Reuters, other MSM liars: Illegal immigration situation in AZ “not as dire as Brewer claims”
Despicable advocacy journalism disgused as “mainstream, unbiased” journalism:
Almost two-thirds of Arizona voters and a majority of voters nationwide agree with her and support the law, polls show.
But as border crime grabs headlines in Arizona and beyond, U.S. government figures show that arrests on the Arizona-Mexico border have been falling since 2000. Violent and property crimes across the desert state have also declined, suggesting the picture is not as dire as Brewer claims.
CNN jumped on the bandwagon as well, insinuating that there was no justifiable excuse to create additional laws against illegal immigration in Arizona. These mainstream media pro-illegal immigration writers are, frankly, nuts.
The issue at hand is the numbers of crimes, especially violent crimes, committed by illegals as a percentage of the population, not whether crime is in and of itself “down.” Sheesh. Statistics from Maricopa County alone show us that the illegal immigration crime problem is widespread. From a 2008 piece written by Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton:
On October 2nd, the Maricopa County, Arizona District Attorney’s office released crime statistics that prove this point. Overall, while illegals represent only nine percent of the population in Maricopa County (which includes Phoenix) they are responsible for approximately 22% of the crimes committed. Here is a breakdown of statistics by crime category. Illegal aliens account for:
· 33.5% of those sentenced for manufacture, sale or transport of drugs.
· 35.8% of those sentenced for kidnapping.
· 20.3% of those sentenced for felony DUI.
· 16.5% of those sentenced for violent crimes.
· 18.5% of those sentenced for property crimes.
· 44% of those sentenced for forgery and fraud.
· 85.3% of those convicted of criminal impersonation or false ID.
· 96% of those convicted of human smuggling.
You may recall, Judicial Watch has been very active in Phoenix, working closely with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio and Phoenix businesses victimized by illegal alien crime to change the city’s policies. And our strategy paid off last December.
Facing the threat of a Judicial Watch lawsuit, Phoenix Mayor Phil Gordon reluctantly reversed himself on the city’s sanctuary policy on December 3, 2007, and then commissioned a panel to study the issue. In May, Police Chief Jack Harris announced key reforms to the policy.
We don’t yet know whether Mayor Gordon is truly committed to enforcing immigration laws or whether, in the face of enormous public opposition and Judicial Watch pressure, he was simply making a politically expedient decision. (In the past, Gordon has actually requested that the Department of Justice investigate local police officials for “discriminatory harassment” when they attempt to enforce the law.)
Here’s what we do know: When local police departments implement sanctuary policies, crime goes up. When local police departments enforce immigration law, crime goes down. It’s that simple.
And from a sympatico piece in the LAT echoing a similar theme as CNN and Reuters, we find this (on page 2 of the online version):
Phoenix has become a hub of human trafficking, and now it has kidnapping numbers that rival cities in Mexico because of smugglers who hold illegal immigrants hostage in drop houses in the city. The city’s crime rates are comparable with those of other big cities, but the presence of well-armed trafficking groups colors the picture.
“It may be safer in Beirut than Phoenix,” said Mark Spencer of the Phoenix Law Enforcement Assn., citing a report that some illegal immigrants were selling grenades on the black market.
Andy McCarthy echoed a similar point here:
Linda [Chavez] further notes that illegal immigration and crime in general are down, but that hardly means Arizonans don’t have a severe problem – kidnapping, a staple of Mexico’s drug wars, is now so rampant in Phoenix that lawyers are advertising themselves as specialists in kidnapping defense.
From an ABC News report from February 2009:
In what officials caution is now a dangerous and even deadly crime wave, Phoenix, Arizona has become the kidnapping capital of America, with more incidents than any other city in the world outside of Mexico City and over 370 cases last year alone. But local authorities say Washington, DC is too obsessed with al Qaeda terrorists to care about what is happening in their own backyard right now.
“We’re in the eye of the storm,” Phoenix Police Chief Andy Anderson told ABC News of the violent crimes and ruthless tactics spurred by Mexico’s drug cartels that have expanded business across the border. “If it doesn’t stop here, if we’re not able to fix it here and get it turned around, it will go across the nation,” he said.
California Attorney General Jerry Brown warned that as the U.S. government focuses so intently on Islamic extremist groups, other types of terrorists – those involved with the same kidnappings, extortion and drug cartels that are sweeping Phoenix – are overlooked.
“Those [criminals], for the average Californian or the average America, may be a more immediate threat to their well being,” Brown said.
