Not so fast: Obama will spread wealth around, but not necessarily his.

This is the kind of lawlessness that makes it hard to negotiate with any confidence that the other side will keep its promises.

Obama’s illegal alien aunt (and campaign donor!) is a deportation fugitive
by Michelle Malkin

Well now.

Turns out Aunti Zeituni Onyango, one of Democrat presidential candidate Barack Obama’s many relatives made famous in his memoir, is an illegal alien. And not just a run-of-the-mill illegal alien on welfare.

She’s one of the hundreds of thousands of deportation fugitives — absconders – whom I’ve been reporting on for the past six years. After 9/11, the government vowed to crack down on absconders. They’ve failed abysmally.

Aunti’s story:

Barack Obama’s aunt, a Kenyan woman who has been quietly living in public housing in Boston, is in the United States illegally after an immigration judge rejected her request for asylum four years ago, The Associated Press has learned.

Zeituni Onyango, 56, referred to as “Aunti Zeituni” in Obama’s memoir, was instructed to leave the United States by a U.S. immigration judge who denied her asylum request, a person familiar with the matter told the AP late Friday. This person spoke on condition of anonymity because no one was authorized to discuss Onyango’s case.

Information about the deportation case was disclosed and confirmed by two separate sources, one of them a federal law enforcment official. The information they made available is known to officials in the federal government, but the AP could not establish whether anyone at a political level in the Bush administration or in the McCain campaign had been involved in its release.

Just you watch: After sitting silent as Joe The Plumber’s records were rummaged by Ohio government employees, the fairweather privacy rights crowd will wake up and start making noise over this.

QUESTION: Will the Obama campaign return the many donations from this illegal alien?

ANSWER: Not bloody likely.

Federal Election Commission records show that Onyango donated at least five times to her nephew’s campaign in July and September. Three of the donations were for $5 each, and two of the donations were for $25. Records compiled by The Huffington Post show she gave a total of $260 to the campaign.

The law:

It shall be unlawful for a foreign national directly or through any other person to make any contribution of money or other thing of value, or to promise expressly or impliedly to make any such contribution, in connection with an election to any political office; or in connection with any primary election, convention, or caucus held to select candidates for any political office; or for any person to solicit, accept, or receive any such contribution from a foreign national.

2 U.S.C. § 441e.

COMMENTS

QUESTION II, from commenter tony4951: “So let me get this straight. Millionaire Obama doesn’t use his wealth to help his poor illegal alien Aunt get out of public housing, but if I complain about Obama wanting to raise my taxes to ’spread the wealth around’ I’m the selfish one?”

Exactly.

Meanwhile, the AP tries to downplay Aunti’s deportation evasion and defiance of a judicial ruling:

Onyango’s refusal to leave the country would represent an administrative, non-criminal violation of U.S. immigration law, meaning such cases are handled outside the criminal court system.

As I’ve pointed out countless times since 9/11, systemic immigration loopholes and deportation failures that have benefited peaceful illegal aliens have also benefited illegal aliens with nefarious intent.

[...]

Lucky for Aunti, the open-borders Bush administration has just issued a special pre-election directive to slow down any deportation efforts that might get her kicked out of the country:

Onyango’s case — coming to light just days before the presidential election — led to an unusual nationwide directive within Immigrations and Customs Enforcement requiring any deportations prior to Tuesday’s election to be approved at least at the level of ICE regional directors, the U.S. law enforcement official told the AP.

The unusual directive suggests that the Bush administration is sensitive to the political implications of Onyango’s case coming to light so close to the election.

Lucky for Aunti, both presidential candidates support shamnesty in one form or another.

Lucky for Aunti, the deportation abyss has not been repaired.

Lucky for Aunti, the congressional practice of creating “special relief” bills to help individual deportation fugitives escape punishment and get rewarded with citizenship is alive and well.

