Deportation Nation, Con't

It's been a busy June for Team Evil as Trump's promise earlier this week of mass deportation operations is coming to fruition on Sunday.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement is pressing forward to arrest and deport families with court-ordered removals in 10 cities beginning Sunday, according to a senior immigration official, after President Donald Trump's tweet revealing an operation was imminent.

But acting Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan has been hesitant about elements of the operation, according to two sources familiar with his thinking.

ICE has said it was considering options to arrest and deport families who have gone through their legal proceedings but has refrained from publicly providing the scope and timeframe of the operation, which officials say could lead to a situation where a family is separated and could cause a backlash against the department. 

To that end, Trump's tweet Monday night that ICE, the enforcement arm of DHS, was preparing to deport "millions" of undocumented immigrants next week was striking, given the figure and the decision to disclose an operation prior to its execution. 

"If you're here illegally, then you should be removed," acting head of ICE Mark Morgan told reporters Wednesday during a call prompted by the President's tweet. "And in this case, that includes families."

ICE says it expects to target thousands of families, as a matter of fact.  And they're doing this for two reasons: number one, as always, Serwer's Maxim. The cruelty is the point.

Four toddlers were so severely ill and neglected at a U.S. Border Patrol facility in McAllen, Texas, that lawyers forced the government to hospitalize them last week.

The children, all under age 3 with teenage mothers or guardians, were feverish, coughing, vomiting and had diarrhea, immigration attorneys told HuffPost on Friday. Some of the toddlers and infants were refusing to eat or drink. One 2-year-old’s eyes were rolled back in her head, and she was “completely unresponsive” and limp, according to Toby Gialluca, a Florida-based attorney.

She described seeing terror in the children’s eyes.

“It’s just a cold, fearful look that you should never see in a child of that age,” Gialluca said. “You look at them and you think, ‘What have you seen?’”

Another mother at the same facility had a premature baby, who was “listless” and wrapped in a dirty towel, as HuffPost previously reported.

The lawyers feared that if they had not shown up at the facility, the sick kids would have received zero medical attention and potentially died. The Trump administration has come under fire for its treatment ― and its alleged neglect ― of migrants who have been crossing the southern border in record numbers. The result is overcrowded facilities, slow medical care and in some instances, deaths.

Trump isn't denying these reports, because he wants them spread far and wide.  He wants migrants terrified.  He wants undocumented folks terrified.  And he wants them fleeing the country.

Reason #2 the ICE machine is shifting into high gear: Obama did a better job of deportations.

Trump won't stand for that.  ICE has its orders to beat Obama.

The wild card in Sunday's raids: law enforcement cooperation in the case of sanctuary cities like Chicago.

Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced that the Chicago Police Department “will not cooperate with or facilitate any ICE enforcement actions.”

According to The Washington Post, President Trump directed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to conduct a “mass roundup” of migrant families with deportation orders. The operation is stated to likely begin on Sunday in major U.S. cities.

In a statement Lightfoot said, “We are all aware of the threat from President Trump regarding raids by ICE, and in response, Chicago has taken concrete steps to support our immigrant communities.”

Lightfoot said with her direction, CPD has “terminated ICE’s access to CPD’s databases related to federal immigration enforcement activities.”
The mayor said she has personally spoken with ICE leadership in Chicago and voiced her strong objection to any raids.

“Chicago will always be a welcoming city and a champion for the rights of our immigrant and refugee communities, and I encourage any resident in need of legal aid to contact the National Immigrant Justice Center,” Ligthfoot stated.

We'll see how this all plays out this weekend.