Street riots can’t set US immigration policy

The New York Post last week chided President Trump for not “getting it right” on deportations. But its real target wasn’t Trump. It was Stephen Miller, the president’s longtime immigration adviser and current White House deputy chief of staff. The Post’s editorial board warned that Miller’s plan to apprehend 3,000 illegal aliens per day is “asking for trouble.”

The Post argued the number is unrealistic. Even if Immigration and Customs Enforcement focuses on “the worst of the worst,” the roundup will still trigger media-fueled hysteria and nationwide riots. Mass arrests, it claimed, carry the “highest risk public-opinion-wise.”

If we concede to street violence, we let the enemy set the terms. That’s not leadership. That’s surrender.

The Post envisioned a wave of anti-ICE demonstrations, media pearl-clutching, and chaos. It feared ICE would be stretched too thin trying to hit its daily targets. Worse still, agents might apprehend illegal immigrants who entered before Biden — or even before Obama — and have “put down some roots.” That, we’re told, would create “economic problems,” particularly for agriculture.

The solution? The Post recommended a “scalpel, not a hammer.” Encourage illegal immigrants to self-deport. Offer incentives. Go soft. Supposedly, a million have already left on their own. And if Trump continues gently urging them out, the paper claims, many more will go peacefully.

The problem? We don’t even know if that number is real. The Department of Homeland Security doesn’t systematically track self-deportations. It’s possible some of the exits happened during the Trump years or even before. Regardless, they’ve hardly made a dent in the 11 million people Homeland Security says are here illegally.

But more troubling than the questionable data is the message Trump would send if he adopted the Post’s approach: that he’s willing to pull back on deportations — not because it’s the right policy, but because it might provoke the left. It would mean ICE can’t arrest even violent felons if it risks upsetting the street mobs funded by Democrats. And because the left treats all illegal immigrants as future voters, that would effectively shut down enforcement altogether.

As a historian, I’ll offer a provocative but fitting comparison: Today’s leftist thugs resemble the Nazi brownshirts of the Weimar era. Back then, many thought the nationalists could harness the street violence for political gain. They were wrong. The brownshirts brought chaos, not order. I see nothing morally or politically superior about the rioters in Los Angeles. They may call themselves anti-fascists. But their behavior — and their impact — is the same.

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Photo by MARVIN RECINOS/AFP via Getty Images

Those who excuse or encourage this violence, or who blame the government for trying to remove violent criminals, don’t care about law and order. They don’t care about stopping murderers, rapists, or cartel operatives. They care about power.

If some illegal immigrants have lived here for years and become productive members of society, the government can evaluate those cases once the criminals are gone. Prioritizing felons doesn’t mean abandoning discretion. But it does mean enforcing the law — despite the noise.

Trump’s crackdown will also encourage more self-deportation. If illegal immigrants know there’s a new sheriff in town, they’ll think twice about staying. As for the rioters and their wealthy enablers? Perhaps, we could find a way to help them self-deport to Antarctica. At a minimum, they deserve the same accommodations the left gave to January 6 protesters.

Even if Miller’s 3,000-a-day goal can’t be fully met, the effort matters. Laura Ingraham is right: We won’t deport all of the Democrats’ future voters. But that’s no reason not to try. The street violence and intimidation are designed to cow Republicans into submission. They’re a threat — not just to policy but to republican government itself.

If we concede to street violence, we let the enemy set the terms. That’s not leadership. That’s surrender.

No more accommodation. Crush the coup.