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Tuesday, May 09, 2017
Is Lehigh County Sanctuary City? Beitler Says No, ICE Says Yes
In an interesting piece on negative campaigning in the Lehigh County Executive race, Lower Mac Comm'r and blogger Ron Beitler asserts that Lehigh County is not a sanctuary city. I tend to agree, but would feel a lot better if ICE and Center for Immigration Studies felt the same way. .I wish I could answer this definitively, but can't.
29 comments:
You own views are appreciated, especially if they differ from mine. But remember, commenting is a privilege, not a right. I will delete personal attacks or off-topic remarks at my discretion. Comments that play into the tribalism that has consumed this nation will be declined. So will comments alleging voter fraud unless backed up by concrete evidence. If you attack someone personally, I expect you to identify yourself. I will delete criticisms of my comment policy, vulgarities, cut-and-paste jobs from other sources and any suggestion of violence towards anyone. I will also delete sweeping generalizations about mainstream parties or ideologies, i.e. identity politics. My decisions on these matters are made on a case by case basis, and may be affected by my mood that day, my access to the blog at the time the comment was made or other information that isn’t readily apparent.
If ICE says it's getting little or no cooperation in Lehigh County, I suspect it is. Allentown being one of the chief culprits of this lawbreaking policy.
ReplyDeleteI hope the Justice Department pulls federal funding for this irresponsible action.
The Mueller led administration sure acts like it; and the delusional mayor of Allentown, "the City without limits", as one.
ReplyDeleteSince Allentown set up the Illegal Alien support center, sounds like it to me.
ReplyDeleteThey are both one in the same since the water war capitol fund start up monies has allready been blew through like a fart in the wind. There has been no accounting of were said 1/4 of a billion dollars went to and city counsil approved a budget of more than one hundred g's more than the administration written its book for approval.
ReplyDeleteThe two have become one in a complicite higharchy of hide the crimes were the county seat is in epicentral city. The home schooled charter times two to get through and we all are still drinking water that smells as if it were taken dirrectly from the little lehigh and pumped to homes for consumption?
for starters
ReplyDeletehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_Immigration_Studies
"The CIS was founded by John Tanton, whom CNN describes as "a retired Michigan ophthalmologist who has openly embraced eugenics, the science of improving the genetic quality of the human population by encouraging selective breeding and at times, advocating for the sterilization of genetically undesirable groups."[7] The Hill notes that Tanton's opposition to immigration is driven by a desire for population reduction and protection of an ethnic white majority."
My argument is about Lehigh County which is clearly NOT a sanctuary city. I don't know enough about Allentown City. The key is are there elected officials actively working to undermine federal law based on philosophical differences related to immigration law policy? In Lehigh County that is not the case. Allentown I don't know.
ReplyDeleteas to pulling Federal funds
ReplyDeletehttp://www.sfgate.com/nation/article/Judge-says-Trump-can-t-punish-cities-over-11098098.php
"Their lawsuit cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2012 ruling that the federal government may not coerce state or local governments to change their laws by threatening to withhold vital funds — in that case, the entire Medicaid grants to states that refused to expand health care for the poor."
from the ICE report
ReplyDeletehttps://www.ilrc.org/sites/default/files/resources/lehigh_resolution.pdf
Anon 8:44. yup, that resolution was co-sponsored by Scott Ott. Folks are arguing Scott Ott of all people drove a sanctuary city policy. . . . Come on. . . . The policy outlines the good faith effort to cooperate with ICE, BUT acknowledges the nations due process laws.
ReplyDeleteThe disagreement was a legal due process argument. Not a philosophical one relative to immigration policy. Lehigh cooperates in good faith. We are NOT a Sanctuary County.
I agree with Ron Beitler. Meanwhile in trump land, the Kushners are offering US acces for $500k. But hey......look over there.....it is a microwave and the crooked media. Donald's swamp deepens every day.
ReplyDeleteThe resolution was the result of ACLU arm-twisting, not due process or philosophy. Allentown police screwed up and denied a *citizen* his civil rights. The county argued they had no choice because ICE had ordered that he be detained, an argument that a first year law student wouldn't even make. (ICE made me do it!)
ReplyDeleteThe political Left actively seeks to destroy our deportation process and has an instruction manual for doing so... break the link between Feds and local police, hence the resolution. The ACLU conned a weak assistant solicitor into putting a requirement for the resolution in the Galarza settlement agreement.
We have the resolution because the ACLU twisted arms, no more. Now, don't rescind and lose Federal block grants. Rescind and get sued by the ACLU for breach of settlement agreement.
