The Senate has passed a bill making Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) the U.S.'s largest interior law enforcement agency with funding for Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda higher than most of the world’s militaries, including Israel’s.
Pending its passage in the House of Representatives, Trump’s bill could mean a massive increase in ICE funding as part of an immigration enforcement agenda worth $150 billion over four years.
This figure is more than the annual military budget of Italy, which at $30.8 billion, is the world’s 16th highest defense spender for this year according to tracker Global Fire Power.
It is also higher than military spending for Israel, ($30 billion), the Netherlands ($27 billion) and Brazil ($26.1 billion).
We could probably hand out a third of that as cash if they left voluntarily.
If the GOP left voluntarily, we could save a LOT more than a third… it’s not even comparable
Even better!
What a stupid thing to waste money on.
You could save some of that money and just enforce rules and fines on the people who hire undocumented workers. You’ll get money from fines and people will stop hiring those without papers. It’s almost like the problem will take care of itself.
Oh wait, that’s right. This is all about hurting brown people, breaking up families, throwing sick kids in cages, and making them suffer.
Nevermind.
I’d like to see them crack down on employers who pay substandard wages no matter who they’re trying to exploit. It does not bother me that anyone is hiring illegal immigrants specifically.
O, we did this…and we decreased our revenue through tax cuts…while we sorta made up for that by fucking over millions of Americans in the process…but…the rich…will be richer…so thats nice.
It’s a bit more than that. ICE can act outside the constitution within 100 miles of the border. We’ve really only seen this with warrantless searches but that’s gonna expand.
Which covers like 2/3 of the US population.
It’s even more egregious than that; I’m pretty sure a court ruled a while ago that international airports count as borders too, for the purposes of ICE.
Well, it’s nice to know the US is getting what they voted for. LOL
Is anyone still pretending ICE is about immigration? ICE is Trump’s SS, and they just got funding beyond any dictator’s wildest dreams. Good luck with your totalitarian police state.
Edit: I want to retract my last sentence. It was callous and stupid. My heart aches for the people who fought against this.
Racism pays.
If you want to put 250m subjects under the boot, you simply need a well-funded American GeStaPo.
I appreciate a lot of the harassment campaigns around tracking and interfering with ICE. These should continue and escalate.
This extrajudicial black-bag unmarked-personnel van-kidnapping bullshit should carry unacceptable risk and highly visible negative public optics for those who keep attempting it.
Seems like it’s time to for people to learn about sustained direct action campaigns.
Rev Left Radio had a great interview earlier this year with a member of Palestine Action about their extremely successful direct action campaign against Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit. While the media would have you believe that Palestine Action is an ineffective bunch of clowns, they have already forced the closure of two weapons factories in England and forced Barclays Bank to divest from Elbit through sustained sabotage campaigns. Their incredible success is the actual reason the UK government has named them a terrorist organization, not just for spray painting some planes.
https://revolutionaryleftradio.libsyn.com/size/5/?search=Palestine+action
For legal reasons, I am not encouraging anyone to break any laws.
Love Rev Left, recommended listening for everyone
So now they are the biggest millitary and paramilitary spender. Cool.
Remember when republican bitches about how much we spent on immigration?
This is perverse
Even more so when you remember that the original “we need to get rid of all those immigrants” argument stemmed from migrants costing the country too much money.
Trillions for deportation. Not one penny for infrastructure or social services.
The ICE budget is free college for everyone like 3 times over.
Gestapo. They’re Nazi Gestapo. Treat them as they deserve.
I’d argue they are more like the SS at this point. Consider: the point of the Gestapo was to police the German population and root out internal threats to the Nazis. The SS, on the other hand, were a military branch that were responsible for eradication of the “undesirable elements”. I feel like the latter is a more fitting mold for ICE.
The SS had many tasks. One of them was to protect the regime against coups from the army or SA.
At the beginning the SA also ran concentration camps, the SS took them over soon.
SS, Gestapo, and regular police were all under Himmler’s command via the Reichssicherheitshauptamt.
Gestapo was formed from preexisting secret political police forces.
Trumpism operates differently than Nazism. However Trump needs a loyal oppression infrastructure to build a more authoritarian system. ICE is on its way to enable that.
Thanks for the clarification!
Good, service guarantees citizenship and the way things are going, the Greatestest and Bestest Democraciest Peaciest and Freedomest Country in the Whole Wide Universe will need some
cannon fodderhighly qualified personnel.Daily reminder to all ICE agents. By signing up for ICE, you have signed yourself up for a lifetime of fear and criminal liability. There are Nazi concentration camp guards that were tried for their crimes in their 90s. There is no statute of limitations on crimes against humanity. Your names are recorded; your deeds are known. And you will face justice for your crimes. And do not count on a blanket pardon saving you. Crimes against humanity are violations of international law that cannot be pardoned.
That’s something I’ve thought about a lot; these people are going to war with their society, and their and their family’s names and addresses are one data breech away from public knowledge.
Fortunately the government is protecting them by mass layoffs and encouraging mass retirements from anyone involved in data security.
My personal bingo card has the families of some these people dropped off in the chihuahaun desert if they piss off the cartels.
Not all guards of concentration camps or SS members were prosecuted. That was also an unusual situation as the Nazi state and the SS ceased to exist and was occupied for decades.
No ICE agent will be prosecuted for conducting arrests or executing warrants against illegal immigrants. Once mass torture, inhumane treatment, extralegal executions and such start, it becomes more risky for them.
We don’t know how bad it will get yet or what comes after. In the best case Trump and republicans lose the next elections. A New Democrat government could simply downsize ICE and only prosecute a handful of bad apples. Remember what happened after Abu Ghraib.
fuck legal systems, we all know the next democrat will pardon them or refuse to prosecute them.
they need to live in fear from decent human beings,
There’s not going to be a next Democrat.
I hope you’re wrong but…I really don’t think you are and I hate it.
surely this neck gaiter will protect me from consequences
There’s no way they need all those people and resources if they’re only going after illegal immigrants. They’re going to start disappearing their other targets too. People of Colour, Democrats, LGBTQ, scientists. Get in line. I hope you’re ready for what we know is coming.
First they came for the immigrants…
They skipped the disabled. They’ve been killing them for centuries.
I’m officially ready to be radicalized.
I’m this country, not wanting to go to a concentration camp makes you a radical
Not wanting to go to a concentration camp is understandable, especially if you have a high paying job.
Not wanting OTHER people you’ve never met to go to concentration camps? Whoaaa there Che, put down that AK-47!
Same, I’m done
Arm yourselves now, before it’s too late.
*Palantir standing the corner taking notes.*
That means this is their new military.
Pretty clever if you think if it. They don’t try to convince their current one but build one up besides them while starving them of their resources.
And not beholden to anybody but Trump himself. He can do with it as he please.
Building a paramilitary beholden to Party-aligned officials as a stopgap until the Party seizes total control of the actual military is boilerplate fascism.
EDIT: And when they do seize control the military, it usually doesn’t end well for the paramilitary.
Who do you think they’re going to Merc? Is it Jigsaw?
It does seem a lot like Schutzstaffel. They’ll need their very own Stasi too.