And lucky for Aunti, anyone who thinks she should face the music and get the boot is considered a “hater” and a “xenophobe” and a RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACIST.

Lucky for Aunti, she can always take up shelter in a sanctuary-offering, rule-of-law defying church.

And guess where a left-wing church has openly broken the law and taken in illegal aliens?

Yeah. That’s right: Chicago.

***

Via cjburch, this commenter sums it all up: “Obama’s aunt is here ILLEGALLY living in poverty, and is a deportation FUGITIVE. She’s collecting WELFARE and has DONATED to Obama’s campaign, ILLEGALLY! Obama. Family in poverty as he makes millions. Complete lawlessness. Give away your hard earned tax payer money to illegal fugitives. CHANGE WE CAN BELIEVE IN.”

Good questions:

Did someone from the campaign tell her to keep quiet?

Why was BHO letting her illegally redistribute her wealth to him, when he could have been helping her by getting her an immigration lawyer? If BHO had gotten her a lawyer, could they have appealed? Why then didn’t BHO help her out? When is he going to introduce an emergency private relief bill to give her a green card?

Do Border Enforcement Activists Create Hateful Atmosphere for Immigrants?

Even the strongest border enforcement advocates were aghast when drunken East Coast teenagers beat an Ecuadorian man to death recently. Here, NumbersUSA founder and indefatiguable border enforcement activist Roy Beck addresses the killing and denounces hateful language directed against immigrants, including illegal immigrants.

The New York Times took the advantage of the outrageous murder to renew attacks on Suffolk County (Long Island) chief executive Steve Levy, a Democrat who has taken aggressive enforcement action against illegal immigration. Beck addresses this as well.

Horrendous Murder of Ecuadorian Man on Long Island Reminds Why We Say NO TO IMMIGRANT-BASHING Language
by Roy Beck

Considerable national media attention is being given to a disgusting murder of an Ecuadorian man in Long Island, New York, allegedly by a group of seven teenagers who in the middle of a drinking binge decided to go "beat up a Mexican."

My guess is that these teenagers are opportunistic thugs who would have found somebody else to beat up if they hadn't had some animus toward Latin Americans.

But it is incumbent on all of us who fight for lower immigration to emphasize the importance of not allowing our language about the problems of immigration policies to stir up hatred, and especially not violence, against immigrants or people who may look like immigrants.

WE SHOULD WATCH OUR LANGUAGE
Perhaps predictably, the open-borders groups have politicized this tragedy and are trying to use it to suggest that those of us who want lower overall immigration should keep our mouths shut -- or be muzzled.

With the New York Times editorial board serving as their most prominent mouthpiece, the pro-illegal-immigration crowd is saying that the blame for this murder lies with people on our side who have stirred up hate toward Latinos.

Their exploitation of this atrocity is distasteful and aggravating. But I feel the first priority for us at NumbersUSA is to make sure that we in the immigration-reduction movement are clear about the issues of language -- and the importance of not inciting inadvertent hostility and even violence against immigrants, illegal aliens or U.S. citizens who appear of foreign origin.

In fact, this has always been a priority for NumbersUSA.

Soon after NumbersUSA started its website in 1996, we ran a prominent link called NO TO IMMIGRANT BASHING. My book published by W.W. Norton & Co. (NY 1996) had a section with the same message.

Earlier that year, I produced a video (now seen by more than 7 million people) that began with an admonition that if immigration makes you angry, don't get angry at immigrants, or even illegal aliens. Rather, the video admonishes people to direct their ire at policy makers who won't protect American workers and families or restore the rule of law in immigration matters.

Our point has always been that immigration NUMBERS are too high and create economic injustice, loss of individual liberty and make environmental sustainability impossible. It is the NUMBERS, not the character or characteristic of the foreign citizens who move here that causes problems.

Of course, no legitimate member of our movement wishes physical harm on illegal aliens or immigrants. But it is easy for people to make unguarded comments in the heat of frustration that reflect badly on all people of a certain ethnic origin. It is these unguarded comments that draw the attention of pro-illegal-immigration groups who claim that they fan hate and violence.

