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Seal Southern Border, Enforce Immigration Laws

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Photo Credit: Marjorie Kamys CoteraCornyn: U.S. Should Help Mexico Seal Its Southern Border

By Julián Aguilar.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, on Wednesday said U.S. aid that has helped return Mexican cities like Ciudad Juárez to normalcy after years of violence should also be used to help Mexico secure its border with Central America and stem the growing tide of undocumented immigrants arriving in Texas.

In recent weeks, the Rio Grande Valley sector of the U.S. Border Patrol has been overwhelmed by a surge of unaccompanied minors from Central America breaching the Texas-Mexico border. About 47,000 have been apprehended along the entire southwest border so far this fiscal year, Cornyn said, and the the final count could be more than 60,000 by the end of the fiscal year in September.

“That 500-mile border between Guatemala and Mexico is a sieve,” Cornyn said during a conference call with reporters. “Once these unaccompanied minors or other adults get in to the hands of the gangs that smuggle them through areas controlled by the Zetas or other cartels, this is not a benign situation. This is a dangerous and deadly … journey.”

The U.S. aid package known as the Mérida Initiative, which was passed in 2008 under the administration of President George W. Bush, earmarked more than $1.4 billion for training and equipment for the governments of Mexico and Central America, though most of that has gone to Mexico. Cornyn said that U.S. officials are already helping Mexico undertake the task of securing its border, but it is obvious that authorities there are overwhelmed.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Children flooding across the southern border

By O’Reilly Factor.

O’REILLY: “Impact” segment tonight. We continue our reporting on the southern border chaos. In the past eight months the border patrol says nearly 50,000 minors have entered the USA without any adult supervision at all. Little kids are showing up. Getting across the border now being warehoused by the federal government.

Joining us from Tucson Art Del Cueto, border patrol agent and president of the union down there. So what’s going on right now with these kids? I guess a lot of them are being bused from Texas to Arizona because Texas can’t handle the numbers? Is that what is happening?

ART DEL CUETO, LOCAL 2544 TUCSON, BORDER PATROL UNION PRESIDENT: Correct. What’s going on is they are being actually flown from Texas to Arizona. The issue is here in Arizona down near the border there is a town called Nogales. And we have a processing center there that’s more able to handle the volume, you would say of these individuals.

O’REILLY: All right so they are being flown on, what, chartered airlines? Military? Who is flying them over from Texas to Arizona?

DEL CUETO: My understanding it was chartered airlines. But I’m not positive on how it is. I just know they are being flown here to Arizona.

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Obama ‘Committed to Escalating’ Lawlessness at Border

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Photo Credit: APBy Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL).

There is now an unprecedented crisis unfolding at the border. The flow of illegal immigrant youth across the southern border is on track to reach 130,000 next year—a projected increase of more than 2,000% from 2011. The White House estimates the cost of “resettling” these illegal immigrants in the United States will reach $2.3 billion in a single year.

This crisis is a direct and predictable result of the President’s sustained and deliberate campaign to dismantle immigration enforcement. His administration has announced to the world that our nation’s immigration laws will not be enforced and that, in particular, they will not be applied to foreign youth.

The world has heard and heeded the President’s message. A wave of illegal immigration has overwhelmed authorities, producing a completely preventable humanitarian crisis—and further diminishing the integrity of our national borders. And there is but one way for the crisis to end: for the President of the United States to declare to the world: “Do not attempt to come here illegally. Our border is no longer open. Our laws will be enforced.”

A local TV station in Texas recently issued a telling report. They revealed that information is being disseminated in Central America urging people to make the life-threatening trek north in pursuit of amnesty: “A mother and child told Channel 5 News that the message being disseminated in their country is, ‘go to America with your child, you won’t be turned away.'”

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Photo Credit: TownHallAfter Leaked Photos Expose Unaccompanied Child Crisis, Border Patrol Agents Threatened With Firings

By Katie Pavlich.

Last week, photos surfaced from Texas and Arizona showing Border Patrol processing centers overwhelmed as thousands of unaccompanied children from Central America continue to need shelter and resources. The photos show hundreds of children sleeping in crowded, chain linked cages. Agents have described the situation as a humanitarian crisis.

