be responsible for the tremendous costs associated w/this illegal migration. Mexico is wrong and I will soon be giving a response!” • In April, the President threatened to close the US-Mexican border if Mexican leaders could not stem the flow of migrants crossing into the United States. After a lot of Republican, business, and Democrat hand wringing about unlisted "dire economic consequences" of a border closure, President Trump said he would instead give Mexico a “one-year warning” to stop the flow of drugs into the United States. President Trump’s latest warning comes days after he lifted steel and aluminum tariffs on Mexico and Canada, marking major progress in efforts to finalize a new North American trade pact. Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle had warned that leaving the tariffs in place would cause major hurdles to the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement being passed by Congress. • The President has rightly called the arrival of migrants at the borders an “invasion” after the reported surges in the number of people arriving at the southern border from Mexico and Central America in April. The President has repeatedly called on top immigration officials to toughen the process for seeking asylum in the United States and he has repeatedly chastised Mexican leaders for doing too little to address the issue. • • • SANCTUARY CITY ILLEGAL MIGRANT DROP-OFFS. Fox News reported on Tuesday that : "US Border Patrol in south-central California said it began dropping off migrants at San Bernardino’s Greyhound Station last Wednesday because housing facilities are beyond maximum capacity, according to a report. The move comes amid a surge in migrants -- mostly from Central America -- crossing the US-Mexico border in recent months. In the seven months leading up to April, apprehensions of unaccompanied children or migrant families were up more than 380% from the same period a year earlier, Reuters reported. US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said that the influx of migrants has overwhelmed US Border Patrol stations originally built to house single adults. The agency said the stations have struggled to keep up with the numbers. Migrants awaiting court hearings to decide whether they can stay in the US have for years been dropped off at bus terminals in the southwest by Customs and Border Patrol agents. The San Bernardino Sun reported Monday that 230 Central American migrants had been dropped off within the last week and about 4,000 since last October. CBP's Acting Commissioner John P. Sanders issued a press release Saturday calling the situation at the border a 'national emergency.' " • • • THE REAL LIFE BORDER STORIES. On May 1, Epoch Times published a report about the tribulations in Roma, Texas. The title was " Illegal immigrants and drug traffickers aren’t the only incursions that border ranchers are battling in southeast Texas." We can consider it as an example of the under-reported and unreported crisis stories along the southern border. Here is an excerpted version of the Epoch Times article by Charlotte Cuthbertson : "A tiny interloper has brought the area’s cattle industry to its knees. It’s called the fever tick. Fever ticks can carry a parasite that causes babesiosis, commonly known as cattle fever, which can decimate a herd. The parasite attacks and destroys the animals’ red blood cells, causing acute anemia, high fever, and enlargement of the spleen and liver -- ultimately killing 90% of a herd that hasn’t been previously exposed to the parasite, according to the Texas Animal Health Commission (TAHC). Cattle rancher Richard Guerra’s 9,000 acres have stood idle for four years, with not a cow in sight and feeder pens overrun by weeds. After being quarantined 22 times in the past 15 years, it has become cost-prohibitive for him to run cattle. At full capacity, he can run 1,000 cattle; now, he stays afloat by leasing his land during hunting season. Guerra’s ranch sits about a mile north of the US–Mexico border, near Rio Grande City, Texas. The Rio Grande is the international boundary, and no fencing exists in the area. The border is ground zero for fever tick infestations, largely because of cattle and deer crossing the Rio Grande from Mexico and infecting US herds. 'Right now, one of our biggest problems, even though we do have some human trafficking, is the problem with fever tick. Fever tick comes from Mexico. Mexico does nothing to control it,' Guerra said on March 22....There is no cure or vaccine for the fever tick, and Guerra’s biggest hope now is for a border wall to be built, cutting access for the wildlife bringing the tick over the border. 'It only takes one fever tick carrying babesiosis to infect a host animal, and it only takes one infected host animal to pass babesiosis to a fever tick,' said Callie Ward, communications director for the TAHC. Right now, 2,655 premises, totaling 950,500 acres, are under quarantine in Texas, according to TAHC’s February data. Texas was home to 16.4% of the nation’s beef cows in 2009, according to Texas A&M University. Once a fever tick is found on a cow, a ranch goes into quarantine for nine months, under USDA rules. During that time, the cattle must be dipped in a vat every 14 days. 