@Tom Campione. Are you arguing that principled conservative Scott Ott and/or the Republican majority on the County board at the time in co-sponsoring and passing the County policy to deal with the lawsuit were following an ACLU/liberal playbook to undermine federal immigration policy?
ReplyDeleteThere are nuggets of truth in what your saying. But it does not apply in this case. I despise clumsy national narratives. The issue here was more complicated and that's the point I'm trying to make. That it's totally unfair for one Republican candidate (Eckhart) to feature this issue in a garbage mailer painting the other candidate (Osborne) as "soft on immigration". NO wedge issue exists here. The entire County board then and now had every intention on cooperating with ICE in good faith to enforce the nations immigration laws.
Sanctuary cities where elected officials try to undermine the law are a major problem. They exist and need to be dealt with. But NOT in Lehigh County. LC is NOT a sanctuary city.
Eckhart's whole mailer is bogus. He slams Osborne for both reassessment and the sanctuary city resolution. But if Eckhart was truly opposed to these measures, where was he when they were approved?
ReplyDeleteHe didn't say anything against the ICE resolution when that came up in 2014, yet he was the sitting controller and could have easily appeared in that capacity or as a private citizen if he was truly against it.
Similarly, Eckhart voted for every contract that came before him for the reassessment, which was actually completed when Eckhart was still a commissioner and BEFORE Osborne took office. If Eckhart had a change of heart and felt that going ahead with the reassessment was wrong, he could have CHOSEN to speak out as a private citizen but would have been OBLIGATED to speak out as Controller. Again, we heard nothing.
Recently, a proposal came forward to add $5 more dollars to every vehicle registration in the county, and Eckhart didn't speak out against it. In fact, he later admitted in a radio interview that he supported the $5 fee.
Eckhart is either a phony or incompetent. It's hard to tell which.
Eckhart has done a good job as controller. I've supported him and will in the future. My issue is with this one mailer. Totally out of bounds.
ReplyDeleteYou are right however with the assessment narrative. Everything on that mailer was about throwing garbage at the wall and seeing what stuck.
Now Brad is not totally innocent. He had a response mailer which tried to paint Glenn as a "career politician". Again, totally clumsy. Both Glenn and Brad have held local positions for years. (Brad S. Whitehall Commissioner before LC Commissioner, now running for Exec.)
I define "career politician" as staying in one place more than 2 terms and collecting a pension. The pension makes it a "career". I'll note that Glenn turned down the Controller Pension and also turned down a raise. Glenn isn't a bad guy. But his mailer was garbage. Brad should not have responded in kind also.
Elections should be won on ideas and record. Not slop.
Ron Beitler, I will be happy to mail you the instruction manual we keep on destroying the deportation process, once I get it back from Charlie Dent. Campione, like some of his fellow travelers in the tea party, has deluded himself into thinking that America's enemy is the Liberal. This distorts his thinking on every issue.
ReplyDeleteRon Beitler, a career politician is a person who makes it his career. It's as simple as that. Osborne, to be fair, made his career in private industry, running a business. His work in South Whitehall and Lehigh County were sidelines. In Eckhart's case, it's the opposite. His main focus has always been government. Even his work as a landscaper took a back seat to his government jobs, especially now that he is controller. So I do consider Eckhart a career politician. Let me add I don't think that's a bad thing.
ReplyDeleteProblem is, the term "sanctuary city" is not clearly defined or understood. Like in Lehigh County, so-called "sanctuary" policies were adopted in order to comply with the law. Secondarily, they are meant to save the taxpayers from the costs of lawsuits and enforcement (detainments aren't free - jails are expensive). Warrantless detainer requests have been found to be unconstitutional and the federal government can not force states and localities to do the job of the federal government (see amendments 4 and 10 of our Constitution).
ReplyDeleteTrump's executive order (8 U.S.C. 1373) was meant to confuse people and conflate 2 separate issues by making them believe "sanctuary cities" are somehow ignoring federal immigration law. The guy who sent the mailer is just following his lead.
No delusion... liberal/progressive/socialists/statists are my enemy. They seek to destroy individual freedom and free market capitalism.
ReplyDeleteDon't believe there's a manual? See the 2nd page where it is says it funded in part by the Soros foundation...
https://www.ilrc.org/sites/default/files/resources/013_all_in_one_guide.pdf
In reply to Beitler; I am not saying Ott is a commie-progressive. I am saying he and others, in wanting to avoid similar problems in the future, allowed themselves to be convinced that the problem was ICE orders, when in fact the problem was that police had no probable cause to believe Galarza was illegal, yet they treated him as one. If they had taken a minute to establish his citizenship, they would have never held him. Rather than fix that process within local police department, OTT and others blamed ICE and then yielded to ACLU strong-arm tactics in order to settle the case as quickly as possible.