My sense is that this concern about language is blown out of proportion, but language DOES matter. The majority of Americans follow Jesus who radically taught that expressing hateful words is tantamount to murder. My own interpretation is that Jesus didn't mean that hateful words are just as bad as murder, but that the origins of murder lie in first having hateful thoughts and expressing hateful words. And we never know how our words might influence somebody else of less stable mind, emotion and character.

We at NumbersUSA have always gone overboard on this, and we have often been harshly criticized for our unwillingness to deal with problems from immigration that rise from significant differences in the culture of the immigrants.

While we are not saying that all characteristics concerns are illegitimate, we have tended to avoid even mentioning ethnicity and national origin. To whatever degree cultural and origin issues may be real, we believe they will be resolved if we get the NUMBERS down to where they no longer contribute to economic injustice and environmental/quality-of-life deterioration.

A great benefit of this kind of carefulness in language is that we can be assured that we never contribute to a climate that could possibly breed the immoral cesspool in which the murderers of Marcelo Lucero apparently swam.

I know that every one of us who reads the story of what happened on Saturday night, Nov. 8, can put ourselves into his shoes and imagine the horror and indignity of his last minutes. This was truly a breakdown of a civil society, an orderly society and the rule of law.

NY TIMES FALSELY BLAMES COUNTY CHIEF STEVE LEVY
Words have consequences. Steve Levy, the Suffolk County executive, is learning that the hard way during a horrible week. ... Mr. Levy's past harsh words and actions against undocumented workers have now left him cornered with a tragically limited ability to lead the county in confronting a brutal act that surely pains him as much as anyone.

For years, the New York Times editorial board has conducted a vendetta against Steve Levy. I have always suspected that the level of vehemence against him by the Times, many other journalists and pro-illegal-immigration groups is rooted in the fact that Mr. Levy is a Democrat.

Because so many of his critics are Democrats, they are outraged that he continues to show what it is like for a Democratic official to be true to some of the best principles of the Democratic Party, such as real concern for vulnerable American workers -- in their jobs, their communities and their schools.

Immigrant advocates assailed him for having poisoned the atmosphere. Some called for his resignation.

To these critics, Suffolk Executive Levy has created a climate of hostility against all Latinos in his county because he has worked for Attrition Through Enforcement -- not against Latinos but against illegal aliens (who happen to come from every country on the planet).

The Times and others continue to slur Latino Americans by equating Latinos and illegal aliens. But Levy knows that most Latinos in his county are NOT illegal. He knows that they probably benefit more from his anti-illegal efforts than anybody.

But the New York Times sees only horribly sinister motives and outcomes to Levy's assertive efforts:

Local lawmakers often complain about immigration, but Mr. Levy went much farther than most. He founded a national organization to lobby for crackdowns. He went on "Lou Dobbs." He tried to deputize county police to make immigration arrests and to rid the county work force of employees without papers. He sought to drive day laborers from local streets, yet rigidly opposed efforts to create hiring sites.

Oh, my gosh, Levy committed the unpardonable sin of actually DOING something and not just mouthing platitudes.

Everything the Times cites as fanatical is a perfectly legal and common tool available to protect American workers and communities from out-of-control immigration. With the official unemployment rate of perfectly legal Hispanic Americans much higher than other Americans, Levy's efforts to keep Suffolk County employers from having an illegal workforce stand to be of most benefit to the Hispanic Americans under his jurisdiction.

ABC News called me this afternoon for comments about Levy.

I said I thought he had probably done more than anybody else on Long Island to reduce bad feelings toward Latinos.

We see in every continent that when citizens feel that immigration numbers are overwhelming them, some develop very negative feelings toward the immigrants. When their government understands this and takes action through lawful channels and trained personnel to reduce the flow and the tensions, the legal immigrants and ethnic minorities are protected.

