Hey, there! Log in / Register
Transit Police say they're not doing ICE's dirty work
By adamg on Thu, 02/23/2017 - 10:18pm
Those pre-faregate inspections are just the same old anti-terrorism checkpoints they've done for years and have nothing to do with ICE, Transit Police tweet tonight:
Transit Police officers do NOT enforce Federal Immigration laws. We are here to serve EVERYONE.
Security Inspection Program has nothing to do w/immigration laws/enforcement. Counterterrorism layer only.
Topics:
Free tagging:
Ad:
Support Universal Hub
Help keep Universal Hub going. If you like what we're up to and want to help out, please consider a (completely non-deductible) contribution.
Comments
Why would they send this message?
I hope our borders are better protected then our fare gates.
Because people are starting to freak out
Lot of rumors going around these days.
Re: Because people are starting to freak out
People are starting to freak out? Only those here illegally, now committing new crimes, should be nervous. President Trump has embraced legal immigration. I believe his initial deportation focus is on CRIMINAL illegals, those who broke the law coming here illegally who then began committing even more crimes. It's long past time that they
freakself-deport out. If Governor Baker allows the Transit Police to become a sanctuary police department, I can assure you that the local police in the 78+ cities and towns will be making the arrests at those train and bus stops, like we did before the MBTA Police was invented as a ragtime dozen officers in the 70s.Rumors? The fake news promoted by the media, "mass deportations," "Trump's Golden Showers on Russian beds used by Bill Clinton," "Russians hacking the election," "MLK bust removed from Oval Office" might cause those here illegally, who have committed no other crimes, to be confused and freak out. During the end of his tenure, even President Obama was boasting of his increased deportations. Illegal aliens should rest assured, that by going home and getting in line for the vetting process, they have a chance. Cutting the line is not the American way.
Yawn
Just go away..
Re: Just go away
Cybah, I agree. Those here illegally who begin committing new crimes should go away. I think the polls vary between 60% and 80% of U.S. citizens who share our view. God Bless President Trump!
No
YOU just go away.. enough with your "illegals" drivel that you continue to spew. We don't care.
Aren't there some paint chips you need to munch on?
Deleaded
Sorry cybah, the paint chips aren't as tasty since the windowsills were de-leaded. I'm not sure if it was Mayor Kevin White or Mayor Ray Flynn, but Boston Housing had me remove the lead paint from all of my rentals years ago. While they were at it, I had them remove the lead paint from my own home too. Federal grant. Nice.
Federal grant?
Were your bootstraps missing back then? Oh, and the golden showers in a Russian bed took place where OBAMA had slept. Get you fake news right, you typically nail disinformation. SAD!
Can we not at least reach a
Cybah, can people at least reach a level of disagreement instead of just denouncing them? Newsflash, not everyone is going to agree with you. Some people care about enforcing immigration laws other do not. People living in a liberal or conservative bubble were they can only tolerate like minded opinions, benefits no one.
Newsflash
I don't care..
having a different politcal ideology regarding
whether or not people are treated as humans doesnt mean you are immune from criticism, or from people thinking you're a dirtbag.
plenty of ppl think im a dirtbag here.
ps
theyre right
Dude could you at least be
Dude could you at least be more interesting when u troll, please? It's like you used to try and then Trump won and now you're just coasting. 3/10 for making me reply but Christ, this is some low quality bait and you need to step up your game.
hmm yes
only the illegals should be worried, not any of the legal visa/greencard/permanent residents that have had issues returning to the place they call home.
Why do you care?
One thing that should be clarified is that the security theater can not demand fingerprints. At least not yet. Courts have stated that they may inspect baggage only. I know from experience that they will try to inspect a person with an explosive sniffing dog on the day I disallowed them from inspecting my backpack. And why did I disallow them? Because I have that choice (for now).
So the whole business of T as "sanctuary police" (coining a new term?) is bogus.
But what I wonder is why do you care? How have immigrants as a group - legal or illegal - caused you harm? Why put so much energy into this issue when there are far greater issues at play? Such as:
1) our continued cultivation of a culture of violence. Not the one just of gangs today but the culture of violence that has always been part of the U.S. as it turned murderers such as early gangsters (white) and now contemporary gangsters (all colors) into figures that should be emulated?
2) creation of a prison subculture. Where too many people wind up with CORIs that affect their ability to earn a decent income.
3) inner city - all colors - subcultures where women are the only adult, where income is low and where the factors needed to provide kids with solid psychologically healthy environments are not present (contributing to the culture of violence and prisons). Kids growing up in cities need the same communal supports the kids in wealthier areas get. If those supports are not in the home then they need to be found somewhere. The only possible place is schools since that is where kids encounter the same environments everyday. But if schools are gutted of all but the three Rs, common core or whatever the new name, then the schools are just educational factories that produce human widgets in the name of education.
