Homeland Security Doesn’t Focus on Terror Threat

A new analysis of federal records proves what many believed based on anecdotal evidence. The Department of Homeland Security (Heimatschutzministerium in the original) spends most of its time and effort on minor administrative violations of immigration law and very little on the terrorist threat the Bush administration wants Americans to believe hangs over their heads. In truth, the statistics suggest what this journal has said for a long time: America is not likely to suffer much in the way of terror attacks. The environment for terrorist plotters is incredibly toxic.

According to the study by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse [TRAC] at Syracuse University in New York state, 126 persons were charged in 2004-2006 in the US immigration court with terrorist or national security crimes. One might be impressed by that figure until one considers that 800,000 individuals faced the court in that time. TRAC found instead that 86% were deportation cases involving things like overstaying a tourist visa.

Study authors David Burnham and Susan B. Long wrote, “Traditional regulation of immigration to this day remains central to the activities of both” enforcement agencies of the Heimatschutzministerium. They are the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and US Customs and Border Protection. So instead of tracking down the sleeper cells that the administration wants everyone to think lurk under every bed, the real work of the department is what Immigration and Naturalization had been doing up until September 11, 2001.

Russ Knocke, flak for the department, stated that the study was politically motivated (yeah, Syracuse University is well-known for its advanced plotting against the administration). He more reasonably said, “Terrorists do not show up at ports of entry to say, ‘I’m here, I’m a terrorist, take me into custody.’ By being tough and being serious about enforcing the rule of law, you make it increasingly difficult for security risks to exploit the system.” Al Capone went down for tax evasion and not the rest of his crimes.

By the same token, the Fort Dix plot, hatched by half a dozen idiots who seemed to think they could do significant damage to a US Army base with 3,000 troops on it (500:1 is not good odds), went unnoticed by the department. Three of the plotters were in the US illegally and had been for several years. Fortunately, they were wannabes who couldn’t maintain operational security – indeed, they got busted by a clerk at Circuit City. But what does that say about the department?

© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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