SUPREME COURT: DEFENSE FUNDS CAN BE USED TO BUILD BORDER WALL

SUPREME COURT: DEFENSE FUNDS CAN BE USED TO BUILD BORDER WALL

A win for Trump and for Americans

BY MICHAEL CUTLER
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:

President Trump and, more importantly, Americans just got some really great news.  On July 26, 2019 The Hill reported, Supreme Court rules Trump can use military funds for border wall construction.



The news report began with this statement:



The Supreme Court on Friday ruled that the Trump administration can start using military funds to construct a wall on the southern border, handing the president a major legal victory.



The ruling allows the administration to use $2.5 billion in military funds to begin construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border while litigation plays out. A lower court had issued an injunction blocking officials from using those funds.



The article went on to quote Chuck Schumer, the Minority Leader in the U.S. Senate in this excerpt:



Democrats blasted the move Friday night, with Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (D-Calif.) calling it "a deeply regrettable and nonsensical decision."



Schumer argued the ruling "flies in the face of the will of Congress and the Congress’s exclusive power of the purse, which our founders established in the Constitution."



“It’s a sad day when the president is cheering a decision that may allow him to steal funds from our military to pay for an ineffective and expensive wall for which he promised Mexico would foot the bill," Schumer added in a statement.



To begin with, it is entirely appropriate to use military funding to construct that vital wall.  While much has been made about use of military assets to back up the Border Patrol through the assignment of military troops to our southern border to perform supporting duties to free up overwhelmed and beleaguered Border Patrol agents, in reality, the Border Patrol and ICE agents back up our military.



The primary shared mission of all members of America’s armed forces, irrespective of the branch of the military under which they serve, is to keep America’s enemies as far from our shores as possible.



However, when terrorists, enemy combatants, spies and others who act at the behest of our enemies get “up close and in person” with our borders, the job of stopping them falls to the Border Patrol and ICE agents.



Indeed, the 9/11 Commission made it clear that border security is national security!



However, me must be clear that construction of the wall on the dangerous and highly porous U.S./Mexican border will not, by itself, end the immigration crisis that impacts nearly every challenge and threat that confronts America and Americans.



There are many elements to the immigration system and a border wall would just constitute one element of what needs to be an integrated immigration system.  For this reasons I have come to compare a wall on the U.S./Mexican border with a wing on an airplane.  An airplane most certainly needs a wing if it is to fly, but a wing by itself would go absolutely nowhere!



Unlike the mainstream media that frequently references California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas as America’s border states, in reality, the United States is a nation of 50 so-called “border states.”   Any state that lies along our northern as well as our southern borders are borders states as are those states that lie along America’s 95,000 miles of coastline.  Finally, any state that has an international airport is also a border state.



It has been estimated that nearly half of all illegal aliens in the United States were lawfully admitted through ports of entry and then, in one way or another, went on to violate their terms of admission into the United States.  These violation of our immigration laws are not addressed by the U.S. Border Patrol but by the agents of ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement).  There are, however, precious few ICE agents for our entire country.  In all there are about 6,000 such agents and, as the term ICE makes clear, they don’t only enforce immigration laws but customs laws and, in fact, other laws as well.



The extreme importance of enforcement of our immigration laws from within the interior of the United States was the predication for my article, “Ice – As Vitally Important As A Border Wall.”



Schumer complained in the Hill article about how Mexico won’t pay for the wall.  In reality, Mexico and other countries whose citizens enter the U.S. illegally across the porous southern border will definitely pay for the wall. 



Every year tens of billions of dollars are sent out of the United States as a consequence of the drug trade and money sent home by foreign workers who work illegally in the United States. 



On January 3, 2018 CNN Business reported, Mexicans in U.S. send cash home in record numbers.  That article reported that: Mexicans sent home $26.1 billion from January to November 2017, according to figures released Tuesday by the central bank of Mexico. That's the most ever recorded and better than the $24.1 billion sent in 2016 over the same period.



Of course not all Mexicans who sent money back to Mexico worked illegally, but then those numbers only reflect traceable money, not money that was smuggled overtly across the border.



The wall would reduce and deter illegal immigration, including the entry of members of transnational gangs, international fugitives and international terrorists and impede the smuggling of narcotics and other contraband into the United States.



As a consequence much of the money generated by those illegal activities would be greatly reduced.



Just as insulation installed in houses and buildings pays for itself by reducing heating and cooling costs, the wall will insulate America and Americans from drugs, alien criminals, international terrorists and illegal aliens who take Americans’ jobs thereby saving our national economy tens of billions of dollars annually.   



That is truly a “win / win!”



It is hypocritical that Schumer would oppose measures to protect our southern border against aliens from trespassing into our country.



As I noted in my article, “Aliens Trespassing: Sen. Schumer, his congressional cohorts, and leftist hypocrisy”-



On October 13, 2014 Schumer posted a press release on his official website that disclosed that because of the threat of terrorism, he had proposed legislation that would make trespassing on critical infrastructure and/or landmarks a federal crime with a maximum prison sentence of five years.



His press release stated:



Currently NYC Law Has Max. Penalty for Trespassing of Under 1 Year – In Light of Terrorism, Fed Law Should Make Loud & Clear, Particularly to Trespassers from Overseas, That Wrongdoers Should Stay Off Bridges, WTC, Statue of Liberty or Other Critical Infrastructure



Schumer Said NYPD Has Done Great Work Pursuing Cases, But Available Punishments Are Too Weak.