'As a consequence, we have to hire helicopters to do our work -- to gather our cattle,' Guerra said. 'That’s $350 an hour. Well, that gets pretty expensive. So the point being that by the time I get my cattle out of the ranch, out of a quarantine, I’ve already spent a lot of money. And it could be that, and it mostly is that, I’m not gonna make any money that year because of all these costs.'....The nine-month dipping protocol would hit an average 500 cow-calf ranch with a cost of $250 per cow, as well as a 47% increase in cash expenses, and an 80 percent decline in net cash farm income, according to a study published in 2010 by Agricultural and Food Policy Center at Texas A&M University....The cost doesn’t include cattle deaths, weight loss, and reduced calf numbers as a result of the extra work. Neighboring ranches also are affected and must undergo tick inspections and two dippings. Guerra’s son, Jody, who will someday become the fifth-generation on the ranch, said the stigma around the fever tick adds another challenge. 'Lots of cattle buyers now don’t want to buy anything south of San Antonio,' he said. 'Even though they might be clean and passed inspection -- people are leery of purchasing cattle from this area, just because they don’t want to take a chance.'....Jody estimates that anywhere from 50% to 65% of the ranchers in the Rio Grande area have stopped production. 'One of the biggest sales yards in Starr County shut down its operation because there’s just not enough cattle production to keep it open,' he said....Fever ticks were once rampant throughout most of the United States, but a concerted, 54-year effort -- from 1906 to 1960 -- pushed the problem back to the US-Mexico border. A buffer zone was created, which includes more than half a million acres, stretching from the Gulf of Mexico near Brownsville, Texas, to Amistad Dam north of Del Rio, Texas....Many cattle, equine, cervids, and nilgai antelope that cross from Mexico into Texas carry fever ticks. USDA employs mounted tick patrols (tick riders) whose job is to ride horses along the border looking for stray animals that may wander from Mexico. They apprehend and treat the animals....'Mexico again does nothing, nada, nothing. So those cattle come across, wildlife comes across,' he [Guerra] said. 'Yes, our technology and our advancements in vaccines and all of that, has really helped. But this doesn’t stop the problem. We need to stop the problem at the border. That’s why we’re in favor of a wall.' " • Epoch Times goes on to talk about the other problems that a border wall would help solve -- "human and drug trafficking that invariably encroach onto the Guerra ranch. 'When they get into a gun battle, we can hear them,' Guerra says of the Mexican cartels across the Rio Grande in Miguel Aleman. 'We’ve had occasions on this property where we have had armed intrusions. People with guns have come through here, carrying loads -- loads of marijuana, or drugs, or who knows what.' Guerra considers himself lucky that he’s only ever found one dead body on his ranch. 'I always sleep with two or three guns by my side and during the day, when I’m out and about in my truck, I always carry a firearm with me. Fortunately, I’ve never had to use it -- so far.'....'Anytime these illegals do damage to my property, I’ve got to pay for it, to repair it,' Guerra said....'We’ve seen a change in the type of individual that we encounter. Gone are the days of just a couple of people coming across, you know, looking for some assistance, looking for some direction,' he said. 'Now, we’re encountering the groups of individuals who may be escorted by armed individuals. We see more evidence of individuals who are coming across that are now drug smuggling.' Meanwhile, Guerra remains hopeful that he can get the ranch up and running again before handing it to the next generation." • • • AND WHAT ARE THE DEMOCRATS DOING ABOUT THE BORDER CRISIS? Nothing. We have to believe that they are stonewalling in the face of this mounting humanitarian disaster simply out of spite -- trying to prevent President Trump from securing the southern border because they want to defeat him any way possible, even by flooding America with illegal immigrants whose number includes drug cartel runners, murderers, rapists, and disease-carrying individuals. In March -- 2,200 illegal immigrants were quarantined over a mumps outbreak at immigration centers. • Fox News reported on Tuesday about the comment Senator Kirsten Gillibrand made on CBS News Face the Nation on Sunday. Gillibrand said she would not use the detention system if she were elected President : "If they are given a lawyer and given a process, they will follow it. They can go into the community in the way we used to handle these cases under the Department of Justice." • Monday evening, former acting ICE director Tom Homan reacted to Senator Gillibrand's comments on immigration and the left's handling of the border crisis while talking to Tucker Carlson on Fox News : "When politicians like her say things like we don't want to detain anybody. She wants to support sanctuary cities. We have the open border attitude or people are enticed to come here illegally and put themselves in the hands of criminal organizations to come to this country. That's why they're coming....Who's to blame for the