A Handful Of Congressional Republicans Are Wondering If The Nazification Of U.S. Immigration Policy Will Hurt Them At The Polls Again

Monday evening there were a slew of reports that Capitol Hill Republicans were freaking out over the Trump-ordered mayhem at the Department of Homeland Security. And, believe me, virtually no one in Congress other than Steve King (R-IA) was excited to hear that the White House's pet neo-Nazi, Steve Miller, had been unleashed with full authority to reimplement his reviled "zero tolerance" agenda. What comes after babies in cages? Babies in gas chambers? Republican senators are grumbling that Miller was never nominated, investigated or confirmed for anything and that he's running the whole show. Trump breaking the law himself by explicitly instructing border agents to just ignore the law and defy the courts, isn't helping either. "If judges give you trouble, say, 'Sorry, judge, I can’t do it. We don’t have the room.'"

The Washington Post's Seung Min Kim reported that Grassley was raging against Trump, especially when he heard that U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Lee Francis Cissna was on Miller's purge list. By Tuesday morning the NY Times was blaring that "Trump’s purge of the nation’s top homeland security officials is a sign that he is preparing to unleash an even fiercer assault on immigration, including a possible return of his controversial decision last summer to separate migrant children from their parents... But the longer term effect of the eruption of Oval Office frustration is likely to be a burst of hard-line policies that stand out even in an administration that has pursued an unprecedented series of executive actions and rules changes aimed at reducing legal and illegal immigration into the United States."

Jonathan Swan at Axios had the details for Republicans already on slow burn, reporting that "Trump has directed top officials to execute the most aggressive changes in immigration policy since his inauguration… Some officials consider the moves legally and politically dubious." Executive orders are aimed at making it "more difficult for people to invoke their fear of returning to their home country in order to seek asylum in the U.S.," largely by pretending the Orwellian fascist dictatorships in the U.S. protectorates in Central America are lovely places for people to live. Trump and Miller want to "change rules to allow the government to detain migrant children for longer than the 20-day limit allowed under the so-called Flores agreement... Sources close to Nielsen tell us that Trump and senior policy adviser Stephen Miller have called for changes that are legally dubious and would therefore be operationally ineffective."

• Nielsen has found Trump's demands unreasonable, and he has privately described her as "weak on the border," even though she oversaw actions that many viewed as the most brutal in recent memory-- such as the "zero tolerance" policy that separated migrant parents from their children.
• These sources say that Trump’s desire to make it dramatically harder for people to seek asylum in the U.S. wouldn’t produce lasting changes because they would immediately lead to court challenges. 

Is this going to have any impact at the polls? In other words, will the evangelical base still loyal to Trump continue to be fine with what his regime is doing refugee and immigrant families? Team Politico reports that even some of Trump's congressional allies are starting to worry. Senators are "urging him not to fire more top officials and warning him how hard it will be to solve twin crises at the border and the federal agencies overseeing immigration policy." And they're worried that Miller has taken over. John Bresnahan wrote that after November elections in which suburban voters rejected Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda, the president is once again making it the centerpiece of the GOP’s platform.

Texas Senator Cornyn, McTurtle's top deputy told Politico he has "no idea what Miller’s agenda is in determining immigration policy because he isn’t Senate-confirmed and doesn’t correspond with the Hill."

Chuck Grassley of Iowa, the most senior GOP senator, is trying to head off even more dismissals as Trump tries to reshape DHS into a “tougher” mold.

In an interview, Grassley expressed concern that Trump may soon boot U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director Lee Francis Cissna and Kathy Nuebel Kovarik, who heads the office of policy and strategy at USCIS.

“I heard that they are on the list to be fired,” Grassley said. “They are doing in an intellectual-like way what the president wants to accomplish. So no, they should not go.”

Republicans empathize with Trump’s frustrations over the border and Congress’ languid pace at changing immigration laws. They mostly backed him on his 35-day government shutdown over the border wall, buckling only as the standoff dragged into its second month.

Most of them hated his emergency declaration on the southern border, but only 25 GOP lawmakers between the two chambers ended up bucking him. And when Trump and Miller sought to tank an immigration compromise last year, Senate Republicans overwhelmingly sided with the president and left Democrats holding the bag on the legislative collapse.

But on immigration, the party is not in lockstep with Trump. So even as the president pursues more aggressive strategies on the border, the GOP might not stick with him ahead of an election cycle that has the Senate up for grabs and with Republicans eager to take back the House.

“He thinks it’s a winning issue,” said Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, the Republican whip. “It works for him. It may not work for everybody else.”

...Centrist GOP Rep. Will Hurd, who narrowly won reelection in 2018, said the turnover in the upper ranks of DHS isn’t helpful during a critical time at the southern border, though the Texan expressed confidence in Nielsen’s successor.

