NYTimes Shocked, Shocked to Find Immigration Enforcement in Airports!

Alternate headline: … would be what, exactly? “Law enforcement agency enforces the law”? “Border security investigations take place at country’s entry points”? “Illegal aliens detained for being in country illegally”?

The New York Times expresses a certain je ne sais quoi, Louis Renault-esque form of hyperventilation in its actual headline: “ICE Arrests Surge at Airports, Opening New Front in Deportation Drive.” Put aside the fact that airports are hardly a “new front” for both border security and immigration-status verification; the Gray Lady needs a fainting couch for what appears to be regular enforcement of immigration violations. Each paragraph feels calculated to produce outrage over an effective and fully authorized application of the law at the country’s virtual borders:

The Trump administration has begun arresting foreign citizens with expired U.S. visas as they travel through airports, including spouses of Americans, according to documents obtained by The New York Times and interviews with immigration lawyers — a tactic that opens up a vast new pool of people for deportation.

… and?

Immigration agents in plain clothes have whisked away targets at check-in counters and arrival gates, with enforcement actions in at least 15 airports in recent weeks. Some of the arrests have occurred quietly, while others have happened as angry fellow passengers filmed the encounters.

… and?

The recent arrests appear to be an expansion of an arrangement between the Transportation Security Administration and Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The Times reported in December that ICE officers were arresting people with deportation orders at airports with the help of information provided by airlines to the T.S.A.

… so?

Now, through a review of Homeland Security Department documents and interviews with lawyers for more than 25 people from more than a dozen countries recently detained at airports, The Times has learned that the program apparently now includes people with expired visas — a much larger group.

Ahem. “People with expired visas” have another official designation: illegal aliens. One doesn’t have to cross the Rio Grande to join that category. In fact, as the 9/11 Commission noted over twenty years ago, visa control is a particular concern for national security, and it has taken this long for DHS to deal with it systematically. That should be the headline here, and it’s almost absurd that the NYT takes offense at it just as the 25th anniversary of 9/11 approaches. 

The NYT attempts to contextualize overstays and absconders:

Hundreds of thousands of immigrants and visitors overstay visas each year. Many with expired visas occupy a legal gray area, as they are awaiting visa extensions or green cards and have been issued work permits. Such individuals were not prioritized for deportation in the past unless they had committed crimes, and they were rarely detained while waiting for visa extensions or green cards. But that has changed under President Trump, whose administration has undertaken a campaign of mass deportation and views all visa overstays as illegal.

Double ahem. All visa overstays are illegal, full stop. Those who come to the U.S. on a visa are required by law to depart when their visas expire or before. Staying past the expiration date is a violation of the law. The 9/11 attacks were possible in part because the State Department and INS didn’t track overstays and didn’t enforce the law strenuously enough when they happened. In a footnote to Chapter 12 in its final report, the 9/11 Commission noted the role overstays played:

This level of enforcement should have begun when al-Qaeda began targeting the US, and certainly after the 1993 World Trade Center bombing masterminded by the Blind Sheikh. It should have been one of the first policies adopted by the Department of Homeland Security after its creation twenty years ago, as recommended by the 9/11 Commission. If people with visas can’t follow the rules, then they should go home and start the process over from scratch. We do not owe them a mulligan, let alone a peaceful trek through the airport so that they can then disappear into the general population. 

The NYT and the rest of the media don’t object to immigration enforcement in airports. They object to immigration enforcement anywhere in the US. This article contains the usual level of heartbreak stories involving people who violated immigration laws and didn’t bother to keep up with their visa statuses, along with the suggestion that following the law is especially burdensome for au pairs, newlyweds, and other assorted people who lacked sufficient incentives to comply with the law and the terms of their entry. They never get around to explaining why these folks lack the capacity when many others seem to have little trouble complying with visa regulations and immigration requirements – nor why their violations should go without consequence. 

Not for the first time, the New York Times gets a Louis Renault Award with a Walter Duranty Red Oak Leaf cluster.

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