The president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe (OST) in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, says that four of its tribal members were recently detained by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in Minneapolis.OST President Frank Star Comes Out issued a statement Friday saying ICE agents detained four men who are homeless and living near the Little Earth housing project in south Minneapolis. The statement continues to say that another OST tribal member witnessed their detainment and was able to confirm their tribal affiliation...It comes amid an ongoing occupation of the Twin Cities by the Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), which has escalated under the auspices of targeting undocumented immigrants and fraud, but is increasingly seeing U.S. citizens detained and residents of the Twin Cities profiled based on their appearance or accent...An incident that went viral on social media saw a Somali-American man working as an Uber driver at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport pulled over by CBP agents who demanded he prove his immigration status, with one agent saying: "I'm an immigration officer, I can hear you don't have the same accent as me ... I want to know where you're born."
It is literally and genetically impossible to be more American than a Native American.
ICE and DHS have outlived their usefulness, as little as it was, and now is the time to eliminate them. Totally eliminate them. (I should be showing as me and not as anonymous. I do not know what the problem is. I logged in. )
ReplyDeleteI agree with your comment, but I 'm curious about your difficulty signing in. You presumably "logged in" to your Google account? (the parent of Blogspot). Then the next step is to then "choose" your Google account (I think the default option is "anonymous." If you choose your Google ID, it should become the header on your comment.
DeleteIf something else is awry, you can always write your comment and then "sign" by writing "Ralph in Costa Rica" or whatever after your comments.
You can also comment as "Name / URL" and fill in some nonsense.
DeleteI don't understand this comment. Are we supposed to stop enforcing immigration law altogether? Is anyone who gains entry to the US entitled to be here? Can nations legitimately maintain borders? Obama deported 3,000,000. Did you like his approach any better, or was it just off the radar because of party politics?
DeleteBoth of these departments were founded in 2002. Somehow, I think we can maintain essential services. When the culture is found to be rotten, you make severe cuts to preserve the essential.
DeleteDoes ICE even have jurisdiction over Native Americans?
ReplyDeleteIt appears that this isn't entirely true. From the sources I've been able to see, there were some homeless interactions in Minneapolis with OST members that recently occured.
ReplyDeleteTim, what part do you consider not entirely true?
DeleteHere's a report from Minnesota Public Radio -
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2026/01/11/native-american-community-members-share-resources-support-amid-ice-operations
There was border enforcement before ICE and even before the Department of Homeland Security were created. Conservatives can cry "But Obama..." all they want. The fact remains that the current administration's policy of using ICE to create fear and chaos in cities far from the borders and refusing to even admit that ICE agents are committing any crimes isn't making the country any safer.
ReplyDeleteAbout all you can say is that Trump's approach is more muscular and theatrical. On a moral level, we're doing what we've ALWAYS DONE: exclude, allow, exploit, expel...as it serves our purposes. We expect someone to do all this dirty work for our benefit (but please hide it). I find the hypocrisy of liberals to be more disgusting than ICE. Your average liberal does not--not really--want to open the door to billions of desperate people from around the world; this would mean the end of their privileged way of life. The average affluent liberal benefits from cheap labor, but would like us to focus on the implied altruism in their "no enforcement" position. Virtue and cheap lettuce, what a deal. Perhaps affluent white liberals care little to nothing about the homeless because the homeless do nothing that benefits them. Selective, self-serving humanitarianism.
DeleteYou've created a very convenient strawman there. Thank you for admitting that what you think some people believe is worse than what ICE is doing.
DeleteI've noticed "strawman" is now being used with greater frequency. It's the new "gaslighting." The two can also be combined. With straw and gas and lighting in the mix I can't help but imagine a burning scarecrow.
DeleteYes, it's not surprising that an argument based on the invention of an imaginary group would go up in smoke.
DeletePlease do make a counter-argument of any kind. For now I'll assume your point is that my "average affluent liberal" does not exist? That I've simply invented this category of Americans? No, I didn't have to work that hard. No imagination needed. I've met hundreds, if not thousands, in my lifetime. It's a matter of observation, not invention.
DeleteIt's hard for me to ignore the fact that the detainees were homeless men living under a bridge. Had they been homeless citizens in California, they'd likely have experienced many years of demonization, deprivation, criminalization and various containment schemes (forced into shelters, county jails, etc.) All with the approval of the vast majority of my fellow Californians; and those who don't approve acquiesce. This is interesting for a number of reasons. Most obviously, that we align our outrage with certain identity themes that have less to do with net suffering and more to do with self-affirming virtue signaling. Almost no one in my community will stand with the homeless on human rights grounds. But our liberals love to proclaim that we're on "stolen land." Not that any will give it back. Or even share a park with a homeless man, Native of not.
ReplyDeleteEvery citizen of the U.S. whose parents were born here almost certainly have ancestors who came here without papers, many of whom never went through the process to become citizens, although depending on the time period probably did follow the process to become permanent residents. This does not reference members of Native populations, obviously. People forget that recent strictures on entering the U.S. are just that: recent. It's hypocritical to claim no one else has a right to do what generations of families did, but that seems to be the current understanding on both sides of the aisle. The main difference is how violent the enforcement should be.
ReplyDeleteEveryone came here without papers (going back about 20,000 years) until North America was "settled." That is, hit a population threshold that made immigration an increasingly pressing subject. I doubt even the most "liberal" person or corporate tycoon (who wants lots of cheap labor) would want to make room for the billions of people who might now desire to relocate to North America, or the US in particular. In other words, comparing today's challenges with some discreet historical moment, with entirely different elements, is only to dodge the fundamental question: What kind of limits does a nation impose and how are those limits enforced?
Delete