“When you’re dealing with something that’s the worst we’ve seen in 12, 13 years, having to deal with that problem and having new people come in and deal with it is always tricky,” said Hurd, whose district stretches along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Moderate GOP Rep. Tom Reed of New York said he would prefer to focus on issues like infrastructure, drug pricing and health care in the 2020 election cycle, saying the issue of immigration is being kept alive “for political purposes.”

Reed also took a veiled shot at Miller: “One hard-liner is not going to dictate the outcome of this.”

But Miller’s rise in the Trump administration is merely one more indication of how the president gravitates toward the restrictionist wing of his party.

“The president is really unhappy with the results and he’s trying to find a different formula that produces a different result,” said Roy Blunt of Missouri, the No. 4 Senate GOP leader. “Unless you either change the court directives or the asylum law, it’s very hard to quickly come up with a solution. And the president’s frustrated by that.”

The problem for Trump is that that’s not going to happen anytime soon. Congress’ dithering on immigration in the six years since the Senate passed its “Gang of Eight” comprehensive immigration bill, which died in the House, is no surprise.

Republicans have been signaling to Trump that with the election coming up so soon, they're not going to be able to confirm any more hard core neo-Nazis he sends over the the Hill. Xenophobic extremist Kris Kobach has been widely rumored to be the top choice of fellow-fascist Stephen Miller to replace Nielsen or one of her fired-- or soon-to-be fired-- lieutenants. Yesterday, the Kansas City Star reported that Kansas' retiring senior senator, Pat Roberts, warned, dramatically, "Don’t go there. We can’t confirm him."

White House Nazi Stephen Miller Is Revamping The Department Of Homeland Security

Late Sunday afternoon, after the White House announced Trump had "accepted the resignation of " (rather than fired, a more accurate representation of objective reality) Homeland Security Secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, the member of Congress who is often the tip of the spear on progressive immigration policy, Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), released this statement:

Secretary Nielsen will go down in history as presiding over an exceptionally cruel regime that separated children from their parents and violated human rights. I welcome her resignation. But, that does not end our quest for accountability for the abuses that occurred on her watch and at the direction of this president. I hope the next Secretary uses this opportunity to reset the Department’s approach and lead with humane, common-sense immigration policies that are based on American values instead of hate.

Mike Siegel is running for a House seat (TX-10) currently occupied by the congressional architect of  Trump's "babies in cages" policy, Michael McCaul

I'm certain that Rep. Jayapal knows the Trump is likely to appoint someone even worse than Nielsen as the next head of DHS. Meanwhile, he immediately announced that Kevin McAleenan, the Customs and Border Protection Commissioner, is taking over as Acting DHS Secretary. Remember, this "resignation" Nielsen comes just two days after Señor Trumpanzee, suddenly withdrew his nominee to run ICE-- who had already been given the thumbs up by one of the two Senate committees charged with vetting him-- because he said he wants ICE to go is a "tougher direction." He's been fighting with Nielsen for not being tough enough. Perhaps the cages were too spacious?

Babies in Cages by Nancy Ohanian

Eventually her departure will be viewed as part of a total overhaul of DHS engineered by Trump's in-house neo-Nazi, Stephen Miller-- kicking Nielsen out was part of Miller's grand plan. Trump tweeted her resignation before she had a chance to resign; he's a really foul person, although I can't say she hasn't earned the abysmal treatment she's getting from him. This afternoon Miller made his move to purge mainstream conservatives from the DHS so they can be replaced with his kind of neo-fascists. Miller-- de facto immigration czar with no congressional oversight whatsoever-- ordered the ouster of Francis Cissna, the head of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; Randolph Alles, the Secret Service director; and John Mitnik, the agency’s general counsel.

On CNN this morning, Jeffrey Toobin noted that Kirstjen Nielsen "is a great example of what happens when you go to work for Donald Trump. He is the great reputation killer. Here is this woman who was a reasonably admired bureaucrat. For the rest of her life people will look at her and think, 'Oh, that’s the woman who put children in cages.'"

CBS News reported that "it is unlikely McAleenan would be nominated as Nielsen's permanent replacement. It's unclear whether he would have to resign as CBP commissioner to take the job, and whether the line of succession at DHS would even allow for such a personnel move. Those legal issues would need to be sorted out." 

McAleenan has worked as CBP commissioner since the early days of Mr. Trump's administration, keeping a generally low profile. In a 2018 interview with the New York Times in the height of the concern over family separations at the border, McAleenan called Mr. Trump's attempt to halt the separations with an executive order an "important recalibration."

