And you thought the people you elected to represent you in Washington would, you know, represent you, the Nevada taxpayer.
Instead, Nevada’s senior Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto has chosen to represent foreigners. She and 22 other Democratic senators, as well as independent Bernie Sanders, have signed a letter addressed to the heads of the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security demanding that the Trump administration rescind a policy that forces largely Central American asylum seekers to remain in Mexico while awaiting an immigration hearing.
In January the Trump administration began enforcing what it calls Migrant Protection Protocols, but others have dubbed it the Remain in Mexico policy. The practice started in San Diego but in July was expanded to the Texas border.
Prior to this, illegal immigrants who claimed to be fleeing persecution in their home countries were freed into the U.S. and given dates to appear for a hearing of their claim, often months or even years away. 
In June, acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan told a congressional hearing that a recently conducted study of 7,000 family units revealed that 90 percent failed to appear for their scheduled hearings and simply vanished inside the country, according to Fox News.
“It depends on demographic, the court, but we see too many cases where people are not showing up,” McAleenan said. “Out of those 7,000 cases, 90 received final orders of removal in absentia, 90 percent.”
U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Fox reported, encountered 144,000 migrants at the border in May alone. McAleenan testified that 60,000 children had been entered into Homeland Security custody in just the previous 40 days.
The senators’ letter, dated Aug. 27, claims that at one point more than 30,000 asylum seekers were waiting in Mexico for adjudication of their asylum cases but that number may well have risen to 60,000 by now.
The senators make a humanitarian argument, without addressing the costs to U.S. taxpayers for education, incarceration and welfare benefits.
“Under the Remain in Mexico policy, the United States has turned its back on its domestic and international legal obligations by forcing men, women, and children to await resolution of their U.S. asylum cases in parts of Mexico plagued by violence,” the senators’ letter states. “While in Mexico, these asylum seekers have limited access to lawyers and shelter, which makes it nearly impossible for them to prepare their cases and effectively denies them meaningful access to the U.S. asylum system.”
The letter recounts specific examples of kidnapping, extortion, trafficking, rape and murder of would-be migrants forced to remain in Mexico. “From January to May 2019, Doctors Without Borders treated 378 patients in Nuevo Laredo,” the letter says. “Of these, more than 45 percent had experienced at least one episode of violence and about 12 percent had been kidnapped while waiting to cross into the U.S.”
In addition to Cortez Masto, U.S. Sens. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Angus King (I-Maine), Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Tom Udall (D-N.M.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) and Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) also signed the letter.
As you may notice, several of them have been or still are Democratic presidential candidates.
There is a process in law for legal immigration. Simply opening the borders to all comers is an affront to those who follow the law and a burden on U.S. taxpayers.
A version of this editorial appeared this week in some of the Battle Born Media newspapers — The Ely Times, the Mesquite Local News, the Mineral County Independent-News, the Eureka Sentinel, Sparks Tribune and the Lincoln County Record.
4TH ST8 
Common Sense 101, IMO
Funny.
I’d say your theory regarding what our representatives are there to do (represent us?) is in a constant state of flux depending on what action is involved or more importantly the particular party that is doing the representing or not representing as the case may be, but that’s because I’m in a good mood. Other days I’d just say you were being a hypocrite. Because so many times I’ve pointed out that our representatives are doing their jobs when they represent the majority view and you claim that it’s why we have a republic and not a democracy.
There have been instances you might remember when people were turned away from this country, who were fleeing from terrible conditions in their own countries that the US had no hand in creating and the shame is on this country to this day.
https://www.history.com/news/wwii-jewish-refugee-ship-st-louis-1939
Those Jews begged the US (and any other country really) to save them for on what they knew was in store for them but we refused.
The people who are coming here now are in similar straights the difference is that the US is largely responsible for the conditions that these people are fleeing from. If we don’t take them in, then their deaths are truly the blood on our hands.
Am I my brothers keeper Thomas or not?
The U.S. is responsible for the gangs in Central America?
Each of those politicians that vote for this ridiculous release should each be tagged with the responsibilities of 25 or more of them and report daily, weekly or monthly on their location, advancements toward becoming citizens of the United states. Any who were arrested, for even a misdemeanor will be evicted with predigest and their representative politicians responsable for their damages to others be it monetary or property damage or whatever.