That is what Steve Levy has been trying to do, although his state's U.S. Senators and the federal Administration has done litte to support him.

Repeatedly in Europe, we have seen what happens when those in power refuse to protect their citizens from out-of-control immigration. The backlash often is ugly and violent. The foreign-born victims never deserve what happens to them. But the villains -- other than the direct perpetrators -- are not those who have tried to restore immigration sanity (like Steve Levy) but those who have allowed the rule of law to disintegrate so that the weakest and lowest-character citizens, in their dark-soul ways of thinking, come to believe they have justification for their foul deeds.

If the New York Times wants to point fingers at politicians who contributed to a killing climate, they might want to point at the Members of Congress in their state who get the F's and D's on our grade cards for refusing to hold accountable the illegal cheap-labor importation industries.

ROY BECK is Founder & CEO of NumbersUSA.

Viet Dinh Addresses National Security Symposium at Regent University

Georgetown professor Viet Dinh delivered a scathing review of the Supreme Court's truculent recent jurisprudence regarding rights of enemy combatants detained by U.S. military forces outside the U.S., whether in Iraq or Guantanamo.

Dinh said the Court's recent decisions have gone beyond judicial supremacy, beyond even judicial triumphalism, to something worse - judicial exclusivism, in which the legislative and executive roles have been reduced to the decision whether or not to suspend the right of habeas corpus.

Dinh notes that the current state of the law, which Chief Justice Roberts has described as "Constitutional bait-and-switch," grants more rights to enemy combatants than to Haitian refugee applicants and, indeed, to U.S. military personnel.

He says it is a result of Constitutional brinksmanship in which a majority of the Court has shown disdain for the Constitutional roles of Congress and the Executive roles in the War on Terror.

Tancredo Proposes Legal Firewall Against British-style Sharia

One wonders how long it would take the 9th Circuit, the federal appeals court that prevented the deportation of a Jamaican homosexual criminal child seducer, to invalidate the law proposed by Rep. Tancredo here. If Congress wants to enact a measure that will withstand the opposition of adversaries with lifetime appointments, it must be accompanied by a very clear statutory exclusion of federal judiciary jurisdiction.

Tancredo Proposes Anti-Sharia Measure in Wake of U.K. Certification of Islamic Courts

“Jihad Prevention Act” would deny U.S. visas to advocates of ‘Sharia’ law, expel Islamists already here

WASHINGTON, DC – Amid disturbing revelations that the verdicts of Islamic Sharia courts are now legally binding in civil cases in the United Kingdom, U.S. Representative Tom Tancredo (R-Littleton) moved quickly today to introduce legislation designed to protect the United States from a similar fate.

According to recent news reports, a new network of Sharia courts in a half-dozen major cities in the U.K. have been empowered under British law to adjudicate a wide variety of legal cases ranging from divorces and financial disputes to those involving domestic violence.

“This is a case where truth is truly stranger than fiction,” said Tancredo. “Today the British people are learning a hard lesson about the consequences of massive, unrestricted immigration.”

Sharia law, favored by Muslim extremists around the world, often calls for brutal punishment – such as the stoning of women who are accused of adultery or have children out of wedlock, cutting off the hands of petty thieves and lashings for the casual consumption of alcohol. Under Sharia law, a woman is often required to provide numerous witnesses to prove rape allegations against an assailant – a near impossible task.

“When you have an immigration policy that allows for the importation of millions of radical Muslims, you are also importing their radical ideology – an ideology that is fundamentally hostile to the foundations of western democracy – such as gender equality, pluralism, and individual liberty,” said Tancredo. “The best way to safeguard America against the importation of the destructive effects of this poisonous ideology is to prevent its purveyors from coming here in the first place.”

Tancredo’s bill, dubbed the “Jihad Prevention Act,” would bar the entry of foreign nationals who advocate Sharia law. In addition, the legislation would make the advocacy of Sharia law by radical Muslims already in the United States a deportable offense.