Here is another excerpt:



“With terror threats at a high, it must be made loud and clear to any would-be trespassers, adrenaline junkies or potential criminals that the federal government and the NYPD take trespassing on critical infrastructure and national monuments very seriously; a law that makes this a federal crime and raises the current maximum jail time from one to five years would help deter this behavior, and provide the NYPD with stronger tools to combat this disturbing trend.”



Schumer said that regardless of a trespasser’s intention, this dangerous behavior puts the individual, tens of thousands of commuters, tourists and first responders like the NYPD at serious risk.  Schumer’s legislation would state that anyone who willfully trespasses or enters upon any critical infrastructure used in interstate commerce will be committing a federal crime and fined and/or imprisoned for up to five years.



Schumer’s press release even cited a 16 year old boy’s prank as justification for imposing a five year prison sentence on trespassers.



Today the very same Schumer and his Democrat cohorts, however, are eager to encourage mass-trespassing into the United States by limitless numbers of illegal aliens through the establishment of “Sanctuary Cities,” the vilification of ICE and Border Patrol agents- calling for the dismantling of immigration law enforcement agencies, the decriminalization of immigration law violations and even providing unknown millions of illegal aliens with United States citizenship.



On March 10, 2005 I testified before the House Subcommittee on Immigration, Border Security and Claims on the topic, Interior Immigration Enforcement Resources.  I began my testimony back then with the same sentence that will serve as the conclusion for my commentary today:



“A country without secure borders can no more stand than can a house without walls.”



______________________________________________________________



SCOTUS Judicial Overlords: Trump May Build Border Wall With Military Funds



BY SELWYN DUKE





republished below in full unedited for informational, educational and research purposes:



A judicial monkey wrench thrown into America’s border security endeavors was removed Friday, as the Supreme Court lifted lower court opinions stating that the Trump administration may not use $2.5 billion in military funds for border-wall construction.



As the Daily Mail reports:



The court’s five conservative justices gave the administration the green light to begin work on four contracts it has awarded using Defense Department money.



Funding for the projects had been frozen by lower courts while a lawsuit over the money proceeded.



The court’s four liberal justices would not have allowed construction to start.



…Trump tweeted after the announcement: ‘Wow! Big VICTORY on the Wall. The United States Supreme Court overturns lower court injunction, allows Southern Border Wall to proceed. Big WIN for Border Security and the Rule of Law!’



The Supreme Court’s action reverses the decision of a trial court, which initially froze the funds in May, and an appeals court, which kept that freeze in place earlier this month.



The freeze had prevented the government from tapping approximately $2.5 billion in Defense Department money to replace existing sections of barrier in Arizona, California and New Mexico with more robust fencing.



The case the Supreme Court ruled in began after the 35-day partial government shutdown that started in December of last year.



Trump ended the shutdown in February after Congress gave him approximately $1.4 billion in border wall funding.



But the amount was far less than the $5.7 billion he was seeking, and Trump then declared a national emergency to take cash from other government accounts to use to construct sections of wall.



“Pursuant to that proclamation, administration officials announced plans to reprogram $600 million from the Treasury Department’s forfeiture fund; $2.5 billion from Defense Department counter-narcotics activities; and $3.6 billion from military construction projects to finance construction of the wall,” the Daily Caller informs, providing further detail.







“The $2.5 billion for counter-drug efforts were at issue in Friday’s case,” the Caller continues. “That sum was slated to finance fencing in Arizona, California, and New Mexico. Government lawyers said those projects are priorities for the Department of Homeland Security, as they are meant to deter narcotic trafficking in major drug smuggling corridors. The administration moved the funds pursuant to a transfer statute that allows such reallocations to address ‘unforeseen needs,’ provided they have not been ‘denied by the Congress.’”



Left unsaid, as assorted left-wing groups and judges conspire to undermine our national security, is that building barriers is quintessential military business. In fact, this “is most of what the military did for the first 100 years [of our history],” stated commentator Ann Coulter in a 2018 Tucker Carlson Tonight interview.



“We weren’t going around remaking the rest of the world,” she continued. “It was the military building forts on our border. Defending American borders is the number one job of the commander in chief.” 



In other words, those questioning Trump’s authority on this matter should take note. As Coulter put it, “I mean, if we were suddenly attacked by China, he [Trump] wouldn’t sit around — or North Korea — he wouldn’t sit around saying, ‘Well, I would like to respond, but Congress just will not write that bill.’ He’d say, ‘No, I am the commander in chief; I have the power to defend against an invasion. We’re being invaded.’”



Nor would Trump sit around waiting for the courts’ approval. This reality brings us to another wall, one that doesn’t have to be built, just recognized — that is, the wall separating the branches of government.



Just consider the headline of the above-cited Daily Caller article: “Supreme Court Allows Trump To Build 100 Miles Of Wall With Military Funds.” Allows?



Now perhaps it’s clear why Thomas Jefferson sounded the alarm about judicial supremacy, that extra-constitutional power that “gives to the judges the right to decide what laws [and presidential actions] are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves in their own sphere of action but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres,” as he put it. He warned that accepting such a doctrine would make the judiciary exactly what it has become: “a despotic branch” that acts as “an oligarchy.”



Jefferson also said that judicial supremacy — a power not in the Constitution — would make the document a felo de se — an “act of suicide.”



And when judges are actually facilitating an invasion of the nation, this warning starts to sound anything but theoretical.