Free Republic

U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel in San Diego sided Tuesday with the Homeland Security Department, which asserted authority under federal immigration law to waive compliance with environmental protection statutes because 14 miles of existing fencing near San Diego is "no longer optimal for border patrol operations." The government argued in court papers that the law allowing it to sidestep environmental reviews "has been repeatedly upheld in the face of legal challenges." California and environmental advocacy groups claimed in court filings that the 1996 immigration law is unconstitutional. They also alleged that a lack of environmental reviews would imperil endangered species...

The judge whom President Trump once attacked for his Mexican heritage has ruled in favor of the administration in a lawsuit attempting to block Trump's porposed wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel, whose parents immigrated from Mexico, ruled Tuesday against a legal challenge to the wall over environment waivers granted by the Department of Homeland Security. The ruling means that the administration will be able to continue waiving the regulations to build barriers on the border. Trump had targeted Curiel during the 2016 presidential race, claiming the judge might be biased against him in a lawsuit...

Hungary built a wall…and the EU is going to pay for it! That is if Victor Orbán has anything to say about it. Orbán is Europe’s Donald Trump, hated by Europe’s borderless Leftists just like Trump is by open border apostles here. Orbán built a wall on Hungary’s border to keep the barbarians at the gate while all around him screamed that illegal migration is a human right. And now he wants the EU – who necessitated the wall with their insane policies - to pay for it, which of course they won’t; but at least Hungry is no longer...

The federal government began work Wednesday on replacing border wall in California, the first wall contract awarded in the Trump administration outside of eight prototypes that were built last year in San Diego. Customs and Border Protection is replacing a little more than 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) in downtown Calexico, a sliver of the president's plan for a "big, beautiful wall" with Mexico. A barrier built in the 1990s from recycled metal scraps and landing mat will be torn down for bollard-style barriers that are 30 feet (9.1 meters) high, significantly taller than existing walls.

Two Mexican opposition candidates on Sunday vowed to take a tougher line against U.S. President Donald Trump’s border wall, at events where they were selected by their parties to seek the presidency in a July 1 election. Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, 64, of the leftist Morena party holds a double-digit lead in recent polls although right-left coalition leader Ricardo Anaya has recently gained traction. Former finance minister Jose Antonio Meade, 48, nominated on Sunday by the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), trails behind Lopez Obrador by as much as 20 points. Lopez Obrador told several hundred Morena supporters gathered at...

A local official in Hidalgo, Texas, cajoled company executives to hire a firm owned by his family in exchange for a cut of lucrative construction contracts, an investigation from ProPublica and The Texas Tribune found. Claims against that official and his family were made last year in a lawsuit by the county. The kickback scheme started during a discussion at a steakhouse near the US-Mexico border in Texas. The kickback scheme was allegedly hashed out over weeknight drinks at a steakhouse in a border county in south Texas. Amid surf and turf and expensive scotch, a Hidalgo County official said...

Just in case any of our elected representatives didn’t notice, we’re going to run out of money (again) in a few days. As you may recall, the largest sticking point in the recent edition of Shutdown Theater was the lack of an agreement on a DACA bill. As Ed mentioned earlier, there is a new proposal to get Congress moving on settling the matter and it’s coming in the form of a bipartisan, gang-style arrangement between Senators John McCain and Chris Coons. The details remain a bit sketchy, but the Washington Post has what little we know about it so...

The Border Patrol announced its third arrest of an illegal immigrant “Dreamer” on smuggling charges this week, saying agents nabbed a 26-year-old man who had picked up four illegal immigrants who just snuck into the U.S. from Mexico. Agents said they spotted the four men’s footprints and radioed to other agents who spotted the four getting into a pickup truck in a nearby citrus grove. After stopping the truck, they discovered the driver was in the U.S. under protection of the Obama-era DACA deportation amnesty. On Monday, the Border Patrol announced arrests of two other Dreamers in California for separate...

Democrats said President Trump will be under pressure Tuesday to prove he can actually forge bipartisanship in Washington, after a year in which they said he tacked to the right, shunning opportunities they gave him to work across party lines. Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer said that from judicial picks to health care to the tax-cut bill, Mr. Trump has tilted to the right — and for the most part hasn’t even sought Democrats’ input.

Homeland Security will demand more information from applicants from high-risk countries before accepting them as refugees, Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen announced Monday as she defended President Trump’s steps on immigration and visitor screening. Ms. Nielsen also highlighted a recent report that found the government weeds out an average of seven travelers each day — 50 a week — who are on the terrorist watch-list yet still try to enter the U.S.

