Free Republic

Senior Minister Meg Barnhouse knows she’ll need beds, a dresser, chairs and a mirror to make the classroom at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin feel more like a home for a mother and her young daughter who are still deciding whether they will become the latest immigrants seeking sanctuary from deportation by moving into a church. It would be the second time Barnhouse’s congregation had offered sanctuary. She was hesitant in 2015 because of the unknown legal and insurance risks, but this time she agreed immediately. There is growing fear in the city’s immigrant community as President Donald...

The Obama administration last year began the process of granting legal status to a 36-year-old illegal immigrant with a long criminal rap sheet whom agents had twice tried to deport and who now stands accused of killing his 15-year-old girlfriend, mother of one child with him, and pregnant with another. The Texas case, involving Armando Garcia-Ramirez, a Mexican, is raising new questions about immigration enforcement under President Obama, as supporters of President Trump point to the matter as proof of a broken-immigration system. Mr. Garcia may even have been the girl’s stepfather at the time he impregnated her — something...

The US has announced a ban on large electronic devices from cabin baggage on passenger flights from eight Muslim majority countries. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said extremists were seeking "innovative methods" to bring down jets. Bombs could be hidden in laptops, tablets, cameras, DVD players and electronic games, it said. The measure will affect nine airlines operating out of 10 airports. Large electronic devices will only be allowed on board in checked baggage. Phones are exempt from the new rules The nine airlines affected are: â—¾Royal Jordanian â—¾Egypt Air â—¾Turkish Airlines â—¾Saudi Arabian Airlines â—¾Kuwait Airways â—¾Royal Air...

The Secret Service says its employees are upset with how long it took agents to apprehend a White House fence jumper earlier this month. "The men and women of the Secret Service are extremely disappointed and angry in how the events of March 10th transpired," the Secret Service said in a publicly shared statement Friday evening.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement says it possesses a “limited amount” of 9mm bullets for agents in the field as well as for training purposes, and it is rationing its ammunition based on internal requests until it can award a new contract. [ ] The apparent role poor planning, or another agenda, played in the issue came to light when ICE said it would have run out of 9mm ammo by June 2017 in the absence of a modified contract with its supplier, Vista Outdoor Inc. So, the agency last month approved a $363,307 ceiling increase to contract No. HSCEMS-11-D-00002....

Utah Congressman Jason Chaffetz subpoenaed two agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) to appear before his committee in connection with the Obama Administration’s gun-running program, Fast and Furious. Firearms from the former president’s scheme were allegedly involved in the 2011 murder of Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent Jaime Zapata in Mexico. Chaffetz, who serves as chairman of the House Oversight Committee issued the subpoenas after the two ATF agents failed to appear voluntarily before the committee. “I’m tired of hearing from just [Justice Department] management, I want to hear from the people that actually are...

The Obama administration had numerous opportunities to arrest Mexican drug and weapons traffickers before the murder of a federal U.S. agent and the seriously wounding of his partner but opted for the hands-off approach, a new federal audit reveals. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), which operates under the Department of Justice (DOJ), should have stopped the traffickers—members of the Los Zetas organization—long before the Immigration and Customs (ICE) agents were ambushed in Mexico with firearms smuggled south of the border thanks to a once-secret Obama administration gun-running operation. Instead, on February 15, 2011, ICE agents Victor...

Washington (CNN)Illegal Southwest border crossings were down 40% last month, according to just released Customs and Border Protection numbers -- a sign that President Donald Trump's hardline rhetoric and policies on immigration may be having a deterrent effect. Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly himself announced the month-to-month numbers, statistics that CBP usually quietly posts on its website without fanfare. According to CBP data, the 40% drop in illegal Southwest border crossings from January to February is far outside normal seasonal trends. Typically, the January to February change is actually an increase of 10% to 20%. The drop breaks a...

Lori Scialabba, the Acting Director at the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) in the Department of Homeland Security, “announced her coming retirement from federal service” on Tuesday, a spokesperson for the department has confirmed to Breitbart News. Scialabba was number one on the list of eight Obama holdover bureaucrats identified by Breitbart News that President Trump “can fire or remove at Homeland Security.”

Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly says President Trump possesses credible evidence that former President Barack Obama ordered the wiretapping of Trump Tower in New York City last year. Trump claimed on Twitter last Saturday that Obama had his “wires tapped” in Trump Tower before Election Day last year, making the accusation without offering any evidence. “If the president of the United States said that, he’s got his reasons to say it,” Kelly said Monday on CNN’s “The Situation Room." "[Trump’s] got some convincing evidence that that took place.” Kevin Lewis, a spokesman for Obama, said last Saturday that Trump’s claims...

