'Abolish ICE!'

By Dan Cadman on March 18, 2018

Just when you think the far left can't get any more unhinged from the rest of American society, various media outlets are reporting that there is a growing movement among progressive activists pressuring Democrats to publicly call for the abolishment of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the arm of the federal government that conducts immigration enforcement in the interior of the United States. (See here and here.)

The campaign includes an article in The Nation advocating the defunding of ICE entitled "It's Time to Abolish ICE", and luminaries including Brian Fallon, former campaign advisor to presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, have tweeted in support of the notion.

Clearly these progressives haven't thought through what would happen if ICE were abolished: If immigration enforcement consisted of nothing but our direct perimeter defenses — inspectors at ports of entry, the Border Patrol between the ports, and the Coast Guard at sea — then logic dictates that any alien who manages to pierce these front-line defenses would be home free.

Then again, maybe I'm being naive and they have thought this through. After all, these are likely the same people who advocate sanctuary cities, counties, and states, and who adamantly oppose a border wall.

This "abolish ICE" notion might well be called the Taco Bell theory of immigration enforcement. People of a certain age may remember when the very un-PC ad slogan of the company was "Make a Run for the Border!" Because that's what would happen.

Hundreds of thousands of aliens would stage themselves on both our northern and southern borders for a chance to penetrate the frontier and, when our inspectors and border agents quickly got overwhelmed, they would be able to live worry-free in the interior, immigration laws be damned.

What a novel approach to national sovereignty and safeguarding the well-being, public safety, and economic security of ordinary Americans.