1 U.S. Immigration Agent Killed, 1 Injured in Mexico

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1 U.S. Immigration Agent Killed, 1 Injured in Mexico 

Published February 16, 2011
| FoxNews.com

A U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was killed and another wounded while driving through northern Mexico Tuesday, in a rare attack on American officials in this country which is fighting powerful drug cartels.

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said one agent was critically wounded in the attack and died from his injuries. The second agent was shot in the arm and leg and remains in stable condition.

ICE Director John Morton late Tuesday identified the slain agent as Jaime Zapata, who was on assignment from the office in Laredo, Texas, where he served on the Human Smuggling and Trafficking Unit as well as the Border Enforcement Security Task Force. The injured agent, who was not identified, remains in stable condition, Morton said.

"I'm deeply saddened by the news that earlier today, two U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) special agents assigned to the ICE Attache office in Mexico City were shot in the line of duty while driving between Mexico City and Monterrey by unknown assailants," Napolitano said.

U.S. and Mexican officials said they were working closely together to investigate the shooting and find those responsible. They did not give a motive for the attack.

"Let me be clear: any act of violence against our ICE personnel -- or any DHS personnel -- is an attack against all those who serve our nation and put their lives at risk for our safety," Napolitano said. "We remain committed in our broader support for Mexico's efforts to combat violence within its borders."

The two agents were driving in the northern state of San Luis Potosi when they were stopped at what may have appeared to be a military checkpoint, said one Mexican official, who could not be named because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the case. Mexican military officials said they have no checkpoints in the area.

After they stopped, someone opened fire on them, the official said.

San Luis Potosi police said gunmen attacked two people a blue Suburban on Highway 57 between Mexico City and Monterrey, near the town of Santa Maria Del Rio, at about 2:30 p.m.

Police said one person was killed and another was flown to a Mexico City hospital, though they couldn't confirm the victims were the ICE agents.

A U.S. law enforcement source who was not authorized to speak on the case said the agent who died was on loan from Laredo, Texas.

Mexican Ambassador to the U.S. Arturo Sarukhan spoke with Morton to express Mexico's condolences, according to a spokesman.

"Please keep Special Agent Zapata's family, friends, and colleagues close to your heart during this difficult time. May the work we continue to do as an agency be worthy of a sacrifice as great as the one made by Special Agent Zapata," Morton said in a statement Wednesday.

Zapata, who joined ICE in 2006, had also served as a member of the U.S. Border Patrol in Yuma, Arizona. He was a native of Brownsville, Texas and graduated from the University of Texas at Brownsville in 2005. No age was given for Zapata.

Though Mexico is seeing record rates of violence from warring drug cartels and a crackdown on organized crime, it is rare for U.S. officials to be attacked. The U.S. government, however, has become increasingly concerned about the safety of its employees in Mexico amid the escalating violence.

In March, a U.S. employee of a consulate, her husband and a Mexican tied to the American consulate were killed when drug gang members fired on their cars as they left a children's party in Ciudad Juarez, the city across from El Paso, Texas.

The U.S. State Department has taken several measures over the past year to protect consulate employees and their families. It has at times authorized the departure of relatives of U.S. government employees in northern Mexican cities.

In July, it temporarily closed the consulate in Ciudad Juarez after receiving unspecified threats.

In 1985, U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique "Kiki" Camarena Salazar was tortured and killed in Mexico. Mexican trafficker Rafael Caro Quintero is serving a 40-year prison term for Camarena's slaying.

ICE, the investigative arm of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the second largest investigative agency in the federal government, enforced immigration laws and is primarily responsible for arresting, detaining and deporting people who are in the U.S. illegally. It also investigates drug cases in the U.S. and Mexico and other types of trafficking.

It was created in 2003 through a merger of the investigative and interior enforcement elements of the U.S. Customs Service and the Immigration and Naturalization Service and has more than 20,000 employees in offices in all 50 states and 47 foreign countries.