Full title: Confirmed: Obama DOJ Failure to Arrest Known Straw Purchasers Led to Murder of ICE Agent Jaime Zapata in Mexico According to a new inspector general report an illegal gun trafficking program similar to Operation Fast and Furious, which took place under President Obama's Department of Justice, led to the murder of ICE Agent Jaime Zapata in 2011. First, the background: On February 15, 2011, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Agents Victor Avila and Jaime Zapata were returning to Mexico City from Matehuala, Mexico when their armored SUV came under attack near the town of Santa Maria del Rio,...

Officials in President Trump’s administration Friday downplayed an intelligence report by the Homeland Security Department that contradicts the White House’s main argument for implementing a travel ban on seven predominantly Muslim countries. The report, which was viewed by The Wall Street Journal and Associated Press, determined that the "country of citizenship is unlikely to be a reliable indicator of potential terrorist activity." [ ] The intelligence report found that in the past six years, foreign-born individuals who were “inspired” to strike in the U.S. came from 26 different countries. [ ] A senior administration official told The Wall Street Journal...

It may not yet be the mass deportation that activists have been warning about. But it appears inevitable that many more undocumented immigrants will be swept up by the Trump administration’s more aggressive enforcement. The groups at risk of deportation have been expanded dramatically by President Donald Trump’s Jan. 25 executive orders and the enforcement memos issued last week by the Department of Homeland Security. In addition to targeting undocumented immigrants convicted of serious crimes – a perfectly appropriate step and the focus during most of the Obama years – federal agents will prioritize people guilty of any crime and...

<p>A draft document obtained by The Associated Press concludes that citizenship is an "unlikely indicator" of terrorism threats to the United States and that few people from the countries Trump listed in his travel ban have carried out attacks or been involved in terrorism-related activities in the U.S. since Syria's civil war started in 2011.</p>

RUSH: Now to immigration. “The Department of Homeland Security to Expedite deportation proceedings by not using Judges.” This is in The Daily Caller today. “With immigration courts reaching a record backlog in 2016, Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly ordered Monday that illegal immigrants who have been in the U.S. for less than two years should be allowed to be deported without a court hearing. … ‘It is in the national interest to detain and expeditiously remove from the United States aliens apprehended at the border, who have been ordered removed after consideration and denial of their claims for relief...

With immigration courts reaching a record backlog in 2016, Secretary of Homeland Security John Kelly ordered Monday that illegal immigrants who have been in the U.S. for less than two years should be allowed to be deported without a court hearing. Kelly signed two memos Monday that made significant changes to the nation’s immigration policy. They ordered the immediate construction of a border wall, expanded the amount of local police who will enforce immigration law, and put every illegal immigrant — excluding those protected under President Obama’s executive amnesty — at risk of deportation. Condemnation of the plan by pro-immigration...

Mexico reacted with anger on Wednesday to what one official called "hostile" new U.S. immigration guidelines hours before senior Trump administration envoys began arriving in Mexico City for talks on the volatile issue. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security unveiled plans on Tuesday to consider almost all illegal immigrants subject to deportation, and will seek to send many of them to Mexico if they entered the United States from there, regardless of nationality. U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson landed in Mexico City on Wednesday afternoon. He was due to be joined by Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly later for...

Immigration policy experts lashed out Tuesday at the Department of Homeland Security’s plan to implement President Trump’s executive orders on immigration. “In my many years of practicing immigration law, I have not seen a mass deportation blueprint like this one,” Marielena Hincapié, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit that advocates for the rights of low-income immigrant families, said in a conference call with reporters. In two memos issued Tuesday, DHS Secretary John Kelly laid out sweeping new guidance for officers tasked with carrying out the president’s immigration policies. Those directives included a push to...

Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials tried to hack Indiana’s state electoral system with at least 14,800 “scans” or hits between Nov. 1, 2016, to Dec. 16, 2016, The Daily Caller News Foundation Investigative Group has learned. The attacks are the second confirmed IT scanning assault by DHS officials against states that resisted then-President Barack Obama’s attempt to increase federal involvement in state and local election systems by designating them as “critical infrastructure” for national security. Members of the National Association of Secretaries of State voted Saturday at their winter meeting to oppose the designation. They are asking President Donald...

We’ve seen up-close and personal the face of the “Not My President Day” crowd, where anti-Trump protesters took the opportunity to bitch about whatever struck their fancy:Yeah babes, we can hardly waitMake mine the Carmel Brownie Blizzard, and yes, I would like fries with that order. And I’m sure you remember the yooge impact of the stupid Day Without (Illegal) Immigrants boycott:I know one family who sincerely wishes that Monday had been a Day Without (Illegal) Immigrants.Meet the perp: Three Whittier Police Department officers were responding to the scene of a traffic collision about 8 a.m. when a 26-year-old, recently...