Tancredo pointed to the results of a recent poll conducted by the Centre for Social Cohesion as evidence that the U.S. should act to prevent the situation in Great Britain from replicating itself here in the United States. The poll found that some 40 percent of Muslim students in the United Kingdom support the introduction of Sharia law there, and 33 percent support the imposition of an Islamic Sharia-based government worldwide.

“We need to send a clear message that the only law we recognize here in America is the U.S. Constitution and the laws passed by our democratically elected representatives,” concluded Tancredo. “If you aren’t comfortable with that concept, you aren’t welcome in the United States.”

9th Circuit Halts Deportation of Homosexual Criminal Who Fears Persecution in His Native Jamaica

A federal appeals court has overturned a Board of Immigration Appeals order to deport a 30-year old Jamaican homosexual man after he was convicted of sexual abuse and contributing to the sexual delinquency of a minor.

The three-judge Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals panel held that the U.S. is not entitled to deport Damion Nathanial Bromfield to his native Jamaica, despite his criminal convictions, because of the risk that he might be persecuted.

The U.S. Department of Justice argued that the Ninth Circuit has no jurisdiction over Bromfield's case because he was found removable on the basis of his conviction for an aggravated felony. But the panel cited the Ninth Circuit's own Ramadan v. Gonzales, 479 F.3d 646, 649 (9th Cir. 2007) (per curiam), to justify its intervention on behalf of the foreign man.

The appellate panel's order "will require the (Immigration Judge) to consider the Jamaican law criminalizing homosexual conduct and the frequency with which that law is enforced," in adjudicating his removal, and the removal of any future homosexual criminal who expresses a similar fear of persecution in his homeland.

Circuit Judge Betty B. Fletcher wrote the opinion. Circuit Judge Richard A. Paez also sat on the panel, along with a federal district judge for the Northern District of California, William W. Schwarzer, sitting "by designation."

The full text of the opinion is at http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data2/circs/9th/0575844p.pdf.

What happens when illegal aliens get arrested?

by Chad Groening
OneNewsNow.com

A public-interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption has presented oral arguments in two separate California appellate cases dealing with illegal immigration.

In the first case, Judicial Watch has filed an appeal on behalf of a San Francisco resident, challenging the sanctuary policy of that city's police department. Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton says San Francisco police are prohibited from notifying federal immigration authorities when they arrest a suspected illegal immigrant for a narcotics offense.

"The appellate court heard arguments as to whether or not San Francisco's sanctuary policy should leave it immune from having to follow California state law that requires it to report to Immigration and Customs Enforcement anyone they suspect who's been arrested for narcotics offenses who is not an American citizen," Fitton explains.

The other appeal, according to Fitton, deals with an illegal alien day-labor site in Laguna Beach.

"We filed a lawsuit on behalf of taxpayers who object to tax dollars going to help illegal aliens get illegal jobs in violation of federal law," Fitton adds. "A lower court, unfortunately, didn't really want to address the issue in a way that we found appropriate, so we appealed, and the appellate court heard arguments there, too."

Fitton says California law requires the courts to publish their rulings within 90 days, so they should know something by Christmas.

Immigrant Immortalized in Rosenthal Photo, Iwo Jima Sculpture, Now Naturalized

Fred Edwards wrote Aug. 1 in Military Matters in Review that Czech immigrant Michael Strank, killed in action at Iwo Jima, has been posthumously awarded U.S. citizenship. Strank himself apparently never applied for citizenship before his death at age 25 leading a Marine Corps fire team against the Japanese.

But a fellow Marine serving in the security unit at the U.S. Embassy in the Slovak Republic filed on Strank's behalf last year, and an immigration official presented a certificate of citizenship to Strank's younger sister late last month.