Mexico is fighting heavily armed and powerful drug cartels that supply the U.S. market. Since President Felipe Calderon launched a military crackdown against drug trafficking shortly after taking office in December 2006, almost 35,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence.

Fox News' Mike Levine and the Associated Press contributed to this report

Arizona Sheriff: I Won't Be Stopped, Intimidated

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- FoxNews.com, July 30, 2010

Arizona Sheriff Not Relenting After Court Ruling 

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio has been doing aggressive crackdowns on illegal immigration for years. And despite Wednesday's ruling by a federal judge to temporarily block portions of Arizona's new law, the former federal drug agent will continue to carry out sweeps in the country's busiest human and drug trafficking corridor.

Arpaio's tactics have made him the undisputed poster boy for local immigration enforcement, sometimes instructing his deputies to carry out sweeps in Hispanic neighbors to arrest illegal immigrants. His latest sweep was launched Thursday afternoon, when roughly 200 sheriff's deputies and trained volunteers searched metropolitan Phoenix for traffic violators who may be in the country illegally.

"It's my job," said Arpaio, standing beside a sheriff's truck that has a number for an immigration hotline written on its side. "I have two state (immigration) laws that I am enforcing. It's not federal, it's state."

According to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement statistics, Arpaio's efforts are not misguided, as a total of 55,699 individuals have been deported from the Phoenix field office in fiscal year 2010, easily besting the second-most deportations during that time -- 38,569 -- in the San Antonio area. A total of 268,910 illegal immigrants have been deported as of July 13, 2010, compared to 387,790 for the entire fiscal year 2009.

Deputy Bob Dalton and volunteer Heath Kowacz spotted a driver with a cracked windshield in a poor Phoenix neighborhood near a busy freeway during Thursday's sweep. Dalton triggered the red and blue police lights and pulled over 28-year-old Alfredo Salas, who was born in Mexico but has lived in Phoenix with a resident alien card since 1993.

Dalton gave him a warning after Salas produced his license and registration and told him to get the windshield fixed.

Salas, a married father of two who installs granite, told The Associated Press that he was treated well but he wondered whether he was pulled over because his truck is a Ford Lobo.

"It's a Mexican truck so I don't know if they saw that and said, 'I wonder if he has papers or not,"' Salas said. "If that's the case, it kind of gets me upset."

Sixty percent of the nearly 1,000 people arrested in the sweeps since early 2008 have been illegal immigrants. Thursday's dragnet led to four arrests, but it wasn't clear if any of them were illegal immigrants.

A ruling by U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton on Wednesday put on hold parts of S.B. 1070 that would have required officers to dig deeper into the fight against illegal immigration. Arizona says it was forced to act because the federal government isn't doing its job to fight immigration.

The issue led to demonstrations across the country Thursday, including one directed at Arpaio in Phoenix in which protesters beat on the metal door of a jail and changed "Sheriff Joe, we are here. We will not live in fear."

Meanwhile, Gov. Jan Brewer's lawyers went to court to overturn the judge's ruling so they can fight back against what the Republican calls an "invasion" of illegal immigrants.

Ever since the main flow of illegal immigrants into the country shifted to Arizona a decade ago, state politicians and local police have been feeling pressure to confront the state's border woes.

In addition to Arpaio's crackdowns, other efforts include a steady stream of busts by the state and local police of stash houses where smugglers hide illegal immigrants. The state attorney general has taken a money-wiring company to civil court on allegations that smugglers used their service to move money to Mexico. And a county south of Phoenix has its sheriff's deputies patrol dangerous smuggling corridors.

The Arizona Legislature have enacted a series of tough-on-immigration measures in recent years that culminated with the controversial new law signed by Brewer in April, catapulting the Republican to the national political stage.

Critics say deputies racially profile Hispanics. Arpaio says deputies approach people only when they have probable cause.

"Sheriff Joe Arpaio and some other folks there decided they can make a name for themselves in terms of the intensity of the efforts they're using," said Benjamin Johnson, executive director of the pro-immigrant Immigration Policy Center. "There's no way to deny that. There are a lot of people getting caught up in these efforts."

