New Bill Needs Some Help To Expel Alien Gang Members—We Provide It
Good news:
there`s a bill in Congress to
detain and
deport aliens based on their membership in known
dangerous
street gangs.
Bad news:
Congress expects the federal immigration litigation
bureaucracy of the Department of Justice`s notorious
Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR)
and federal appeals courts actually to enforce the bill.
"The Alien Gang Removal Act of
2005,"
H.R. 2933—introduced in the House of Representatives
on June 16 by J. Randy Forbes (R-VA)—currently has
thirteen cosponsors. [PDF] The bill would seek to deport known
alien gang-bangers and
drug cartel foot-soldiers who are otherwise in the
U.S. legally, with a green card or non-immigrant
visa—even if they have not been convicted of a specific
removable crime under current immigration law.
Hearings on H.R. 2933 will be held
before the
House Judiciary Committee`s
Immigration, Border Security and Claims subcommittee on
Tuesday at 3 p.m. at the
Rayburn House Office Building, room 2141.
H.R. 2933 amends the Immigration
Act to create new grounds of inadmissibility—Section
212(a)(2)(J)(i)—and new grounds of removability—Section
237(a)2)(F)(i)—for aliens who are members of any
informal criminal street gang, who are also
convicted of a "gang crime," or who are members
of known criminal organization officially designated by
the Secretary of Homeland Security as a criminal gang.
Additionally, illegal alien gang
members, already removable as being present in the U.S.
without inspection or as
visa-overstayers, could also be charged under the
new H.R. 2933 provisions in order to limit their
eligibility for
relief from removal in Immigration Court.
H.R. 2933 could be an effective
weapon against violent street gangs, hit-men and support
staff for Mexican-based drug cartels—such as the
notorious "Zetas"
(renegade Mexican paramilitary officers now
operating in the U.S.).
Proving criminal charges against
elusive kingpins and shadowy hit-men from the
drug underworld is daunting. But the new grounds of
removability and inadmissibility could be used to root
out criminal alien gang members who might not otherwise
be removable. H.R. 2933 includes these aliens
under the
mandatory detention provisions of Immigration Act
Section 236(c), so this strategy will help stem the tide
of frivolous
immigration litigation in these cases (although it
will not dry it up completely).
Nevertheless, there is a problem
with H.R. 2933: it still operates within the
litigation-based framework of the EOIR Immigration Court
system.
This means the new H.R. 2933
charges could be immediately shelved as unprovable by
EOIR immigration judges all over the country.
Practically speaking, the new
charges could easily fall into disuse, due to the
inherent difficulty in proving
"gang
membership" for any
particular alien under the "clear and convincing
evidence" standard of
Immigration Act Section 240(c)(3).
A VDARE.com reader
identifies the main problem with the bill recently via
e-mail:
"Most of the
[Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Special
Agents] know their stuff regarding all of the
local gangs,
their territories, the
tattoos and
the gang signs. And they work with
local law enforcement
too. [But] what
little gang-banger is going to admit to his
membership in Immigration Court?”
My reader gave an
example:
"…an adjustment of status case in for an
`ex-gang-banger,` or so he claimed. When he was on the
witness stand, the immigration judge could see a little
tattoo on his face, a teardrop. I`ve been told that this