child dying in custody today? They need to look in the mirror." Homan said that is the wrong message to immigrants. Fox News wrote : "A 16-year-old Guatemalan boy died Monday in US custody. He had been held by immigration authorities for six days -- twice as long as federal law generally permits -- before being transferred to another holding facility even after he was diagnosed with the flu. The teenager, identified as Carlos Gregorio Hernandez Vasquez, was the fifth minor from Guatemala to die after being apprehended by US border agents since December." Homan argues that policies like Gillibrand's promise to not detain only invites more illegal immigration : "When you start preaching open borders, we won't detain you, that's when more people come. That's when we're going to lose the border." • And, lose the border for what?? So that Democrats can figure out how to scam the voting system and win elections fraudulently because non-US-citizen illegal immigrants vote. • • • PRESIDENT TRUMP WANTS TO TRANSFORM AMERICA'S IMMIGRATION SYSTEM. Fox News reported last Friday that : "President Trump on Thursday unveiled a long-awaited immigration overhaul that would dramatically alter how the US accepts people into the country, upending the system in order to favor admissions based on merit rather than family ties. 'If adopted, our plan will transform America's immigration system into the pride of our nation and the envy of the modern world,' Trump said from the Rose Garden. The proposal would judge immigrants with a points-based system that would favor high-skilled workers -- accounting for age, English proficiency, education and whether the applicant has a well-paying job offer. Currently, only about 12% of immigrants are admitted based on employment and skills, while 66% are admitted based on family connections inside the US. Administration officials estimate that those numbers would flip to 57% and 33%, respectively, under the Trump plan." • President Trump said his plan would help recruit "top talent" : "We discriminate against genius [under the current system]. We discriminate against brilliance. We won't anymore once we get this passed....Through these steps, we will deliver an immigration system that strengthens our traditions, our culture and our values." • Fox News stated : "The average yearly wage of legal immigrants is approximately $43,000. Administration officials said Wednesday that immigrants admitted based on education and skills would have an average income of $126,000, and they would expect the average yearly wage of all immigrants to rise to roughly $96,000. Trump has long sought to end what he has called 'chain migration' as part of his broader push to reform America’s immigration laws and who is allowed into the country. He has also frequently called for the end to the visa lottery program, something his immigration plan seeks to do. It would be replaced by a new 'Build America Visa' program that would recognize 'extraordinary talent' and 'people with professional and specialized vocations,' including exceptional students. The plan does not deal with those already in the country illegally, including those who came to the country as children and were protected under an Obama-era executive order. However, Trump said it closes loopholes so that gang members and criminals are inadmissible, and would stop frivolous asylum claims. 'For criminals already here, we will ensure their swift deportation,' he said." • Fox News said that the plan will be opposed by some conservatives who want the overall annual number of immigrants to be reduced, citing Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for lower levels of immigration, called it a "positive effort" but flagged the failure to reduce legal immigration levels : "This plan represents a very positive effort on immigration, and includes important provisions such as limits to chain migration, closing the loopholes that are allowing the flow of drugs and migrants at the southern border and a crackdown on visa overstays. It is concerning there was no mention of E-Verify. However, it is not likely to become legislation, but is rather a statement of the President's goals. As such, the fact that it does not even call for a modest reduction in total immigration, but instead offsets decreases with increases in 'skills-based' immigration, is very concerning." • But, President Trump said the plan will present a “clear contrast” with Democrats’ immigration plans : “Democrats are proposing open borders, lower wages and frankly, lawless chaos. We are proposing an immigration plan that puts the jobs, wages and safety of American workers first. Our plan is pro-American, pro-immigrant, and pro-worker. It’s just common sense.” • "Common Sense" -- that's the sticking point -- Democrats are sorely lacking in common sense. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said Thursday that the plan : “...isn’t a serious attempt at immigration reform. It repackages the same partisan, radical anti-immigrant policies that the administration has pushed for the two years -- all of which have struggled to earn even a simple majority in the Senate let alone 60 votes." