US Hostile Towards Illegal Aliens, Claims Human Rights Report – OpEd

While a majority of American citizens, according to polls, believe the Obama Administration is doing too little to secure the U.S.-Mexican border, a human rights group complains that Border Patrol officers discriminate against Latinos and have caused the deaths of illegal aliens in a new “study.”

Yesterday, Amnesty International USA released their report, “Hostile Terrain: Human Rights Violations in Immigration Enforcement in the U.S. Southwest,” in which the group alleges that U.S. law enforcement officials are guilty of discrimination in their enforcement practices.

“Communities living along the U.S.-Mexico border, particularly Latinos, individuals perceived to be of Latino origin and indigenous communities, are disproportionately affected by a range of immigration-control measures, resulting in a pattern of human rights violations,” the study claims.

However, many within the law enforcement community believe Amnesty International’s study is flawed since the only people living on the Mexican side of the border are Latino and the vast majority of lawbreakers sneaking across the border are from indigenous communities.

“If Norway shared the southwest border with the US, and they were experiencing poverty, hostility and danger in their nation, U.S. citizens, politicians and law enforcement officials would be discussing the problem of Norwegian illegal aliens entering the United States,” said NYPD police officer Iris Adriana.

“The left-wing, open-borders crowd continue to put out bogus press releases and statements that are basically anti-police and anti-American,” Officer Adriana said in a telephone conversation with the Law Enforcement Examiner.

The U.S. government has actually relaxed security along the nearly 2,000-mile border with Mexico in recent years. The federal government has even prohibited state and local police forces from enforcing immigration laws such as in the case of Arizona.

Attorney General Eric Holder and the U.S. Justice Department recently accused the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office in Arizona of engaging in systematic racial profiling against Latinos in its efforts to crack down on illegal immigration, a charge thus far unproven.

The Amnesty study said federal immigration programs that operated in conjunction with state and local police put “Latino communities, indigenous communities and communities of color along the border at risk of discriminatory profiling.”

A Homeland Security Department spokesman said the report’s finding were based “almost entirely on either outdated information or anonymous anecdotes that can be neither investigated nor resolved.”

Special Agent Matt Chandler said the Border Patrol, as well as U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement “takes allegations of racial profiling and civil rights and civil liberties violations seriously and has processes in place to immediately investigate and take appropriate action as needed.”

“The department has worked hard to create a culture where all people are respected and treated fairly and within the bounds of the law,” he added.

In addition, as Officer Adriana pointed out, a large percentage of Border Patrol and ICE agents are themselves Latino including the BP Chief, David Aguilar.

The Amnesty International report claims:

• Recent immigration policy in certain border areas has pushed undocumented immigrants into using dangerous routes through the US desert; hundreds of people die each year as a result.

• Immigration enforcement in the USA is a federal responsibility. Federal immigration officials are increasingly working in collaboration with state and local law enforcement agencies but improper oversight of state and local law enforcement has led to increased racial profiling.

• Increasingly, state laws and local policies are creating barriers to immigrants accessing their basic human rights, including rights to education and essential health care services. While these laws are targeting non-citizens, these policies are also impacting US citizen children.

• Recent legislation enacted or proposed in several states target immigrant communities and places them, Indigenous communities and other minority communities at risk of discrimination.

• Immigrant communities also face a range of barriers to justice when they are victims of crime such as human trafficking, domestic violence or bias crimes.

However, Amnesty International’s “study” neglects to offer evidence to backup the group’s allegations, said attorney and political strategist Mike Baker.

“As usual, the liberal-left never allows facts to interfere with their allegations and accusations,” Baker quipped.