The Justice Department launched an investigation of his office nearly 17 months ago over allegations of discrimination and unconstitutional searches and seizures. Although the department has declined to detail its investigation, Arpaio believes it centers on his sweeps.

Arpaio feels no reservations about continuing to push the sweeps, even after the federal government stripped his power to let 100 deputies make federal immigration arrests.

Unable to make arrests under a federal statute, the sheriff instead relied on a nearly 5-year-old state law that prohibits immigrant smuggling. He has also raided 37 businesses in enforcing a state law that prohibits employers from knowingly hiring illegal immigrants.

"I'm not going to brag," Arpaio said. "Just look at the record. I'm doing what I feel is right for the people of Maricopa County."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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Widow of Houston Officer Killed by Illegal Immigrant 'Shocked' at ICE Appointment

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FOXNews.com - June 25, 2010

The widow of a Houston police officer killed by an illegal immigrant was "shocked" to learn that the city's former police chief has landed a top immigration job with the Obama administration, her lawyer told FoxNews.com on Friday.

That's because Joslyn Johnson, whose husband, Rodney Johnson, was killed in 2006, is suing former Houston Police Chief Harold Hurtt for failing to enforce federal immigration laws. She claims her husband would be alive today if the city had bothered to check up on the gunman's immigration status.

Now that Hurtt is taking a job to oversee partnerships between federal and local officials with Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Johnson -- and other critics -- say they're concerned the official who resisted immigration enforcement in Houston will now be in charge of promoting it.

"She was shocked at the irony," Johnson's attorney, Ben Dominguez, said.

As a police chief, Hurtt was a supporter of "sanctuary city" policies, by which illegal immigrants who don't commit crimes can live without fear of exposure or detainment because police don't check for immigration papers. During his tenure as Houston police chief, he criticized ICE's key program that draws on local law enforcement's support. He said in 2008 that local police "don't want to be immigration officers." He described that as a burden on the force.

Several years after the killing, Hurtt announced he would participate in the federal 287(g) program, which gives local police authority to initiate deportation proceedings against illegal immigrants linked to serious crimes. But then the city backed off the program and linked up with ICE on a separate one that has local officials run immigration checks on suspects once they are in jail.

Johnson could not speak directly to FoxNews.com because she is also a member of the Houston police force and subject to rules prohibiting her from commenting on department policy.

Dominguez, speaking on her behalf, said Johnson believes Hurtt is "competent" but hopes he does not spearhead policies that will put officers in harm's way.

"If (his federal policy is) similar to Houston's policy, then it's going to continue to endanger private citizens and officers," Dominguez said.

The gunman who killed Johnson's husband had already been deported once, returned and then arrested at least three times before he shot the officer. Johnson's original court petition -- naming Hurtt as well as the city and the police department -- claimed that the department's failure to discover the gunman's immigration status and report him to federal authorities enabled him to stay "at large" in the country.

Dominguez said officers at the time were not checking the immigration status of suspects.

Johnson's suit is not seeking monetary damages, aside from attorney fees -- it is seeking a change in policy so that federal immigration databases are widely available to local departments. Hurtt is still a party to the lawsuit but has not been served because he left the force, Dominguez said.

Kelly Nantel, a spokeswoman for ICE, told FoxNews.com that Hurtt has always been a proponent of the jail model of the 287(g) program, but as a police chief, he didn't favor more proactive local enforcement because he didn't believe it was the best utilization of his resources.

"I think the critics are only talking about half of what he said," she said. "He's always been a strong proponent of every law enforcement agency making those decisions on their own."

But the criticism has been strong.

Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, questioned whether Hurtt was the right choice for the job.

"Here he is, he should be standing up for the letter of federal law," King said. "I don't know how he can do that given the record that he has. I think this is another piece in the puzzle to granting some type of de facto amnesty."