Imagine that?
Click to access RL34027.pdf
https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2018/10/29/american-policy-is-responsible-migrant-caravan/?noredirect=on
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/dec/19/central-america-migrants-us-foreign-policy
https://jacobinmag.com/2018/12/honduras-coup-lobo-human-rights-us-obama-trump
These fine? federal senators, along with local legislators want to allow all the seekers people in? Fine! Since they are of substantial means, have large real estate holdings, and financially ‘deep pockets’, either by personal holdings or contributors, along with means for proper security, perhaps they should lead from the front. Take personal responsibility financial for them and house them, get medical as needed etc. Your ancestors did or were treated as such upon arrival in the early 1900s.
Rhetoric is fine, but lead from the front without raiding everyone else’s pockets.
It’s Ike’s fault.
Once again, look at the squirrel, but what the heck. It’s a weekend.
The idea that the responsibility of providing a haven for asylum seekers lies only with the countries that happen to be next door is arbitrary and therefore, devoid of reason. That being said, this is not an easy issue to resolve. We obviously can’t take all comers, but neither can other countries. The obvious answer is for each country to take in their share of legitimate applicants, but that would require international cooperation and Conservatives in most countries wouldn’t hear of it – fears of world government, etc. Certainly, part of the answer is to take down the Statue of Liberty. It’s meaningless today, and the copper is probably worth a lot, but then again, it still brings in some tourist dollars. We need to see an accounting of profitability before we decide for sure.
As for the 90% who don’t reappear in court, be aware that we are taking the word of a Trump appointee, giving it perhaps a 50% chance of being true. Even less if we believe the Washington Post to be a more reliable source: “The rate of no-shows is far below 90 percent, according to the Department of Justice’s most recent annual figures. When using the Justice Department’s preferred metric, 44 percent of migrants who were not in custody failed to show up for their court proceedings.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/06/26/how-many-migrants-show-up-immigration-court-hearings/
But even if McAleenan is correct, the fault lies with our badly understaffed court system. We cut the court system budget and then spend millions trying to track down the very migrants that were in our hands. Wal-Mart didn’t get where it is by telling its customers to come back in a few months. Conservatives say they want the government to be run like a business, but then they starve it of resources. After that, they claim that government is inherently dysfunctional. A nice way to insure that your own views come true.
Quoting the above article: “U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Fox reported, encountered 144,000 migrants at the border in May alone. McAleenan testified that 60,000 children had been entered into Homeland Security custody in just the previous 40 days.”
Presumably, many of these 60,000 children were accompanied by parents. Even if they average only one parent per child, families appear to make up perhaps 120,000 of the 144,000 migrants encountered at the border. Are these the murderers and rapists that Trump refers to?
Round ’em all up and dump them back into Mexico! No less humane than to dump them on us originally!
“Am I my brothers keeper?”
Don’t understand why supposed Christians keep getting this question wrong. It’s right in the beginning. One of the very first lessons in the lesson plan. And yet republican after republican, professing at Christianity if nothing else, just keep answering the question with a loud
NO.
The hell is wrong with you people?
Typical leftist. Jesus isn’t telling the government to take care of “my brother”, that instruction was made to individuals ( like her fine senators to personally take in these people on their own dime)
It would appear that the leftist plan, is to destroy our country from within. Why do I say that?
Because there is no way a Dacian can survive with the welfare system we have taking in all the world.
Get it ?
It’s important to know who your enemy is!
A country not Dacian
Atholes you’re just the perfect example so thanks for showing up and proving it.
Not a word about his brothers, not a word about the inhumanity demonstrated by the individuals involved, just some perverted defense of a monstrous “gov’ment”.
Very Christian.
Well, thank you, p. I am a Christian and will continue to pray for you. And it wouldn’t hurt if you could learn a little reading comprehension. Maybe I should ask God to help you there, too.
[…] June, then-acting Homeland Security Secretary Kevin McAleenan told a congressional hearing that a recently conducted study of 7,000 family units revealed that 90 percent failed to appear for […]