In response to the leaked images out of Arizona, Patrol Agent in Charge Leslie Lawson is cracking down on the use of personal technology by agents in the Nogales Border Patrol processing center.

“Due to the recent unauthorized use of a personally owned electronic device in the Nogales Processing Center, the use of such devices will be restricted to locations outside of detention areas,” Lawson wrote in a June 6 memo to all employees at the Nogales station. “Effective immediately, the use of personally owned cellular phones, cameras, or recording devices in the Nogales Detention Facility and the Nogales Processing Center is strictly prohibited…

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Influx of Minors Across Texas Border Driven by Belief That They Will Be Allowed to Stay In U.S.

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesThere is growing evidence that a surge of tens of thousands of Central American minors across the Mexican border into Texas is being driven in large part by the perception they will be allowed to stay under the Obama administration’s immigration policies.

Administration officials — after initially dismissing such reports — are now attempting to push back on the idea, warning parents not to send their children as officials scramble to accommodate tens of thousands who already have arrived in Texas.

“Those who cross our border today illegally, even children, are not eligible for an earned path to citizenship,” Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said this week. “Those apprehended at our borders are priorities for removal . . . regardless of age.”

The crisis marks another immigration-related political dilemma for President Obama and has been seized on by Republicans as an argument against legislation to allow millions of undocumented immigrants to remain in the country legally. It could also hamper Obama’s ability to meet the demands of his liberal base by using executive authority to ease enforcement policies if Congress fails to act.

The administration has emphasized that the influx of minors is being driven foremost by widespread gang-related violence in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador. Most of the children are crossing over the Rio Grande Valley into Texas, often under the guidance of human-smuggling cartels, and many are seeking to reunite with parents already in the United States, aid workers said.

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Obama: ‘Our Future Rests’ On The Success Of DREAM Kids

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Photo Credit: DonkeyHoteyBy Joel Gehrke.

President Obama reminded Democratic donors that “our future rests” on the success of people brought to the United States illegally as children, who would qualify for citizenship if Congress had passed the DREAM Act.

“About 30 to 40 percent of the kids in this school, by the way, are DREAM kids,” Obama said Wednesday evening. “You wouldn’t know it looking at them, because they are as American as apple pie. But every single one of these kids, you might not be able to tell the difference, but a whole bunch of them — they’re worried about whether or not they’re going to be able to finance their college education of their immigrant status. They’re worried about whether, in fact, this country that they love so deeply loves them back and understands that our future rests on their success. Why wouldn’t we want to give them that certainty that you are part of the fabric of this nation, we’re counting on you, and we’re going to make sure you succeed? Why wouldn’t we want to do that?”

Obama made the comments at a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee fundraiser in Massachusetts, in reference to students at Worcester Tech. “So these young people are graduating, ready to go to college, but also certified nurses, EMT folks. Many of them are choosing to join the military and will contribute to our country in this way,” he said. “And looking out as I was speaking to them and then shaking their hands, and giving them hugs and high-fives and all the things that kids do on a graduation, I thought to myself: How could we not want to invest in these kids?”

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Photo Credit: AP / Rick ScuteriBorder Patrol changing diapers, heating baby formula for surge of children

By Stephen Dinan.

Gil Kerlikowske, commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, said Friday that many of the illegal immigrant children his agents are encountering trying to slip across the U.S.-Mexico border have never even seen a doctor before.

He described scenes of Border Patrol agents changing diapers and heating baby formula in order to care for some of the youngest children, and said agents are being asked to do things way beyond their skill set — particularly for so many of the agents who are young, single men.

“I’ve been down there, a lot, and spent a lot of time and I’ve seen these agents doing incredible things,” he said.

The commissioner was pushing back against a complaint filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and several immigrant-rights groups this week charging that agents and officers have been neglecting or abusing many of the children, verbally or physically.

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Child Immigrant Facility ‘Dog And Pony Show’ Invite Comes With Tons Of Rules

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Photo Credit: REUTERS / Eric ThayerThe U.S. Department of Health and Human Services is welcoming members of Congress and their senior staff to tour a temporary shelter being used to house illegal immigrant children — but the invite comes with a list of rules, including a suggestion that members leave their cellphones in their vehicles.