In fact, kidnappings and other crimes connected to the Mexican drug cartelsare quickly spreading across the border, from Texas to California. The majority of the victims are either illegal aliens or connected to the drug trade.
An ABC News’ investigation uncovered horrific cases of chopped-off hands, legs and heads when a victim’s family doesn’t pay up fast enough.
“They’re ruthless, so now they’re ripping each other off, but doing it in our city,” Anderson said.
BTW, that CNN piece I linked to up to earlier stated “A CNN Fact Check found that the senator’s claim about the murders in Phoenix cannot be proven, but he did have police statistics to back up his claims of the city’s high number of kidnappings, although its exact standing in the world is not clear.” Well, via the magic of Google we could at least find out what their standing in America is, as I just demonstrated.
From a December 2009 NYT piece:
PHOENIX — The raging drug war among cartels in Mexico and their push to expand operations in the United States has led to a wave of kidnappings, shootings and home invasions in Arizona, state and federal officials said at a legislative hearing.
The drug trade has long brought violence to the state, a hub from which illicit drugs and illegal immigrants are smuggled to the rest of the nation.
Over all, in this city and surrounding Maricopa County, homicides and violent crime decreased last year. But the authorities are sounding an alarm over what they consider changing tactics in border-related crime that bear the marks of the violence in Mexico.
A home invasion here last year was carried out by attackers wielding military-style assault rifles and dressed in uniforms similar to those of a Phoenix police tactical unit. The discovery of grenades and other military-style weaponry bound for Mexico is becoming more routine, as are hostage-taking and kidnapping for ransom, law enforcement officials said.
The Phoenix police regularly receive reports involving a border-related kidnapping or hostage-taking in a home. The Maricopa County Attorney’s Office said such cases rose to 241 last year from 48 in 2004, and investigators believe many go unreported.
The violence in Mexico – where more than 6,000 people were killed in the last year in drug-related violence, double the number of the previous year – is “reaching into Arizona, and that is what is really alarming local and state law enforcement,” Commander Dan Allen of the State Department of Public Safety said Monday.
“We are finding home invasion and attacks involving people impersonating law enforcement officers,” Allen told the state Senate Judiciary Committee, whose chairman, Jonathan Paton of the Tucson area, called the hearing.
“They are very forceful and aggressive,” Allen said. “They are heavily armed, and they threaten, assail, bind and sometimes kill victims.”
Chief David Denlinger of the Department of Public Safety said that while tactics like home invasions might not be new in the drug trade, “they are getting more prevalent.”
Fox News, from March 2009:
As the violence in Mexico spikes, four major drug cartels that are fighting each other for territory and smuggling routes may be forming alliances with each other.
Currently three cartels control most of the border region between the U.S. and Mexico. But the federation, or Sinaloa cartel, is fighting for a larger area of the border and may be negotiating a truce with the Gulf cartel.
Click here to see video on Housley’s report on Mexico’s cartels.
Fred Burton, vice president for counterterrorism and corporate security at Stratfor Global Security says it’s not surprising these groups are trying to join forces.
“We’ve seen reports coming out of Mexico that cartels have set down and tried to do business together because of, let’s face it, pressure. Whether that be law enforcement pressure or military pressure, (it) is bad for business.”
The Sinaloa traditionally has used southern Arizona as its avenue to smuggle drugs into the United States. But these once-open borders have been shut down by U.S. Border Patrol agents, who have increased patrols and put up fences. Agents say it only makes sense that the Sinaloa cartel would fight for new territory and at the same time look for a new partner.
If the Sinaloa struck an alliance with the East Coast-based Gulf cartel it would gain another smuggling route into the United States and an important ally in the war against the Mexican military.
In the last two years, Mexico has deployed 50,000 Mexican troops and federal police officers along the northernmost regions in order to confront the drug cartels, after President Felipe Calderon pledged to tackle the growing problem. His strategy has been met with varying success.
President Obama said Wednesday that he was looking at possibly deploying National Guard troops to contain the violence, and the administration has been watching cartel movement closely.
“If they have to adapt their tactics, whether that means negotiating with another cartel, or whether it means giving up certain trafficking routes — which we have also seen — all of those are a reflection of effective strategy to pressure these cartels,” said Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Roberta Jackson.
The drugs cartels are now claiming they have as many as 100,000 foot soldiers at their disposal — which include a growing number of deserters from the Mexican military. This has turned this conflict into what some experts call an evenly-matched fight. Others describe it as a propaganda battle.