Democratic Majority Leader denounced the White House’s new amnesty offer as inadequate, just one day after he said had endorsed a border wall because it won’t be built. Schumer’s conditional rejection of the new White House amnesty giveaway is muted and suggests that Schumer and his allies expect to pressure GOP Senators into yet more concessions. Dan Horowitz, editor of Conservative Review, says Democrats will feign opposition to the amnesty to encourage further negotiations and concessions from uninformed and confrontation-averse GOP legislators. “They will have plenty of messaging about noble ‘dreamers,’ improving ‘border security’ … Schumer is very familiar with...

The Democrats' crusade to force a government shutdown in order to win permanent protections for "Dreamers" went down in flames Monday. The price extracted by Democrats was meager compared to what they wanted. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) merely agreed to allow a floor debate on immigration (which McConnell said he'd have done anyway). But this compromise does guarantee that we will now get a "clean" immigration debate, and therein lies an opportunity for a big win -- though President Trump may not like it. Last week, White House Chief of Staff John Kelly reportedly angered the president in...

The Trump administration is waiving more than 30 environmental rules to accelerate the construction of President Trump's proposed border wall in New Mexico, forcing environmental groups to consider another round of lawsuits.The Department of Homeland Security published a notice Monday that said the waiver was necessary to ensure the "expeditious construction of barriers" near the Santa Teresa Land Port of Entry. "The Secretary of Homeland Security has determined, pursuant to law, that it is necessary to waive certain laws, regulations and other legal requirements in order to ensure the expeditious construction of barriers and roads in the vicinity of the...

Now that Democrats have fled from their ill-fated Schumer Shutdown, tail between their legs, attention now shifts to the ongoing talks over a possible DACA agreement on immigration.  Lawmakers find themselves up against two deadlines: (1) The March cutoff established by the Trump administration after the president announced his cancellation of his predecessor's legally-dubious executive amnesty, and (2) the February 8 time limit just set by Mitch McConnell, after which he'll move to the introduction of bills and amendments on various legislative solutions to the DREAMer situation.  As various 'gangs' and working groups on Capitol Hill power through their negotiations, it's...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — The Trump administration announced Monday it was preparing to replace existing vehicle barriers along a stretch of the U.S.-Mexico border in New Mexico that officials call “an area of high illegal entry.” The notice published in the Federal Register said the area extends around 20 miles (32 kilometers) west of the Santa Teresa Port of Entry. According to the notice, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security will replace the existing barriers with bollard walls to deter and prevent illegal crossings. Bollard walls are made up of sturdy, vertical posts that are spaced to provide visibility to the...

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said the Republican-led Congress should offer a path to citizenship for DREAMers now and pass a bill that deals with border security and “chain migration later” in exchange for granting “amnesty” to all undocumented immigrants. Rather than waiting until Congress can agree on some sort of comprehensive immigration package, conservatives in Congress have argued that any deal granting legal status to “Dreamers,” called so in reference to the DREAM Act, should be tied to additional border security measures, such as funding for the border wall and legislative language that prevents “chain migration,” or family reunification, in...

Military special forces based in Florida and U.S. Customs and Border Protection special units three weeks trying to breach and scale the eight models in San Diego, using jackhammers, saws, torches and other tools and climbing devices, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the information was not authorized for public release. The report recommends combining elements of each, depending on the terrain. The official likened it to a Lego design, pulling pieces from different prototypes.

When charges of “racism” and “xenophobia” fail, Democrats’ fallback argument against President Trump’s proposed border wall is that it simply “won’t work,” so why waste billions building it? Tell that to the residents of El Paso, Texas. . . . snip And crime abated with the reduced human traffic from Juarez, considered one of the most dangerous places in the world due to drug-cartel violence, helping El Paso become one of the safest large cities in America.

America can't be great again if America is going to slip beneath the waves of a migration tsunami. This is a plea to President Trump to stand by his promises and avoid the amnesty trap that the Progressives are trying to lure him into. Instead lead the congressional forces of those who want to make America great again. Use every tool, every power you have to enact the following: 1. Ending chain migration and the visa lottery 2. Mandating employer use of E-Verify 3. Construction of a southern border wall

The tricks of the multibillion-dollar drug business include using drones, submarines, ultralight planes and even frozen sharks to transport product across the US-Mexico border. Just consider that in 2016, US Customs and Border Protection Air and Marine Operations agents attempted to seize a submarine in the Pacific Ocean with nearly $194 million worth of cocaine. And yet President Trump argues that his proposed border wall, a throwback to a bygone era, will "stop much of the drugs from pouring into this country and poisoning our youth."