But instead of focusing on these issues that really are hurting our nation we, as though acting out a societal obsessive-compulsive disorder- ignore everything else and focus on a comparatively minor issue.
What has come down as maxim that is so often true in its application even if it never happened:
Nero fiddles while Rome burns.
How about your thoughts on this...
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/undocumented-woman-brain-tumor-...
Ya know, Fishy, I do not know what drives you. Aside from the fact that illegals do very little crime:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/26/us/trump-illegal-immigrants-crime.htm...
Your comments are always so far off the bank, I don't even know where to begin.
Yes, there is much "fake" news out there; much of it created by Trump and his administration. He is a crap master; he spews out calculated crap to be soaked up by folks like yourself.
I really feel sorry for you.
My wife & I are both
My wife & I are both naturalized citizens (and by the way, I bet we're both contributing more to society than you are). My in-laws are here on a legally-applied, legally-acquired, and well-paid-for green card. Do you know how long it takes and how expensive it is to go through that process? They go back to visit now and then - while they are not from one of the 7 countries that were affected by Trump's rushed immigration ban, EVERYONE in our family is now concerned that they will be hassled or, worse, barred entry during one of their trips.
So with that said - you can piss off with your "only illegal immigrants should be afraid" and "fake news" claims.
same here
I've had an FBI file since at least 16, when I got my green card - fingerprinted and background checks, interviews, the whole works. All visa and green card holders go through a lot to get their status and face deportation if they commit crimes under current laws (visas and green cards can be withdrawn for committing felonies and some misdemeanors). My family was vetted thoroughly to get that card - it's time consuming and expensive, especially if you have to hire a lawyer for the process.
I managed to get naturalized as an adult without having to get a lawyer (I was cheap - figured I'd get one if I ran into a roadblock and didn't end up needing to) but I'm also a white professional from Canada so I had an easier process (but they don't profile .... really. it's just a coincidence I got mine 8x faster than a coworker who is from Jamaica).
I probably wouldn't be stopped at the border now as either a green card holder or naturalized citizen because I don't fit the profiling they claim they're not doing (Muslims can be palefaced like me) but saying it's ok to do it to them because of a fake perceived threat (there's hundreds of millions of Muslims world wide - less than 0.001% are terrorists) is saying it's ok to do it to me - we all followed the same rules and are supposed to have the same rights. Excusing an attack on those rights for a subgroup is tantamount to saying eventually, you can do it to all visa holders, green card holders, and naturalized citizens. Trump is the one breaking the law - the courts have said so.
The immigration "line" is a popular myth
For most people who want to become Americans, there simply is no legal process for them to do so. There's no line for them to get into, let alone "cut".
There is so much wrong with what you wrote.
On the surface, the statement
is just wrong. People who migrate to the United States as Resident Aliens can, after a term of residence, apply to become citizens. Read all about it here.
But let's just say you meant that there is no legal process to legally migrate to the United States. Well, there are several ways, but the most popular is getting permanent residence status, commonly referred to as "getting a Green Card," even though the cards are not green. The Department of Homeland Security even has a whole webpage dedicated to getting a Green Card. The most recent Yearbook of Immigration Statistics even has statistics on how people got their Green Cards. For those too lazy to look, of the roughly one million Green Cards issued, about 3/4 got theirs through family sponsorships, while the "Diversity Lottery" was responsible for about 47,000 admissions. The remained was split between employee sponsored admissions and refugees (about 150,000 each.)
The whole world might want to move to America (because we are the greatest nation on the planet, I guess), but we can't hold them all. But to say there is no system is wrong.
Ubermonkey is right
More precisely, the legal process is inaccessible to most Mexicans.
Do you know anyone from Mexico? It's virtually impossible to get a legal visa to the US.
https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/why-don’t-they-just-get-line
Go to my statistics link
And click on Table 3.
In 2015 (the most recent year data is available) 158,619 Mexicans received permanent resident status, which is roughly 15% of the Green Cards doled out. That is more than were given to people from India and China, who together account for about a quarter of the world's population, combined.
But yeah, there is no process to come to the US legally, especially for Mexicans.
Oh, and one more table
Table 32 has the nonresident temporary worker admissions. In 2015, 771,598 Mexicans availed themselves of those, though by their nature those are one off visas, so if 771,598 used them in 2016, there would probably be a lot of repeat visa holders.
And look, I'm not saying the immigration process isn't broken. It is, in several ways, both in favor and against those unlawfully here, but let's not pretend that the border is closed.
