If you want real reform of ICE and CBP, end their officers' immunity

In our disfunctional government, shutdowns have become so common they are barely news. But believe it or not, we are in a partial federal government shutdown right now. The main issue preventing a budget resolution to be passed seems to be what, if any, new restrictions to be put on ICE and/or CBP. The restrictions Democrats are proposing, requiring that immigration agents get warrants and stop racial profiling, "real accountability" (whatever that means), and requiring them to wear body cameras.

The problem is that some of those things are already required by law. Judicial warrants are required by the Constitution! This administration has no problem ignoring legal requirements. And the administration is adopting body cameras this week, before reaching any funding deal.  But nothing would really stop them if officers turn the cameras off or stop wearing them. Plus they control the camera footage. Just having cameras does no good if this fascist agency has total control of the tape.

But there is one simple thing that the Democrats could insist upon that would make a real difference and would be enforceable: End qualified immunity for ICE and CBP officers. If ICE and Border Patrol were liable for their officer's misconduct, that could potentially be an enforceable check against abuse. If victims of ICE/CBP officer violence could sue for damages, that could mean real accountability, and compensation for people who they are harming. I bet if that happened we would immediately see a dramatic drop in the number of car windows smashed, ransacked homes, and even shootings. It would also create an incentive for ICE and CBP officers to have body cameras turned on--that is their alibi against false accusations. And without immunity that would give an avenue to get footage that is less exonerating through discovery.

But most importantly, lifting immunity for those officers would move enforcement of the new restrictions out of the executive branch that Trump controls. The courts would decide liability. We would not have to hope that the DHS honors any deal about how to restrict officers later on. I realize the courts  are flawed. There are a lot of terrible Trump-appointed judges on the bench who might dismiss cases about the most egregious abuses, and the number of Trump judges is growing. But there are still a lot of non-Trump judges, and the DHS can't bet on getting a Trump judge every time so it still could serve as a check.

Finally, having CBP and ICE pay for their abuses is  also a back-door way to have at least some of that enormous budget increase pay for something other than abusing people. When the huge increase in ICE funding passed last year, there was a lot of concern that would lead to even more egregious abuses. But if ICE officers did not have immunity, that enormous budget could at least partially be turned into a compensation fund.

Am I too optimistic about the power of lawsuits to bring justice? Maybe. But I don't think there is any question that lifting officer immunity would make a much bigger difference than any of the things that Chuck Schumer is  insisting upon now that the administration could easily ignore later.

ICE are not police

The Tenth Amendment reserves the "police power" to the States. Federal agents, like ICE, do not have the general power to enforce order and "preserve the peace" like police are supposedly for. That is why in the U.S. we do not have a national police force.

But the Trump Administration wants to pretend we do. So they have taken a relatively new agency, ICE (created in 2003), which has a narrow mandate of enforcing immigration law and enforcing customs (i.e. tariffs), and decided they are general purpose shock troops. In theory ICE officers don't have the authority to arrest protesters (at least not protesters who are U.S. citizens or lawful aliens) much less rough them up. If their job is disrupted by protests, they can call the local cops, like anyone else.

Which is why it is utterly absurd that ICE agents will provide security for the U.S. Olympic delegation. They are not a security service. The Trump administration really is trying to groom them to be their own all-purpose security brutes despite the fact that it has nothing to do with their legal mandate.

Imagine if the ATF's legal counsel wrote a memo saying that the second amendment does not apply to seizure of privately owned firearms

If the government can just write a memo saying "this constitutional right does not apply" and that makes the government's conduct legal, then we don't really have any constitutional rights. If this is upheld than why should any administration follow any provision in the constitution?

The FIFA peace prize bribe was all for nothing

I do not see how the U.S. can host the World Cup in just a few months when it refused to process visa applications from approximately 40% of the countries in the world.

UPDATE: The suspension "will not apply to applicants seeking non-immigrant visas, or temporary tourist or business visas." So Football/Soccer fans coming for the World Cup will not be affected... assuming the Trump Administration doesn't decide to harass them too. Which it might. Our current immigration authorities are not exactly sticklers for the rules.

We can still enforce the Emoluments Clause

There are now reports that Maria Corina Machado plans to give Trump her Nobel Peace Prize as a bribe for being installed as leader of Venezuela. Putting aside the fact that we seem to be living in a joke without a good punchline, it is worth noting that the gift would violate the Emoluments Clause of the Constitution.

Yeah, I know, so did Trump's acceptance of the FIFA Participation Award Peace Prize, and so will Trump's acceptance of the Qatari plane (assuming he does follow through with his plans to take it home with him when he leaves office rather than letting the U.S. government keep it), and so did countless other gifts Trump has accepted from foreigners throughout the last year. The Trump Presidency has been an endless stream of Emolument Clause violations.

Since the Supreme Court effectively dismissed the first term Emolument cases against Trump in 2021, in the second term everyone seems to pretend that means that the Emoluments Clause doesn't exist anymore. That unspoken consensus has only resulted in even more brazen Emolument violations by Trump in this term. Remember, the first term violations were mostly about whether payments by foreign nationals to Trump's DC Hotel, which ultimately profited Trump, meant he was accepting payments from foreigners. Now he is just openly taking bribes. I'm not sure why no one is bringing Emoluments lawsuits against Trump anymore. If we had a real Court system these should be slam-dunk cases.

But I'm hoping that whatever comes after Trump would include an effort to enforce the Emoluments clause by having the U.S. Justice Department seize anything that Trump got in violation of the clause on behalf of the federal government. I really wish someone with Presidential aspirations would say out loud that, if elected, every bribe that Trump has personally received will be clawed back from Trump or his heirs by the next administration.

This is a fucking mess and the people in charge are too dumb to even notice what a fucking mess they made

Remember when W. Bush toppled the Iraqi government after months of half-assed detached from reality planning for what the post-invasion government would be like?

This is like that, but without any of the half-assed planning.

So much winning

Our illegal war in Venezuela now includes kidnapping foreign heads of state.

These things tend to have unintended consequences. I hope the Trump Administration is preparing...

Ha, who am I kidding? of course the Trump Administration hasn't given a single thought to the downstream consequences of this. Secretary Drunk Rapist is too busy strutting around and telling his demented boss about how cool the explosions looked.

Meanwhile my prediction #21 20 19. Didn't last 50 hours before being wrong. That must be a record.