As a white male, I'm in an endangered species because I don't get my ass kissed by politicians looking for votes.
ReplyDeleteIt seems these days that being a white, United States Citizen is a disadvantage in nearly every endeavor you can think of. Minority groups and Latinos especially get the attention and preferences in jobs because people don't want others to think they're prejudiced.
And God help the politician who says they are for enforcement of our immigration laws. The cries of racism are never-ending.
I was at a LC Commissioners' Meeting recently, and there were a great many Sanctuary City supporters who didn't stand for The Pledge of Allegiance.
ReplyDeleteLet's make sure our actions make it very clear that we are not a Sanctuary county.
People have a first amendment right to refuse to take loyalty oaths, something that whiskey patriots think matter. Their appearance at a meeting and participation in their own government is a sufficient pledge of allegiance to me.
ReplyDeleteTom Campione, the notion that there is some vast conspiracy of leftists who march in lockstep to shackle Free-thinking Americans is just plain nutty. There are no manuals and 999 of 1000 liberals have never even heard of Saul Alinsky, let alone read his book. The Lehigh County case was not settled quickly either. That is more nonsense on your part. That case winded through the courts until the Third Circuit issued a decision six years after an American citizen was mistakenly picked up and improperly classified.
ReplyDelete"OTT and others blamed ICE and then yielded to ACLU strong-arm tactics in order to settle the case as quickly as possible."
ReplyDeleteThey didn't settle. The 3rd circuit court found that a US citizens was unconstitutionally detained by Lehigh County. Lehigh County was liable for damages, so they changed their policy (and rightly so) to prevent it from happening again.
Bernie, it is not a conspiracy. It is called an ideology! Democrats are a bunch of socialists. Your Marxist/Leninist/Alinsky view of the world is bizarre and freakish. It is the exact opposite of our Constitution. There are no more conservative democrats (blue-dogs). The entire party is made up of extreme Leftists who believe that they, the political elite, know what is best for society when in fact they are a bunch of unhinged, deranged, megalomaniacs.
ReplyDeleteTom Campione, Does it honestly make sense to you to detain a US citizen unconstitutionally due to "policy" and then to keep said policy in effect? This is not a "leftist" vs "conservative" argument. US citizens are entitled to certain constitutional protections...no matter their skin color.
ReplyDelete@9:09 You are right this isn't "left" vs. "right" in this case. Despite folks trying their damnedest to spin it as such. The actual facts of this particular case as I understand them don't fit into that narrative. There is NO activist liberal faction acting to undermine federal law in Lehigh County Government. The County is working in good faith to enforce immigration laws. Actual sanctuary cities where that's not the case exist. But it's not reality in Lehigh County.
ReplyDeleteThe issue here if anything seems to constitutional conservatives vs. these sort of Trumpian nationalist populists. There are those today in that camp who seem pick and choose when the constitution applies. That is un-nerving to me. If I'm wrong or mis-characterizing please explain to me how.
I'll also say in this case eventhough it was a US citizen winning a lawsuit that prompted the policy change, even if it wasn't it is still settled law. An immigrant on US soil gets constitutional protections. It's a settled matter. Undocumented immigrants get due process of law. Is anyone here disputing that? The supreme court ruled. ( Zadvydas vs. Davis ) If that's a problem for folks then the argument should be to change the constitution. Not advocate for Lehigh County to ignore the law.
Tom Campione has just established, yet again, that he is incapable of carrying on a conversation without unleashing a torrent of insane smears on anyone who fails to agree absolutely with his ridiculous rants.
ReplyDeleteThe Republican Party no longer has free thinking individuals but is now a party of rabid alt-right reactionaries marching in lockstep with big business elites who are using them as unwitting pawns in their race to globalize the notion of a corporate oligarchy.
ReplyDelete@1:27 I disagree. Trump populists are not Constitutional Conservatives and (IMO) do not represent the party as a whole... I submit below as evidence. Note, Sen. Mike Lee is one of the most conservative members of the US Senate. Yes, there are too many party hacks today. People like boot licking swamp creature Mitch McConnell. But we still also have principled conservatives who put county over party in the Republican Party. I'll cite those like Mike Lee, Sen. Ben Sasse, Congressman Justin Amash and many others. These young(ish) leaders are the future of the party IMO. Unabashedly conservative but totally principled.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/05/11/utah-senator-mike-lee-obama-nominee-to-head-up-the-fbi/22082032/?a_dgi=aolshare_facebook