"Only those here illegally,
"Only those here illegally, now committing new crimes, should be nervous"
This is how we know you're white. This is how we know you do not have to worry that you will be stopped on your way to work and delayed 4 hours until you can prove your citizenship.
When exactly
Did that happen?
Google it
Note that a former GOVERNOR of Arizona was detained outside for hours despite being very elderly, so that he could prove that he was here legally.
Former Governor detained
So I Googled it. This former governor was indeed detained in the heat. This happened in 2012.
Being a citizen is not enough
The US Keeps Mistakenly Deporting Its Own Citizens
Okay, prove that you're a
Okay, prove that you're a citizen and not some illegal. On demand on a randomly selected day of your morning commute. Do you carry your birth certificate with you? Or your passport? Oh, you don't? I guess we'll have to detain you until we figure out if you're a threat to national security or not.
Anyone with a slight tan should be nervous
Do you not read the news? They're detaining people with valid visas, green card holders, naturalized Americans, and Americans by birth. The only common theme is they "look" Muslim. They held an American citizen at the border and forced him to unlock his phone so they could copy the data on it - his NASA PHONE WITH NASA DATA. They held people from leaving a DOMESTIC flight from SF to NYC last night, forcing them to show their papers before letting them off. Like the Gestapo did.
Regardless of how you feel about immigrants, documented or otherwise, our state and municipal police forces, DMV, etc shouldn't be doing unmandated and unfunded work for a federal agency. They have always detained people who broke the law (state and local) but to be asked to detain people because it is now their responsibility, not Homeland Security, to check their papers FOR FREE robs the city of Boston and the State of Massachusetts of their budgets just to terrorize people.
Indeed
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/02/24/muhammad-ali-jr...
The son and fist wife of Muhammad Ali were detained after returning from a speaking engagement in Jamaica.
There was a tweet
A passerby at State Street sent out a tweet (that was retweeted by Adam) yesterday, in which she took a picture of one of these checkpoints and claimed that ICE agents were "asking random passerby for fingerprints". The tweet has since been deleted, but you can see why that might cause significant concern among the community, and why TPD would want to dispel the rumor.
Well
If you're going to believe every random tweet you read, you deserve to be scared. Get a grip.
Fear, uncertainty, disinformation
It doesn't matter what the transit police say or do. Trump has created so much fear and spread so much disinformation that immigrants won't go to the police for any reason. When you have a large class of people avoiding all authorities we as a society are less safe. It opens people up to blackmail and abuse and reduces the likelihood of riders coming to the help of one another.
Law
If you're here legally there's nothing to worry about.
Tell that to those green card holders
You know, the ones who were detained returning to the US?
You are an idiot.
Oh, and what about the NATURALIZED CITIZEN who applied for a passport and ended up with ICE demanding his green card?
You are an idiot.
So, this guy had "nothing to worry about"?
He was detained and threatened with deportation despite being born a US citizen.
http://www.nbcchicago.com/news/local/eduardo-caraballo-puerto-rico-depor...
I guess the people who threatened to deport him to Puerto Rico were as daft as you are?
Trump has created so much
Maybe they will get so fearful they will leave the country. That would be terrible!
Re: Fear, uncertainty, disinformation
Trust me, the illegal immigrant community is not a wealth of information on most crimes. Those rare illegals who volunteer to testify are well protected.
To suggest that enforcing current immigration laws, advocated by President Clinton and President Obama, will result in scaring informants, is laughable.
As for the anonymous Transit Police post, will the Chief of Transit Police put his name on that? Are the T Police now ordered to not cooperate with ICE when an illegal alien, arrested for a new crime is arrested on the T? That is scandalous. Again, the local police, State and even the Environmental Police have full jurisdiction at all MBTA property. "Tall Deval" Baker should announce whether the troopers and EPO's can work with ICE if the the Transit police are told to stand down. City and town officers will patrol the T, as they always have, without State House interference. All officers should rest on their oath to enforce the law.
I'm not an attorney but those lawyers who represent our police will make a fortune if any law enforcement officer is disciplined for enforcing the law.
Trust you?
hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
No we don't want to trust you. We want you to just to go away.
cybah, I asked you to trust me on the Trump win
cybah, I'm not sure why you hate, although I have studied the Kübler-Ross model and anger is a stage. I believe you are there. God Bless you. I asked this forum to trust me on a Trump landslide as early as last summer and was scoffed at then too. Oh well.
a trump landslide
an interesting way to view the guy that lost the popular vote, really, no matter what your politics are.