“It’s not particularly surprising to see them claiming thousands and thousands of people in their employ, so that they can try and frighten the population, intimidate people including the security forces against whom they are operating,” Jackson said.
But Burton, who studies the unrest daily, said more disturbing than the sheer number of foot soldiers, is the cartels’ firepower.
“I think the most frightening aspect of this, if you look at this, are not so much the numbers of 100,000. It’s the tactical capabilities that the cartels have, for example in places like Reynosa when they are able to muster RPG’s and law rockets.”
From a CBS News report from November 2008:
Law enforcement sources tell CBS News Phoenix has become ground zero for the explosion in the reported number of kidnappings and home invasions involving drug traffickers. (CBS)
(CBS) It’s a phone call few Americans will ever hear: “He’s going to lose his finger, don’t let him lose his life.”
That’s the terrifying sound of a kidnapper demanding money in exchange for the life of a loved one. It’s hard to believe but calls like these come in virtually every single day in Phoenix, Ariz., which last year set up a special task force to battle back, CBS News chief investigative correspondent Armen Keteyian reports.
“The status of the problem is one that is going to explode across our country,” said Lt. Lauri Burgett of the Phoenix Police Department’s Violent Crimes Bureau.
Just last weekend a mother and her 3-year-old daughter were kidnapped by Mexican meth dealers seeking money owed by the dad. She was eventually released unharmed.
So was another man, but only after being tortured for three days by smugglers. His wife had to listen to his screams over the phone – as well as field $100,000 for ransom.
“They tried to take out the eyes and the ears and the finger, also,” she said.
In fact, law enforcement sources tell CBS News that Phoenix has become ground zero for the explosion in the reported number of kidnappings and home invasions involving drug traffickers and criminals with connections to the Mexican drug cartels.
A CBS News investigation has discovered that as of last weekend, there have been 266 reported kidnappings and 300 home invasions this year alone. Sources say the real figures could run as much as three times higher because so many go unreported.
“It wasn’t uncommon to have a new kidnapping case coming into our offices on a daily basis,” Burgett said.
Law-enforcement sources say the kidnappings signal the brutal expansion of the raging Mexican drug wars spilling across the border. And one map reveals just how widely Mexican drug organizations have spread across the country – 195 cities in all.
Bbbbut, because “crime is down” in Arizona means, at least to Reuters and other left wing news media outlets, it means that the illegal immigration “situation in Arizona is not as dire as Brewer claims.”
Is there any wonder there’s so much misinformation out there about this issue, primarily being spread by pandering Democrats and their allies in the MSM, an MSM that – prior to the passage of the controversial AZ law – were all over the reports of the explosion and escalation of drug cartels and kidnappings and smugglings? The dereliction of duty on their part with respect to their current reporting is downright dangerous.
The state of AZ has acted in the best interests of legal law-abiding citizens of that state, legal citizens which include the Hispanics who haven’t circumvented the system and who are here because they went through the proper channels. AZ even went so far as to moderate the law to try and address concerns made by others who don’t have to deal with what they have to on a daily basis. So the law isn’t perfect. What law is? If someone else has a better idea, then let’s hear it, because the feds sure as hell aren’t doing their jobs and people – legals and illegals alike – are getting kidnapped, assaulted, raped, murdered, and smuggled, sold drugs to – by other illegals and it’s become a huge problem there, as well as many other states in the US.
I’m reading stories already about how some illegals are already leaving the state because of the new law. That’s great news, because it means the state might be a little safer and that legal residents who need public services won’t have to lose out to or stand behind someone who isn’t here legally. Not only that, but more law enforcement resources can eventually be diverted to tackling crimes committed by people who are here legally. Don’t be surprised if other fed up states with similar issues follow suit.
I’m also reading comments from folks who oppose this law suggesting that those who are in favor of it will not be the ones “paying the price.” On the contrary, proponents of this law have indeed paid a price over the years when it comes to various crimes committed by illegals like kidnapping, rape, murder, drunk driving, drug smuggling, prostitution, etc – crimes that have not just been committed against legals here but illegals as well. Not only that, but illegals have helped bankrupt the funding for public services like healthcare and education in states like California, costing them billions per year.
To suggest that people who are in favor of the AZ immigration law will “pay no price” for this law grossly ignores the fact that they have been paying the price for federal inaction on the issue for decades – in both money and blood.
That has to change, and the change starts now.