Hurtt, a former police chief in Houston and Phoenix, will assume the position of director for the ICE Office of State and Local Coordination. Starting July 6, Hurtt will supervise outreach and communication between ICE, local law enforcement agencies, tribal leaders and representatives from non-governmental organizations.

Aside from the Houston case, Hurtt's policies have been blamed for enabling illegal immigrants to kill two police officers and seriously injure another in Phoenix before he left in 2005.

But Nantel dismissed such allegations.

"The responsibility of those homicides lies on the shoulder of the individuals who committed the crimes," Nantel said.

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CATO Legal Analysis of SB 1070!

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A Legal Analysis of the New Arizona Immigration Law
Posted by Ilya Shapiro

I’m a bit late to the immigration party — in part because I’ve been traveling on my Obamacare debate tour and in part because the Kagan Supreme Court nomination and end-of-term Supreme Court decisions have sucked away all my time. Still, I do have a few things to add beyond Dan Griswold’s excellent points about what real immigration reform would look like and why Arizona’s new law, love it or hate it, at least has the benefit of raising the need for such fundamental reform into the national political discussion. (Jeffrey Miron also offers some sensible suggestions, and Roger Pilon points out that doing nothing is simply not tenable as a matter of policy or politics.)

First, the Arizona law — which I’ve actually read, unlike the attorney general and the secretary of homeland security – is carefully crafted so as not to go beyond the scope of federal law and so, as Dan alludes in his thoughtful podcast (drawing on discussions with Roger), is probably constitutional. Here are the key things it does:

1.Creates the new state crime of “trespassing by illegal aliens,” which essentially consists of being in the state in violation of federal immigration laws as determined by an officer or agency authorized by the federal government to verify immigration status;
2.Sets out that no official or agency of the state or its political subdivisions (county, city, etc.) ”may adopt a policy that limits the enforcement of federal laws to less than the full extent permitted by federal law;”
3.State (and local) law enforcement officials shall make a “reasonable attempt . . . when practicable, to determine the immigration status” of any person with whom they have made “lawful contact . . . where reasonable suspicion exists that the [detained] person is an alien who is unlawfully present in the United States;”
4.If an alien who is unlawfully in the United States is convicted of violating any state or local law [including the new "trespassing by illegal aliens"], the alien “shall be transferred immediately [on discharge from imprisonment or assessment of fine for the offense] to the custody of the [federal immigration authorities];”
5.A police officer “may lawfully stop any person who is operating a motor vehicle of the officer has reasonable suspicion to believe the person is in violation of any civil traffic law and [the the pre-existing law against human smuggling];”
6.Makes it illegal to stop to hire or pick up passengers for work if the vehicle “blocks or impedes the normal movement of traffic;”
7.Makes it illegal for an illegal alien to knowingly apply for work, solicit work in a public place, or perform work as an employee or independent contractor;
8.Makes it illegal for anyone violating the law (including the new illegal hiring law, as well as pre-existing prohibitions on hiring illegal aliens) to transport, move, conceal, or harbor persons who the alleged violator knows to be illegally in the United States, as well as to encourage or induce aliens to come to Arizona illegally;
9.Provides an entrapment defense to the pre-existing crime of employing illegal aliens (whether knowingly or intentionally); and
10.Authorizes the immobilization or impoundment of vehicles used to committ various vehicle-related offenses relating to illegal aliens.

None of these provisions, on their face, appear to be unconstitutional, in the sense of Arizona intruding on federal authority over immigration policy. Indeed, as reported last week by the Washington Post, this conclusion is backed by a 2002 memo from the Office of Legal Counsel — the Department of Justice unit that acts as the executive branch’s “outside counsel.” This memo concludes: first, that states have “inherent power” to make arrests for violating federal law and, second, ”federal statutes should be presumed not to preempt this arrest authority.” OLC memos are not law themselves but they are the DOJ’s official position on various legal issue. Having said that, an OLC memo can at any time be withdrawn or replaced — as indeed the 2002 memo replaced an earlier 1996 memo on the subject (or, more famously, Jack Goldsmith withdrew the so-called “torture memos”).
And, of course, Congress could pass a law saying states shall not enforce federal immigration laws.