Trump Landslide
Trump 306
Clinton 232
Sorry :(
Now for your followup
Your tortured explanation of why neither of Obama's victories was a landslide
dont apologize to me
i didnt vote for hillary, i just don't live in a fantasy world.
304
Update your talking points please.
Ya might want to go back and
do more research on "lack of empathy".
(And, for cripes sake, he did not win by a landslide. Good. God. More spewing of crap from the Trumplets). And you talk about fake news. Put your money where you incorrect mouth is and stop spewing it to the rest of us.)
A landslide? It all came down
A landslide? It all came down to 70 thousand people in 3 states deciding how millions of people's lives will be affected. Funny how conservatives are totally blind to that fact, yet keep screaming at the top of their lungs that 'coastal elites' shouldn't be deciding for middle America. Then again, hypocrisy has always been your strong suit.
Arresting poeople who are committing a crime is their job
and always has been. What they are saying they won't do is stop EVERYONE and ask for their documentation and arrest people on that basis only. It's not efficient, they aren't responsible for doing ICE's job, and they aren't being paid to do their job - doing ICE's work for them for free will keep them from doing their job, it's that simple.
Fear perpetuated by a biased
Fear perpetuated by a biased media who promotes narratives versus reporting facts?
Trump has created so much
Much of the fear and hysteria today is being generated and reinforced from the left. The tweet about fingerprints is an example of that.
Careful with that kool-aid
Reporting actual facts about what the terrorchimps in DC are doing to our constitutional rights is not fearmongering.
It is called reporting reality.
The reality is frightful, not the reporting.
Remove the reporting and the reality of pissing and shitting all over our constitution and rule of law while commiting treason will still be frightening.
Not that you understand reality much, anyway.
Gasp...
Oh the horror of actually enforcing existing laws legally passed by our legislators...
My *legal*-immigrant co
My *legal*-immigrant co-worker believes in the rule of law and so has no use for the illegal immigrants.
Shame on him, I suppose, hm?
See below for non-responses to my comment that are close cousins to ad hominem speech.
Not seeing them
Not seeing any "non-responses."
Yeah well let us know when
Yeah well let us know when your legal coworker is willing to pick fruit, scrub dishes, and wipe elderly butts for minimum wage or below. You know, those hard, dirty, necessary jobs he has no use for but make civilization go regardless.
The thing about smug responses such as yours
(Go ahead, get upset about me using a cousin to ad-hominem there; but that's exactly what your reply was: smug).
...is that it seems to assume that every immigrant is on a level playing field. If we leave aside rhetoric about "terrorists" and/or "criminals" wishing to immigrate here, we can at least start from a reasonable assumption that there are good people born in other countries who are looking to make a move to the US. It's unreasonable, however, to think that they all have the same resources, chances, or circumstances for coming to the US.
That's not to say that this is giving a pass to illegal immigration. Really, this whole discussion about "legal vs. illegal immigration" is nothing but a distraction to the larger issue: Congress not doing it's job in reforming immigration in a more sensible way. Don't get started with the R vs D blame game; I really don't care. Bottom line is that the entirety of Congress shares some blame in this regard. And I will say that it's a complicated issue that I don't dare claim to be able to speak to in any elegant way.
Until that happens, we're going to have the same, stupid, heated conversations about "legal vs. illegal". So if you really care about this at all, call your congress persons.
I'm just glad
that these checks are still going on. They've caught, what, now, like 100 terrorists? Not a waste of police resources at all!
Security Theatre
That's what its all about.. nothing more, nothing less. They don't even do it well.. Love when they do it at Haymarket and only do it at one entrance.... if I can walk back up the stairs and go back in via another entrance, so can a terrorist.
Complete waste of money and resources... but oh look, a poodle!
Do you have a problem with
Do you have a problem with this gentleman being deported? Or would you like him to stay? Maybe he can shack up at your place!
http://kdvr.com/2017/02/17/suspect-in-light-rail-station-murder-was-want...
and this is related because...
and this is related because.. it's not.
The MBTA does this to check for explosives and inspect bags. They are NOT going "papers please" and running finger prints thru an ICE database..
This guy wouldn't have been caught this way.
Reminds me of another hot button issue where
the argument is by ending a pregnancy early the fetus could turn into a human being who grows up to be a great person but that will never happen. What is ignored is that the fetus could turn into a human being that grows up to be a gangster, mass murderer, or worse, insurance adjuster (trying insert some levity!
Using this example to fuel sarcasm about criticism of the obsession with illegal immigration ignores how many (probably far more) illegal immigrants are actually adding more to the economy - taxed wages that do not return back benefits or eventually receive social security), do jobs that pay the lowest and actually are good and decent human beings.