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., described the Trump plan as "dead-on-arrival" and "not a remotely serious proposal" : "The White House has repackaged the worst of its past failed immigration plans: greenlighting the Administration’s barbaric family detention policies, reviving the President’s ineffective and wasteful wall, completely abandoning our patriotic and determined Dreamers and gutting our asylum and refugee protections, which the evangelical community has called the ‘crown jewel of American humanitarianism. To say that this plan’s application criteria are ‘merit-based’ is the height of condescension." House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., said that Trump's proposal was "based on a set of falsehoods aimed at only allowing immigrants from certain favored nations or backgrounds : "This new proposal is a non-starter and another example of how this President continues to base his immigration policies on xenophobic and false stereotypes about immigrants from certain parts of the world....If we close ourselves off from the world, shut ourselves in with walls and closed minds, we do so at our own peril and at the expense of the better future we forfeit." • Common Sense??? It is not in the Democrat vocabulary. BUT, the President has a plan to circumvent the Democrat insane immigration agenda : "If for some reason, possibly political, we can't get the Democrats to approve this merit-based high-security plan, then we will get it approved immediately after the election when we take back the House, keep the Senate and of course hold the presidency." • Fox News says that : "Trump’s immigration proposal comes as the administration is scrambling separately to deal with the more pressing challenge of illegal immigration on the southern border. Customs and Border Protection said it apprehended or turned away more than 109,000 migrants attempting to cross the border in April, the second month in a row the number has topped 100,000. A bill unveiled by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Wednesday would end asylum claims from Central America at the border, and return unaccompanied minors to their home countries." • • • DEMOCRATS IGNORE TRUMP'S IMMIGRATION PLAN AT THEIR PERIL. That's what Liz Peek wrote in a Fox News article on Tuesday. Peek asks : "When will Hispanics realize they are being played by Democrats? When will they understand that for all their sanctimonious promises, Democrats have no intention of resolving the plight of the Dreamers, or of fixing our broken immigration system? Maybe they already have. Hispanic approval of President Trump is soaring, to the alarm of Democrats who take those voters for granted. It’s about time." Liz Peek also asks : "Why doesn’t she [Speaker Pelosi] offer a compromise which trades resolution of the Dreamer issue for some of Trump’s popular measures redrawing immigration requirements? Isn’t that how governing is supposed to work?" • Peek says the Democrats are stuck on the Hispanic vote issue : "That is not how resistant Democrats work, especially on immigration. They would rather leave the issue unresolved, a festering sore that upends the lives of people stuck in DACA limbo, and leaves our southern border in chaos. Democrats will not let go of a wedge issue that helped President Obama win reelection in 2012. Attracting 71% of the Hispanic vote that year was critical, especially in key states like Colorado, Nevada, and Florida. Hispanics are the fastest-growing minority in the US In 2012 they represented 10% of the electorate; in 2020, they will account for 13.3%, according to Pew. How did Obama rack up such enthusiasm among Latinos in his second campaign? By promising immigration reform. Again. He had vowed to tackle the issue when first elected, but spent his political capital instead on ObamaCare, even as Democrats held a majority of both houses of Congress. Not since Lucy snookered Charlie Brown with that infernal football has there been such a cruel tease. Approaching the 2012 election, Hispanics were angry that Obama had not prioritized immigration reform and furious at the President’s aggressive deportation program. In his first three years in office, Obama ordered the removal of 1.1 million undocumented people, the most under any President since the 1950s. The United States needs immigrants, and polling indicates that most Americans welcome workers from abroad. Alarmed that his Hispanic support was fading, Obama announced his DACA program just months before the 2012 election. The New York Times reported at the time, “...the President’s move was a clear play for a crucial voting bloc in states that will decide whether he gets another term.” It worked. Hillary Clinton did not do as well with the Latino community as Obama, but still drew 66% of Hispanic votes." • Liz Peek notes that alarm bells must be : "ringing now amongst Democrats as polls show President Trump’s approval climbing among Hispanics. Three recent surveys have put him north of 40%. The liberal media, which has doggedly portrayed the President as racist and his immigration policies as especially harmful to Hispanics, is appalled. But no one should be surprised. While Democrats court Latinos with ever-more liberal immigration and border policies, Pew Research has shown the number one issue for Hispanics, as for most voters, is the economy. Trump has delivered a booming jobs