Second, notwithstanding the new law’s facial constitutionality, state or local law enforcement officials could use it to behave in a way that intrudes on federal prerogatives or violates constitutionally protected individual rights. That circumstance could give rise to an “as-applied” legal challenge. If police officers stop Hispanic motorists on pretextual grounds just to ask for their papers, for example, that would constitute a Fourth Amendment violation. Notably, however, the sections relating to state enforcement of federal immigration laws contains a provision specifying: “This section shall be implemented in a manner consistent with federal laws regulating immigration, protecting the civil rights of all persons and respecting the privileges and immunities of United States citizens.”

Third, just because the law is constitutional doesn’t necessarily mean it’s good policy (just like not everything that some people say is good policy — like Obamacare, or torture during interrogations – is necessarily constitutional). There are many arguments against the Arizona law unrelated to civil liberties or racial profiling concerns, including that it misdirects state and local resources away from more pressing priorities (such as violent crime); that it’s driven by misguided fears of crime (when crime has actually been dropping in Arizona, and nationally the foreign-born commit crimes at lesser rates than the native-born); and that an “enforcement-first” mentality gets things backwards in that we should first reform and expand the ways people can come here legally and then take action against those who still come illegally. Similarly, there are many arguments in favor of the Arizona law not based in racism, or political opportunism, or misapplied economics.

Fourth, the boycotts of Arizona adopted by city councils around the country — at last count, Berkeley, Boston, El Paso, Los Angeles, Oakland, San Francisco, St. Paul, and West Hollywood have all passed resolutions restricting official travel, investment, and/or contracts with the Grand Canyon State – are likely themselves unconstitutional. That is, unlike private individuals, organizations, and businesses, states (and their political subdivisions) cannot erect barriers to trade against other states. Preventing such interstate discrimination was, of course, one of the original purposes of the Constitution and, specifically, its Commerce Clause (which grants Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce). We often discuss the Commerce Clause in terms of Congress incorrectly invoking it to justify legislation not having anything to do with either commerce or interstate activities — such as, again, the individual health care mandate — but just the same it protects economic liberty by forestalling trade wars. (Technically, the issue here is the “dormant” Commerce Clause in that cities are intruding on the boycott-less regime Congress has established by not passing boycott laws.) Lo and behold, Gary Pierce of the Arizona Corporation Commission sent a letter to L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa threatening to cut-off the 25 percent of its electricity that the City of Angels gets from its eastern neighbor. “I am confident that Arizona’s utilities would be happy to take those electrons off your hands,” the commissioner says. Stopping this sort of tit-for-tat silliness — along with being able to better muster national armies — is why we got rid of the Articles of Confederation.

In short, the Arizona immigration law presents a tremendously complex issue, as the Arizona Republic has recognized, that does not lend itself to easy calls or soundbites. I myself am not certain how I would have voted if I didn’t have the third option (as Arizona doesn’t) of imminent federal reform — to the disconsolation of state legislators around the country who have asked me what they can do to placate a (legitimately) aggrieved public besides enactiong Arizona-style laws.

President Obama and Congress, pass comprehensive immigration reform now!

Ilya Shapiro • May 24, 2010 @ 7:48 am
Filed under: Government and Politics; Law and Civil Liberties; Trade and Immigration
Tags: Arizona, bill 1070, immigration, Office of Legal Counsel, preemption

Update on the Arizona Immigration Issue
Posted by Ilya Shapiro

Since I provided my legal analysis of the new Arizona immigration law, I’ve become aware of a few interesting developments in that regard.

First, it seems that I wasn’t working off the latest version of the bill — which I should add is awfully hard to find. Indeed, perhaps we should excuse Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano for not having read it; both the Arizona Senate’s website for SB 1070, and the Arizona House’s website for the amending legislation, HB 2162, list several different versions under their “Bill Versions” tabs that do not match the bills in the other. As someone who typically plays in the federal sandbox, if someone can direct me to a verified true copy of the final operative bill, as signed and amended, my colleagues and I – indeed the entire policy community – would be grateful.