Relying upon a single datum ignores the much larger reality of all illegal immigrants people.
Illegal immigration exists because there is a need for people to leave horrid conditions in the hope of something at least less horrid. Want to stop illegal immigration? Help Central and South American nations be nations where poor people see a better chance at a decent life.
On the other hand if Trump and his friends of the mill and billionaire class successfully gut the U.S. economy then the illegal immigration might shift to the other direction.
Trump friends are millionaires and billionaires?
The "uneducated" are doing alright for themselves.
And only themselves
The educated aren't sociopaths and recognize the value of working together toward shared prosperity.
Adding to the economy? You
Adding to the economy? You meaning sending it back to Mexico? The Mexican government keeps taxes low on its elite in part by exporting, rather than helping, its own poor. It causes little worry that some $25 billion in remittances sent from Mexican citizens working in America puts hardship on those expatriates, who are often subsidized by generous U.S. social services.
As far as those horrid conditions, shouldn't we be pressuring Mexico to improve its country? Or how about pointing out their stern approach to immigration as to not affect “the equilibrium of national demographics.” The truth is always more complex than "leaving horrid conditions" in search of a better life.
Spoken like a man ...
Who has never done farmwork.
Who doesn't get how cheap food is in the US - for now.
Who can't think two thinks past his output hole.
Turn in your green card now, CCD
http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2017/02/16/us-citizen-renewing-passport-told-to-...
I agree with cybah, "Security Theatre"
It's long past time to go with the Israeli approach of profiling, instead of stopping the 89 year-old grandmother while men in the terrorist demographic pass through. In 2008, El-Al was named by Global Traveler magazine as the world's most secure airline.
It was reassuring, flipping through the cable channels the other night, to come across an episode of "Cops" from a distant state. The officer noticed a dangling license plate, held by a loose screw. He checked the plate by computer and it turned into a registration, gun and drug arrest. That's how we were trained in MA also, check the plate when there is a loose screw.
Sad that our TSA agents and Transit Police aren't allowed to narrow the field.
This is mass transit, not an
This is mass transit, not an airport. What are you even talking about?
What does Israeli airport profiling have to do with subways where hundreds of people can pass through fare gates in a matter of minutes?
Our rights/ illegals rights
Comical that they are violating citizens rights but desperate not to appear racist by violating rights of illegals
damn you auto-correct
Before deleting and correcting, this was the Transit Police's tweet:
Ihre Papiere, bitte!
Border Patrol Agents Stop Domestic Travelers at New York Airport.
Now Adam
I'm going to say there's more to that quote because people won't click on the link and read it (even if its the first line of the article)
They did this because they were looking for someone who had a deportation order. Let's be clear this isn't happening to all flights. It's a one-off.
Of course it doesn't mean they won't do it again or make it a norm.. anything is possible in Bizzaroland today. But let's try to be a little more truthful by talking about the entire story, not just the interesting parts.
But I agree that it's a terrible and eye opening practice.
EDIT: changed third paragraph for clarity
one-off
sure
yeah
This the first time I've heard of this, which is why I think people are taken by surprised.. but as I said in the following paragraph:
one off.. while exceeding their legal aurhority to do so
They only have authority to check people on international flights - this was a domestic flight, where you can fly with just your driver's license. There's a reason people keep comparing this administration to pre-war Germany - because they keep acting like it!!
See there's a bit of this
See there's a bit of this that bothers me. When law enforcement has a specific individual they want, often what happens is that people are told to stay seated, said individual is removed from the plane and then let everyone else go about their business. The airline knows who is supposed to be sitting in every seat so it'd be as simple as getting that information from the gate agent. Demanding to see an entire plane's worth of people's IDs just looks a shake down, albeit one approved by the courts. But it's clearly a show of force that's in-line with the current administrations priorities to do showy things that rally their base while turning off large swaths of the country. Even if you agree with the underlying policy this flashy way of doing things is expensive, unnecessarily antagonist and continues this climate of polarization.
Why antagonize your local law enforcement partners by forcing them to eventually work with a flashy federal immigration apparatus. If you were doing things quietly, I think locals would be much more apt to cooperate with ICE while maintaining the trust of the communities they're protecting.
Perceptions are a really funny thing. Trump may surpass Obama with respect to total number of deportees in the final tally but Obama deported more people than any previous president yet managed to stay below the radar of the evening news. His policies never rose beyond the immigrant advocacy community as the deporter-in-chief and there certainly weren't dozens upon dozens of mayors going to the news stating they were going to "protect" their communities from ICE. My suspicion is that when historians go back and look at the Obama vs. Trump policies more "dangerous" individuals as a whole will have been removed under Obama.