In recent days, Mr. Trump has threatened to shut down the U.S.-Mexico border or slap tariffs on cars made in Mexico coming into the U.S. if Mexico and Congress don't fix the situation at the border.

[After Trump publicly humiliated her and threatened to fire her] Nielsen became known for her vigorous defense of the "zero tolerance" policy resulting in family separations at the border, blaming Congress for a "loophole" in the laws that needs to be fixed. Nielsen claimed in a White House briefing last year that the administration was merely continuing a policy from "previous administrations" that mandates separating a child who is "in danger, there is no custodial relationship between 'family' members, or if the adult has broken the law."

"As long as illegal entry remains a criminal offense, DHS will not look the other way," Nielsen told reporters at the time. 

Revolving Door by Nancy Ohanian

One thing we can easily surmise is that Trump, who never had any respect for Nielsen to begin with, didn't fire her because of the horror of the admission to a court last week that his regime says it will take as much as two years to be able to identify 47,000 separated migrant children and return them to their parents. One has to wonder if the evangelicals who are a hefty majority of Trump's base can countenance even that most unholy possible action by their "president" in service to their hopes of overturning Roe v Wade. There doesn't seem to be any bottom at all to their adhesion to what is clearly-- at least to everyone else-- Satan's man on the planet.

This morning, NBC reported that the straw the broke the camel's back with Nielsen was Trump's demand-- sounds like Miller's demand-- that the child separation policy being reinstated. NBC's Julia Ainsley and Geoff Bennett reported that Trump has been carrying on about this "for months" and that it wants it reinstated in a big way. Miller has pounded it into Trump's head that the brutality of this policy has been the most effective tool they've deployed at deterring asylum-seekers.

And on CNN this morning, Frank Bruni noted that "[Nielsen] will go down more than Rex Tillerson and Jeff Sessions as what it’s like to work for Donald Trump in this administration. Your reputation is shredded. You compromise your principles, and at the end of the day, you end up paranoid... She was paranoid in recent weeks because she saw signs she was going to be canned even though the president wasn’t telling her. How do you work in this administration? It’s an acid bath, not a job... They are at [Trump's] mercy and whims."

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

We do not have a policy of separating families at the border. Period.
-Kristjen Nielsen, Secretary Of The Department Of Homeland Security, June 17, 2018

On Wednesday, Kristjen Nielsen, She-Wolf Of The DHS, once again displayed her exceedingly gross contempt for humanity. This time, it was before a House committee. She couldn't bring herself to admit that she's been keeping kids in cages. Back in January of last year, it was before the Senate where she was so contemptuous and so disingenuous that she claimed that she didn't know that Norway was a predominately white nation. Since her name and appearance is so Scandinavian, one might think that she would know that but, well, she comes from a Trump World of "alternative facts," so...

In any event, working for the Colonel Klink of Presidents has clearly taken its toll. Her appearance before Congress only managed to add a couple of more absurd quotes to her shameless list of personal greatest hits. She couldn't even bring herself to call the cages what they are- cages! I was surprised she didn't call them "Kiddie Kondos" and try to trademark the term; better yet-- Kristjen's Kiddie Kondos, with a nice, sporty KKK logo!

It seemed that Nielsen feared that if she did call them what they are, cages, she might be consumed by fire like her fellow NAZIs in the ending of Raiders Of The Lost Ark. "They're beautiful!" Even if she did admit that they are cages, she'd add that she sees nothing wrong in kidnapping kids and throwing them into cages. No, the only thing people like Kristjen Nielsen see wrong is that they can't sell their souls more than once in their heinous lives. "I regret that I have only one soul to sell for he who grabs the pussy!"

Sadly, as was to be expected, Nielsen was not so much as even threatened with being in contempt of Congress, nor was she arrested on the spot for kidnapping or crimes against humanity. That would only happen in a Capitol Building where a sense of morality and justice actually prevailed. Instead we saw yet another example of Washington lawmakers normalizing the deplorable and the despicable. The kind of behavior of Kristjen Nielsen proudly displays once begat the French Revolution, or at least a judgment at Nuremberg. There used to be a death penalty for kidnapping and for using your bigotry as an excuse to rip families apart and put members in prison camps.

Well Kristjen, I guess you always wanted to be the face of White Nationalism and White Supremacy. You're a good little tool of evil. Congratulations. In Trump's latest "beauty" pageant, you'll at least be one of his top 5 finalists, right up there with Gen. John Kelly. One day soon, we might just see you go before some willfully toothless congressional game show panel and claim that you "were only following orders." At that point, the skies will open and deliver a whirlwind of red, white, and blue balloons and red, white and blue confetti. The curtain behind you will then part and the only sentence you will hear is "And, Kristjen, you have just won yourself a brand new car!" It'll be black 1941 Mercedes-Benz 770K limo, of course. You can drive it all the way from Arizona to Argentina. I'd like to see you try.