In any case, I’m please to announce that the (seemingly) final amended version I’m now working from has improved an already constitutional bill by further safeguarding civil liberties. Most notably, the ”may I see your papers?” provision was changed to read that law enforcement officials shall make a “reasonable attempt . . . when practicable, to determine the immigration status” only after having made a “lawful stop, detention, or arrest . . . in the enforcement of any other law or ordinance . . . where suspicion exists that the [detained] person is an alien and is unlawfully present in the United States” (amended text in bold). This establishes a higher predicate standard for police to initiate contact with any person to whom this law will be applied. In other words, there has to be an independent reason for the stop or detention before the police can ask to see proof of immigration status.

The amended bill also prohibits any consideration of “race, color or national origin” in enforcing the new law in any manner that runs afoul of either the U.S. or Arizona constitutions. Moreover, the legislature clarified that the determination of an alien’s immigration status would only be performed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Border Patrol, or a “law enforcement officer who is authorized [to do so] by the federal government.”

All of these changes unquestionably improved the civil rights provisions of the law and should further protect it from successful legal challenge — again without saying anything about the law’s policy wisdom.

Second, while some analysts have argued that Arizona’s law might be preempted by federal law — although the leading case, De Canas v. Bica, 424 U.S. 351, which is 34 years old and predates more recent immigration reforms, is not favorable to that position — Roger Pilon alerted me to a 2005 case (unanimous in the judgment, less so in the reasoning), Muehler v. Mena, 544 U.S. 93, that shows that Arizona’s law doesn’t go as far as the Constitution might allow. In Mena, the police detained the inhabitants of a house whice they were searching pursuant to a lawful search warrant. While most of the officers performed the search, others questioned one detainee about her immigration status without any reasonable suspicious that she committed any crime — and certainly without having any reasonable suspicion that she was an illegal alien. The Supreme Court, in an opinion by Chief Justice Rehnquist, upheld this line of questioning. Part of the reasoning was that the “may I see your papers?” bit did not prolong the detention in any way — the search was still ongoing — but this is at least some indication that the Constitution allows immigration-related questioning without even the reasonable suspicion required by Arizona.

Third, apparently the head of ICE, John Morton, said his agency will not process illegal immigrants referred to them by Arizona officials. Morton apparently doesn’t think that laws like Arizona’s “are the solution.” Well, we at Cato certainly agree that Arizona’s law will not solve a problem that demands a comprehensive federal solution, but that doesn’t mean federal officials can simply decline to perform their duties under the law as it exists. What Morton proposes is akin to state “nullification” of duly enacted federal law — except worse, because his agency’s job is to enforce that very law. If Morton feels that strongly about our immigration laws, he should either resign or, while complying with his duties, testify before Congress about the law’s defects and lobby his boss, President Obama, to push reform.

Fourth and finally, President Obama is deploying 1,200 National Guard troops to the border and requesting $500 million more for border security. With due respect to Arizona Senators John McCain and Jon Kyl, who want even more troops and money, this approach is neither here nor there. (And it echoes Obama’s split-the-baby decision on Afghanistan, not willing to go for a whole-hog escalation but also not willing to rethink the overall policy.) Half-measures won’t do it here, Mr. President (and Congress). If you lack the heart (or have too much of a brain) for a full wall-and-militarization of our southern border — and perhaps mass rounding up and deportation of 12 million people — it’s time for a fundamental reorganization of the immigration system.

U.S. immigration (non-)policy is nonsensical and unworkable. We’re beyond the point of perestroika; it’s time for regime change.

