By Frank J Biga III –
One of the sweetest results of the election of Donald Trump is the likelihood that the liberals are going to get a good solid dose of their own medicine as conservatives will now have the ability to use the State to advance conservative ideas. This is not something liberals will be used to as most Republicans have been timorous eunuchs when they have held power. President Trump will stand in marked contrast to this analogue and liberal reaction to it could tear the decimated Democratic party apart further. In fact, right now they are taking the wrong approach with serious consideration being given to back-bencher and very liberal Representative Keith Ellison from Minnesota as the Chairman of the Democratic National Committee. Such a move almost guarantees further GOP pickups in 2018.
Liberals love the State. In fact, as is generally understood in conservative circles, they are statists and not really liberals. They have just usurped the term liberal which used to mean someone who was for more individual liberties. And the Democratic Party is manifestly an anti-freedom party aside from having the freedom to take the life of the innocent unborn. Their presidents in the last 100 years have uniformly used the State to push Progressive ideology by enshrining it in the law using whatever legislative means necessary to achieve these ends.
Donald Trump is their absolute worst nightmare. As a business executive he knows how to wield power, and as a former Democrat he has had plenty of political role models to learn the art of politics from. Trump also has an eleven-year old that I think is the main reason he ran for President. He knows that unless someone changes the trajectory of our nation, that we won’t have a nation left by the time his son Barron is 40.
So, Trump will do whatever he needs to do within the Constitution and the law to achieve what appear to be culturally conservative ends. And liberals will see their cherished “progress” reversed, and suddenly in some cases.
One of the most talked about weapons that Trump will use is, as Obama showed us all, his “pen and phone” to reverse many of President Obama’s unilateral executive orders. From the legal status of the foreign born “Dreamers” being changed to the administration’s likely directives to the Justice Department to drop appeals in the appellate courts over issues ranging from abortion to “climate change”, Trump can make major changes in tone and direction on January 20. In addition, his election itself is having a positive effect as reports from the border indicate that some ICE officials are ignoring President Obama’s open borders policies and are stepping up enforcement because they know they have a new boss to answer to as of January 20.
And Trump’s early selections for his Cabinet are encouraging in this regard. Senator Jeffery Sessions was just named as his Attorney General nominee. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach and Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke are mentioned as potential picks for Homeland Security. I believe each of these individuals are willing to use the available mechanisms to enforce our immigration laws going forward as there have been rampant violations of immigration laws.
One such egregious example are the so-called “sanctuary cities”. I like to call them “The New Confederates” as they are just as loyal. Over the last few years, there are or have been around 300 of these local government units that have just decided to unilaterally ignore federal immigration law and have in some cases instructed their municipal police departments to not cooperate with federal immigration authorities and effectively provide “sanctuary” to illegal immigrants. Quite a few illegals have flocked to such havens because they know they are protected unless they are somehow apprehended by the FBI or ICE itself. The most well-known example is San Francisco who let an illegal immigrant who had been deported 5 times already out of custody who then shot and killed Kate Steinle, who was walking with her father along the pier. This caused national outrage and one would think liberal “sanctuary city” mayors would rethink their policies given this tragedy. Unfortunately, it will require Mr. Trump to change their minds.
Trump has promised to cut off funding from sanctuary cities across the country. This may be enough in the case of smaller municipalities as federal funds are often needed to balance budgets. But the mayors of several large cities including New York, Seattle, Philadelphia, Boston and Chicago have promised to maintain their “sanctuary city-status” in spite of these coming monetary penalties.
But ultimately it is the Trump-led Justice Department that will have the upper hand here. There are federal laws already in place, including the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRAIRA) passed in 1996 which, among other things, makes it illegal to harbor aliens in the United States.
Harboring is defined as any action that can significantly facilitate the ability of an alien’s capacity to stay in the United States illegally. Courts have upheld arrest of local government officials in the past under this act. Penalties include up to 10 years of prison time. I think Trump will direct his Attorney-General and the Justice Department to pursue cases against the recalcitrant mayors who continue these policies. And I would not be surprised if he pursues indictments against mayors who had these policies over the last several years as well. That should be within the federal government’s rights as the statute of limitations has not expired on recent sanctuary city activity going on now. So this would be legal war of the first magnitude. And I do not think Trump will back down. Immigration enforcement is his number one campaign promise.
And he has the Constitution on his side as well. In 1819, the state of Maryland’s legislature was against the creation of the Second Bank of the United States (2BUS) and decided to tax the 2BUS at its branch in Maryland essentially hoping to drive the 2BUS out of Maryland. The cashier of the 2BUS in Maryland refused to pay this tax and this led to the landmark Supreme Court decision McCulloch v Maryland which declared the Maryland tax unconstitutional. In the words of Chief Justice John Marshall, “the power to tax involves the power to destroy”. As such the state law could effectively neuter the federal law creating the 2BUS and then invalidate the Supremacy Clause of the Constitution which had affirmed that Federal laws take precedence over State laws. This Supremacy clause has been upheld ever since.
The same logic applies to the actions of the Sanctuary Cities. Their actions are not protected under the First Amendment nor any other part of the Constitution. The Supreme Court, with liberal justices in concurrence, has recently affirmed that immigration legislation and enforcement are the purview of the Federal Government and not the states. Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona fought this a few years back and lost. The Congress has the ultimate authority here and could pass laws changing this or find a way to restrain President Trump. But given the political atmosphere and the fact that the GOP did better than expected in Congressional and Senate races due to Trump’s coattails, there is little chance this will happen. Trump will be given virtually free reign here to work within the existing laws and those laws give him a great deal of latitude to start a new era of assimilation and end the massive influx of the last three decades.
It is astounding though how liberals did this to themselves and unwittingly set themselves up for this coming massive reversal. They ignored “flyover country” for 30 years and labeled those concerned about their culture and nationhood as nothing more than vile racists. They imposed their open borders ideology using their preferred method of forcing their views on everyone – unelected judges. How sweet it is that this will come back to haunt them.