Iwo Jima Flag-raising Hero Becomes an Official American
by Fred Edwards, Military Matters in Review

On July 29, Marine Sgt. Michael Strank was posthumously awarded a certificate of U.S. citizenship. Jonathan Scharfen, acting director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, presented the certificate to Mary Pero, 75, Strank's younger sister.

The ceremony took place in front of the U.S. Marine Corps War Memorial, often called the Iwo Jima Memorial. Sculptor Felix de Weldon crafted it from the famous photograph snapped by Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal Feb. 23,1945.

De Weldon's work reproduced Strank -- and the other five men who raised the flag -- so meticulously that you can see their grime and smell their sweat. Strank, or Sergeant Mike, as his men called him, was the third from the left in the photo, and was barely visible.

Two of the six men would live to walk off the island. A third man would be carried off with shrapnel wounds. The other three would be buried in the sands of Iwo. This reflects the same casualty rate of the invading forces: during 36 days of fighting, the United States suffered almost 26,000 casualties, nearly 7,000 of them killed. Only one of every three who hit the beach left the island unscathed.

Until this year, the Marines listed Strank's birthplace as Pennsylvania. According to Scharfen, a Marine security guard at the American Embassy in the Slovak Republic was researching Strank's background and found no record that he was a U.S. citizen. So he filed an application for posthumous naturalization.

So who was Michael Strank? In "Flags of Our Fathers," James Bradley fills in details from interviews of Strank's family, friends, and fellow Marines.

He was born Michal Strenk on the Marine Corps birthday, Nov. 10, 1919, in Jarabenia, Czechoslovakia. His father, Vasil, emigrated to the United States in 1920 and changed his name to Strank. Vasil worked in the Pennsylvania mines for three years, and saved enough money to bring his wife and 3-year-old son to America.

In 1935, he became a naturalized American citizen, but son Mike never received a certificate. When Mike sailed for Iwo Jima, he was a 25-year-old sergeant and combat veteran of the Pavuvu and Bougainville island campaigns. He shunned the sergeants' mess and ate with his troops, who he called "his boys."

His company commander had recommended him for platoon sergeant, but he refused, saying, "I promised my boys I'd be there for them."

Indeed he had promised. Often he would tell his squad, "Follow me, and I'll try to bring all of you back safely to your mothers."

Joe Rodriguez, a member of one of the three fire teams Mike led as squad leader, said "Everybody idolized Mike. He was a born leader, a natural leader, and a leader by example."

After Bougainville, Mike was exhausted from combat and couldn't shake a case of malaria, so he was sent home on leave to recover. He also couldn't shake the feeling that he had used up his share of survivability. One evening when he was out to say goodbye to friends Mike and Eva Slazich, he told them, "I doubt if I'll ever see you again. I don't think I'll be coming back."

He let slip his premonition to his family, and his father pleaded with him to seek a stateside assignment. Mike replied, "Dad, there's a war going on out there. Young boys are fighting that war. And Dad . . . they need my help." So he went to Iwo Jima with his boys.

Bradley describes the aftermath of the flag-raising as follows: Mike and a group of Marines had come under Japanese sniper fire, and he pulled them into an outcropping that was protected from all sides except the sea. He was drawing a diagram in the sand of the tactics they would use to break out when a shell "tore a hole in his chest and ripped out his heart."

Many accounts describe it simply as an artillery shell, and some describe it as an "enemy" shell. Bradley, on the other hand, states: "Almost certainly,the round had come from a U.S. destroyer offshore; it sliced through the only unprotected side of the outcropping. The Czech immigrant to America, born on the Marine Corps birthday, serving his third tour of duty for his adopted country, the sergeant who was a friend to his boys, was cut down by friendly fire."

No matter the source of the shell, Sergeant Mike died as a combat leader. He was a Marine's Marine. Now he's an official American. Semper Fidelis.

Fred Edwards is a journalist and a military columnist. To see his bio and archived columns, visit http://www.milmat.net