market and rising pay, leading to record-high consumer sentiment. Hispanic unemployment in April dropped to 4.2%, the lowest ever recorded, and wages have grown faster for Latinos than for any other ethnic group. It is also truethat the Hispanic community, which is more than two-thirds Catholic or Evangelical, is more conservative on social issues than today’s Democrats. As candidates in the upcoming election are pressed by Trump to defend late-term abortion, for instance, they may lose Hispanic voters." • BUT, says Peek : "It is on immigration that Democrats may be moving in the wrong direction. Polling done last year showed 63% of the country approving of a deal such as that outlined by Trump this week : trading permanent protection for Dreamers in exchange for merit-based immigration, ending the diversity lottery and limiting 'chain' migration. Some 61% of Hispanics favored that outcome. In particular, 84% of voters (and 83% of Hispanics) 'think immigration priority for those coming to the United States should be based on a person’s ability to contribute to America as measured by their education and skills.' More than two-thirds of the nation opposes the diversity lottery." • As Liz Peek states : "We currently have 1.3 million unfilled jobs; surveys show finding competent workers is the number one challenge for companies today. Instead of randomly opening our doors, it makes sense to prioritize those who can fill some of those jobs and immediately contribute to the growth and prosperity of the country....We need smarter and more productive immigration policies, and to fix the Dreamer nightmare. Hispanics could make that happen -- by forcing Democrats to the table. They need to demand that Democrats earn their support, not take it for granted." • • • DEAR READERS, as Adam Schiff's House Intelligence Committee postpones enforcement action after AG Barr's DOJ offers to share some Mueller files related to counter-intelligence and foreign intelligence, and as President Trump's lawyers appealed a lower court decision ordering that his financial records be released to the House Oversight Committee to the Washington, DC Circuit Court of Appeals -- headed by Merrick Garland, the Obama Supreme Court nominee that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell outraged Democrats by refusing to even schedule a meeting of the Judiciary Committee to consider his nomination -- we see the fight shaping up between the President and the House over all aspects of his public and private life. • BUT, the worst offense as yet hurled at President Trump is Speaker Nancy Pelosi's Wednesday declaration to reporters that “we believe that the President of the United States is engaged in a cover-up -- a cover-up.” How dare Pelosi try to invoke Watergate images against a President who has done absolutely nothing wrong -- who has, instead, been tormented, spied on, and blocked in his every presidential agenda item. President Trump's response was perfect -- he cut short an infrastructure meeting with Democrat leaders Pelosi and Schumer and demanded they and their Democrats end what he called their "phony investigations" before he'll negotiate with them on issues like infrastructure. The President delivered a statement brimming with contempt from the Rose Garden after the meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer ended abruptly : "So, I just wanted to let you know that I walked into the room and I told Senator Schumer, Speaker Pelosi, I want to do infrastructure. I want to do it more than you want to do it. I would be really good at that. That's what I do. But you know what? You can't do it under these circumstances. So get these phony investigations over with....Instead of walking in happily into a meeting, I walk in to look at people that have just said that I was doing a cover-up." President Trump said, "I don't do cover-ups.” President Trump was was standing at a Rose Garden podium displaying a sign that said “no collusion, no obstruction.” • The President took the opportunity offered by the canceled meeting to chastise the media for their coverage of the Russia probe : “This whole thing was a takedown attempt at the President of the United States, and honestly you ought to be ashamed of yourselves for the way you reported so dishonestly.” • The President also said that he was annoyed to learn that the scheduled meeting on infrastructure would take place after a House Democratic caucus meeting expected to focus on his possible impeachment. He said he told the top Democrats to “get these phony investigations over with” before talks could resume : "I’ve said from the beginning you can’t go down two tracks." The President blasted the probe as a “total hoax” that “hurt us in so many ways.” • Will their obsession with impeachment ruin every chance the Democrats have to make something of their House majority? Impeachment or Immigration? Impeachment or Infrastructure? We know where the American public comes down on these issues -- and it spells big trouble ahead for Pelosi, Schumer, and the 23-and-counting Democrat wannabe presidential dwarfs. The "Mirror, Mirror on the Wall' will give them the truthful answer they refuse to accept now -- in November 2020. If you don't trust your own common sense, just ask the people of Roma, Texas.