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

The Trump administration has introduced us to yet another name and face for evil. That name and face is the name and face of Kirstjen Nielsen. Nielsen is Herr Trump's Chief of Homeland Security, or "die Homeland" as they probably call it in the White House. When asked by the White House press corps why we were only seeing film and photos of male refugees in cages, she acted, and I mean acted, in her ice cold nazi-like contempt, like it was news to her. She even claimed that she didn't know what photos reporters were talking about even though they've been running like a loop on TV (Well, maybe not Rupert Murdoch's Republican channel or Alex Jones). She played her own loop of evilly disingenuous, smart ass word games about not knowing about the photos; "Photos? What photos? She took the attitude that she didn't understand what the fuss was about when reporters wanted to know the whereabouts of toddlers and young girls stolen from their parents by the Trump jackboots, the same jackboots that laugh and make jokes about the cries and terror of their captives. Either Nielsen doesn't care or she knows perfectly damn well what's happening with those kids in her Kiddie Internment Camps.

Kirstjen Nielsen. Remember that name. It's the kind of name that Republicans prefer our immigrants to have. Names don't get any whiter than that, but that's why she's got the job she has. You could look at her contempt for anyone who wanted to know the additional horrible details and see the result of decades of republican wet dreaming. Just how much further will they go, and how much further will we enable them, and their kind, to go?

When it comes to Kirstjen Nielsen, you could say, "Meet the new Sarah Huckabee Sanders." The job position is different but whereas Sanders only went as far as displaying the complete lack of empathy of an Ayn Randian psychopath, i.e. the apple of the eye of the current Republican Speaker of the House, Nielsen was put before the press and the nation Monday to take the White House theme of depraved indifference yet another step further into outright evil. Imagine being in charge of knowing where the babies and young girls are and how or if they are being properly cared for, and not even caring enough to know the details. If she does know, then that is even more evil. Either way, there's that contempt of that not caring and then going out before the entire world and just cavalierly saying you don't know, or, basically say "Is there a problem?" Some terrorists hide behind a mask. Some hide behind their smirk.

The press doesn't get off easy either. Yes, I'm glad that they are asking the questions about the whereabouts of the stolen children, but the reason we are only seeing pictures of the young males is beyond obvious. It's a marketing ploy and the press needs need to shout that fact from the rooftops. It's the kind of marketing ploy that Republicans are so extraordinarily adept at: marketing fear, not the fears of the children and their parents but the fears of reptilian Republican voters. The reason we are only seeing pictures of young males, some who look as old as 18 or 19 is that it plays into the Trumpist narrative that all young males of color are gang members, MS-13 and all that. It's the Republican politics of fear being played to the hilt as they use children as pawns and bargaining chips in furtherance of their white supremacist agenda. Stephen Miller, John Kelly, Jeff Sessions, Donald Trump. Add Kirstjen Nielsen to that list of racist horror. Add Kellyanne Conway who just defended their actions in the name of Catholicism. You might as well add the names of all who work in the Trump White House. With any luck and if we actually get out of this nightmare of neo-nazi Trumpism, all of the names of those who work in today's White House will be remembered by history. That's the wall we should build; a wall in Lafayette Park across the barricaded street in front of the White House, a wall with all of their names, every, single, one, of, them, a wall where future generations can all go a spit, while future republicans complain that we are spitting on their heritage. Think of the irony of a White House goon like Conway citing a religion that has its own issues of how children are treated. Maybe that's OK, too, if you're a republican. Just wait 'till we here about all sorts of abuse, sexual and otherwise, coming from these camps. You have to know that that is only a matter of time.

The reason we haven't seen the photos of toddlers and young women; the reason the press needs to name is that photos of toddlers and girls would engender sympathy. They would engender feelings of humanity, something Trump and those who work for him can't stand. They don't show the girls because just look at the reaction that picture of the sobbing two-year-old got. That picture will get a Pulitzer and go down in history as being as powerful as the Pulitzer-winning photo of the girlnaked and napalmed Vietnamese girl did decades ago, in Nixon's time. Those pictures are photo-journalism at its best, and they are why fascists hate journalists. Now it's up to the press to tell all, not just half. In the meanwhile, we will get some staged photos of happy, well-cared for toddlers and young girls in an attempt to quiet things and mollify us. How long before we see a photo op of Ivanka or some republican congresscretin like Rep. Marsha Blackburn or Sen. Joni Ernst, wearing new MAGA hats available at Trump.com. for the low, low price of $49.99, visiting a "cleaned up for presentation" detention center. I can just see Ivanka asking a little girl if she knows how to make shoes.