American Spectator

No Confidence
By W. James Antle, III from the October 2010 issue

The Obama administration has finally met a labor union it doesn’t like, and the feeling is mutual. In June, a union representing 7,600 employees in the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) — affiliated with both the American Federation of Government Employees and the AFL-CIO — issued a unanimous vote of “no confidence” against the political appointees the White House chose to oversee immigration law enforcement.

The National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council specifically named ICE director John Morton and assistant director Phyllis Coven, accusing them of having “abandoned the agency’s core mission of enforcing United States Immigration Laws” and “campaigning for programs and policies related to amnesty.” The union leaders further charged the Obama administration with the “creation of a special detention system for foreign nationals that exceeds the care and services provided to most United States citizens similarly incarcerated.”

Organizations representing border patrol agents had already slammed their upper management at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and ICE. The AFL-CIO-affiliated National Border Patrol Council issued its no-confidence vote last year. The National Association of Former Border Patrol Officers (NAFBPO) concurred. “The U.S. has reached a critical crossroads in dealing with the illegal alien problem,” NAFBPO founder Buck Brandemuehl said in a statement. “This problem must be addressed now, as it is strangling our democracy and threatening our national security.”

At the same time the Obama administration was requesting funding for 1,000 additional border patrol agents, the National Border Patrol Council complained that it was clandestinely reducing the number of agents along the U.S.-Mexico border by cutting the overtime hours they can work. “By lowering the statutory overtime cap nearly 15 percent through the current administrative restrictions, top-level managers in the Border Patrol are depriving Americans of desperately needed coverage along the border at a time of national crisis,” Council head T. J. Bonner told the Washington Times.

These border patrol and customs agents aren’t just disgruntled employees. They are outraged by an administration that is suing to block Arizona’s SB 1070 immigration law — and bragging to the United Nations that this is a positive step for human rights — and undercutting the removal of most illegal immigrants. The people who are paid to put their lives on the line for the country’s border security are outraged that their political superiors seem to have other priorities.

Consider the firestorm set off by a leaked memo outlining ways the United States Citizen and Immigration Services (USCIS) could effectively legalize at least tens of thousands of illegal immigrants even in the absence of “comprehensive immigration reform.” The USCIS could grant “parole in place,” which comes with a work permit and the right to apply for a green card. Or it could identify a subset of illegal aliens — like potential beneficiaries of the DREAM Act, which Congress has pointedly failed to enact — and give them “deferred action,” delaying deportation indefinitely.

Then there was this brainstorm: DHS could stop issuing the “notice to appear” letters that begin the deportation process unless the alien in question has a “significant negative immigration or criminal history.” That’s like a landlord being barred from issuing pay or quit notices to tenants who refuse to pay rent. In essence, these were proposals to give amnesty by executive fiat, handing out green cards and refusing to enforce immigration laws.

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