The 40-minute tour will take place Friday at the Ventura County Naval Base in Oxnard, Calif., according to the email invitation, obtained by The Daily Caller.

The tours are meant to give members and staffers an inside look at how temporary facilities being used to house illegal immigrant children who came to the U.S. without their parents. The minors, who hail mostly from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, are being called “Unaccompanied Children,” or UACs.

Sent to members of Congress and staff by Rose Hacking, of the office of the assistant secretary of legislation at HHS, the invitation comes with the following commands:

No recording devices will be allowed (We may ask you to leave your cellphone in our vehicle)

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HHS: Grantees Sheltering ‘Unaccompanied Alien Children’ Must Provide ‘Family Planning Services’

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Photo Credit: AP A $350 million grant opportunity announced Friday by the Department of Health and Human Services to provide shelter for unaccompanied alien children (UAC) states that recipients providing residential shelter to these children must provide them with “family planning services” and that residential care providers deliver services in a manner that is “sensitive” to sexual orientation and gender identity.

“Residential care providers are required to provide…family planning services,” says an official description of the grant program published by HHS.

“Residential care providers are required to provide or arrange for the program required services in a mannter that is sensitive to the…sexual orientation, gender identity, and other important individual needs of each UAC [unaccompanied alien child],” says the official description.

The grant will be issued by HHS through the Administration for Children and Families’ Office of Refugee Resettlement (ORR). The primary function of the Office of Refugee Resettlement/Division of Children’s Services (ORR/DCS) is to provide temporary shelter care and related services to unaccompanied alien children in custody.

Unaccompanied alien children (UAC) are defined as minors who have no lawful immigration status in the U.S., who have not reached the age of 18, and for whom there is no parent or legal guardian in the U.S. or no parent or legal guardian in the U.S. is available to provide care and physical custody.

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White House Adviser Valerie Jarrett Met ‘Four Or Five Times’ With Illegal Immigrant Activist Group (+video)

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Photo Credit: REUTERS / Jonathan ErnstBy Patrick Howley.

President Obama’s senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett held a series of meetings with illegal immigrant activists during Obama’s first term and concluded that “They are the best that we have.”

Jarrett, a Chicago-era mentor to Obama and wife Michelle, is currently fighting to pass immigration reform legislation, in her words, “this summer.”

“I had met, maybe, a year-and-a-half ago, with about Four Dream Act kids,” Jarrett said in a 2012 conversation with Walter Isaacson at the 2012 Aspen Ideas Festival, video of which was posted by The Aspen Institute in 2014.

Read more from this story HERE.

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Central America Newspapers Tout Open US Door for Illegal Minors

By Todd Beamon.

Newspapers in El Salvador and Honduras are promoting policies by the Obama administration that defer deportation to minors brought to the United States as children by their parents — known as “Dreamers” — and those that are housing illegal children at military bases in the South and West.

“Almost all agree that a child who crossed the border illegally with their parents, or in search of a father or a better life, was not making an adult choice to break our laws, and should be treated differently than adult violators of the law,” Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson is quoted in a story about a new two-year extension of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals Act published by Diario El Mundo in El Salvador.

Signed by President Barack Obama in 2012, the law grants temporary legal status to many young illegal immigrants, ending the threat of deportation for at least two years.

The policy, however, does not entitle the immigrants to state services. The law was renewed for two more years.

“With the renewal of DACA, we act according to our values and code of this great nation,” Johnson said. “But the biggest task of comprehensive immigration reform is yet to come.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Ted Cruz: ‘Obama’s Lawlessness’ Responsible for Spike in Illegal Immigration

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Photo Credit: Breitbart By Kristin Tate.

A sharp spike in illegal immigration has caused facilities and resources along the U.S.-Mexico border to become overwhelmed. As a result, U.S. Border Patrol has been releasing thousands of illegal immigrants onto U.S. soil each week. Some released immigrants are even criminals–as Breitbart Texas previously reported, more than 36,000 convicted criminal illegal aliens were released by U.S. authorities in 2013 alone.

Texas Senator Ted Cruz told Breitbart Texas that this “humanitarian crisis” is a “direct consequence” of the Obama Administration’s actions and rhetoric surrounding illegal immigration.