Ilya Shapiro • May 26, 2010 @ 8:51 am
Filed under: Law and Civil Liberties; Trade and Immigration
Tags: amended bill, Arizona, HB 2162, ICE, immigration, SB 1070
http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2010/05/24/a-legal-analysis-of-the-new-arizona-immigration-law/
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ICE Official Says Feds May Not Process Illegals Referred From Arizona

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- FOXNews.com - May 21, 2010


A top Department of Homeland Security official reportedly said his agency will not necessarily process illegal immigrants referred to them by Arizona authorities.

John Morton, assistant secretary of homeland security for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, made the comment during a meeting on Wednesday with the editorial board of the Chicago Tribune, the newspaper reports.

"I don't think the Arizona law, or laws like it, are the solution," Morton told the newspaper.

The best way to reduce illegal immigration is through a comprehensive federal approach, he said, and not a patchwork of state laws.

The law, which criminalizes being in the state illegally and requires authorities to check suspects for immigration status, is not "good government," Morton said.

In response to Morton's comments, DHS officials said President Obama has ordered the Department of Justice to examine the civil rights and other implications of the law.  (In response to his comments??  I thought Obama said that he ordered DOJ to do that weeks ago...)

"That review will inform the government's actions going forward," DHS spokesman Matt Chandler told Fox News on Friday.

Meanwhile, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano said ICE is not obligated to process illegal immigrants referred to them by Arizona authorities.

"ICE has the legal discretion to accept or not to accept persons delivered to it by non-federal personnel," Napolitano said. "It also has the discretion to deport or not to deport persons delivered to it by any government agents, even its own."

Morton, according to a biography posted on ICE's website, began his federal service in 1994 and has held numerous positions at the Department of Justice, including as a trial attorney and special assistant to the general counsel in the former Immigration and Naturalization Service and as counsel to the deputy attorney general.

Border apprehensions in Arizona, where roughly 500,000 illegal immigrants are estimated to be living, are up 6 percent since October, according to federal statistics. Roughly 6.5 million residents live in Arizona.

Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-AL, said it appeared the Obama administration is "nullifying existing law" and suggested Morton may not be the right person for his post if he fails to enforce federal immigration law.

"If he feels he cannot enforce the law, he shouldn't have the job," Sessions told Fox News. "That makes him, in my view, not fulfilling the responsibilities of his office."

Sessions said the U.S. government has "systematically failed" to enforce federal immigration law and claimed Morton's statement is an indication that federal officials do not plan on working with Arizona authorities regarding its controversial law.

"They're telegraphing to every ICE agency in America that they really don't intend on cooperating with Arizona," Sessions said. "The federal government should step up and do it. It's their responsibility."

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Salvadoran children rescued from Phoenix smuggling ring

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From the Website Secure The Border.org
May 16, 2010

The Arizona Republic, by Allison Hurtado
May 11, 2010

Federal agents rescued three children Tuesday morning from suspected human smugglers in Phoenix after their parents apparently had paid to have the children smuggled in the United States, according to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The parents of the children, who were from Salvador but were living in Washington, D.C., paid $13,000 to have their children smuggled into the United States last month, according to a statement by ICE.

After the children arrived in Phoenix in April, the smugglers refused to release them unless their parents paid an additional $6,500. Once the parents paid the extra $6,500, they were asked to produce another $7,000.

The parents became worried and contacted authorities on Monday.

By Tuesday morning, ICE investigators had found the children's location. The smugglers apparently dropped off the children at a local business in west Phoenix, and authorities picked them up.

The three children, ages 11 to 15, were scared but otherwise unharmed and appeared to be in good health, the statement said. Federal authorities didn't release any more details about why the children were dropped off at the business.

ICE was coordinating with its Office of Investigations and the Salvadoran Embassy in Washington, D.C., to reunite the children with their parents.

The investigation into those smugglers was continuing, but as agents searched for the children Monday night, they were led to a drophouse in Phoenix, said Vincent Picard, spokesman for ICE.

Sixteen immigrants were found inside the house on 71st Avenue. The immigrants came from many different countries and were all turned over to ICE.
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http://www.securetheborder.org/article/salvadoran-children-rescued-from-phoenix-smuggling-ring