“We need a president who is willing to uphold the law,” Cruz said. “On issue after issue the Obama Administration has openly ignored, defied, and unilaterally tried to change the law. With respect to securing the border, the Obama Administration has handcuffed the courageous men and women who serve in Border Patrol. Morale in ICE is at an all-time low because the political operatives leading this Administration are preventing them from doing their job and upholding the law.”

He continued, “Just a few months before the last election the president illegally and unconstitutionally granted amnesty to some 800,000 people illegally. If the president wants to change federal immigration laws, the Constitution lays out a way to do so–you go and make your case to Congress and you convince Congress to change the laws…unfortunately for President Obama, following the Constitutional structure is apparently too cumbersome. One of the consequences were seeing on the border is a humanitarian crisis that is a direct consequence of Obama’s lawlessness.”

Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: AP / Rex C. CurryTexas will lead fight for freedom, Cruz tells GOP convention

By Kevin Diaz.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz told an ecstatic crowd at the Texas Republican Convention that their freedom is being threatened by a lawless president who has shown weakness abroad and overstepped his boundaries at home.

The first-term Texas senator, an oft-mentioned potential White House contender, offered up a full-throated indictment of President Obama and the Democrats in Congress, prompting sustained cheers and calls of “Run, Ted!”

“Today liberty is under assault like never before,” Cruz thundered as he paced the large, open stage. “And again today Texans will stand up and lead the fight for freedom.”

The line could serve as a reference to Cruz and fellow Texas native Rand Paul, the Kentucky senator who will follow him on the stage later in the day as a possible rival for conservatives’ affection in the run-up to the battle for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016.

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Surge in Kids Illegally Crossing into U.S. Alone Strains Border Patrol

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Photo Credit: AP / Brian SkoloffThe flood of young children pouring across the southwestern border is worse than the administration has previously acknowledged, and efforts to deal with unaccompanied minors are overwhelming the Border Patrol, distracting it from going after smugglers and other illegal immigrants, according to an internal draft memo from the agency.

The four-page memo, authored by Deputy Border Patrol Chief Ronald D. Vitiello and dated May 30, contradicts the administration’s argument that the border is secure enough to begin legalizing current illegal aliens already in the U.S.

Instead, Chief Vitiello paints a picture of a government struggling to cope, leaving the children suffering poor conditions, agents unable to focus on major security threats and little sense that it will get better.

Known within the Homeland Security Department as Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC), their numbers have skyrocketed this year, forcing the department to siphon manpower and money from its other critical border duties.

“The large quantity of DHS interdiction, intelligence, investigation, processing, detention and removal resources currently being dedicated to address UAC is compromising DHS capabilities to address other transborder criminal areas, such as human smuggling and trafficking and illicit drug, weapons, commercial and financial operations,” Chief Vitiello wrote in the memo, which was viewed by The Washington Times.

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DHS Giving Illegal Immigrant ‘Petty’ Criminals Second Chance in Waiver Application Process

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Photo Credit: REUTERS/Eric ThayerAre you an illegal immigrant whose waiver to stay in the country was denied because of your criminal past? Well, you’re in luck, because the Obama Administration may let you stay in the country anyway.

In a guidance distributed to congressional offices and obtained by The Daily Caller, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced that it is reopening cases in which applications for provisional unlawful presence waivers were denied to criminals.

According to the notice, USCIS had determined that applicants should not be denied an I-601A waiver due to a past criminal offense so long as it “falls under the petty offense or youthful offender exceptions or is not considered a crime involving moral turpitude.”Last week, USCIS began reopening waiver applications denied due ‘solely’ to a prior criminal offense before January 24, 2014, “in order to determine whether there is reason to believe the prior criminal offense might render the applicant inadmissible.”

The notice does not specify what types of crimes constitute a “petty offense,” and defines neither “youthful offender” nor “a crime involving moral turpitude.” Neither DHS nor USCIS responded to TheDC’s requests for comment.

The provisional unlawful presence waiver process allows illegal immigrants who are immediate relatives of U.S. citizens to overcome their inadmissibility due to their illegal status so long as they meet all the eligibility requirements outside of being in the country illegally. Prior to 2013, people had to return to their home countries to apply for these waivers.

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