The ICE Men Cometh

THE recent raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on Irish people suspected of illegally entering the U.S. via Canada, or helping to smuggle people in, do not appear to have bagged any major players.

Most of those arrested are merely young Irish undocumented who were trying to make a life for themselves in the U.S. and who had the misfortune to come across the Canadian border at the wrong time and in the wrong company.

Even the people suspected of helping bring them across were hardly in the FBI’s most wanted category. The Irish people involved appear to have acted out of the best mot-ives and made very little money if any from the transactions.

Given that the Irish arrested were all given very low bail and released, clearly they were not the immediate target of the raids, or if they were it hardly seemed worth the manpower and time to nab them. All of which leads one to believe that ICE must be after a bigger fish.

The suspicion is that they may be seeking someone inside their own organization who is allowing people to cross while accepting bribes. That was the initial story when the arrests first happened, but then it seemed to disappear as an angle.

Yet ICE officials have told this newspaper that their investigation is ongoing. Michael Chertoff, head of the Homeland Security department which oversees ICE, has made it clear that cracking down on smuggling is a key priority.

But picking up a few hapless Irish unfortunate enough to be caught crossing over and those who helped them hardly seems to fit that bill.

King the New Tancredo?

IT was hard to distinguish Congressman Pete King from Congressman Tom Tancredo after President Bush’s immigration speech on Monday night. Both men appeared on The O’Reilly Factor on Fox News after the speech and tried to outdo each other on how strongly they would reject the president’s plans that he outlined on the networks earlier that night.

King, who fought the extradition or deportation of every suspected IRA operative for decades, has now morphed into a fanatical opponent of every undocumented person living in the United States.

His only solution seems to be to lock down the borders and essentially starve the undocumented here out by a series of draconian measures, including making them felons.

It is like an evil twin has taken Pete over since 9/11, leaving many of his long-time supporters, including many in the Irish community who supported him financially, wondering what exactly he has become.

Perhaps he is emboldened by the fact that it now looks very likely that he will face only token opposition in his Long Island district after his Democratic opponent, David Denenberg, claiming health problems, mysteriously withdrew just two days after getting into the race.

Whatever it is King is becoming, it is a million miles away from the compassionate conservative so many of us used to know. Worse, King appears to glory in his new “Know Nothing” stance. Maybe he’ll learn that illegal immigration cannot be excised by criminalization and deportation.

Bush Got It Right

SPEAKING of President Bush’s immigration speech, it appears the president may well have gotten it right as he had both the left and right angry with him after it.

It was a thoughtful speech that revealed that this president understands the complex issue of immigration reform, and wants to be even handed in his approach to it.

To those on the left who oppose the border controls, he made it clear that it is inexplicable that a country should not do what it needs to do to safeguard its own borders.

To those on the right, he made clear it is ridiculous to talk about border security, yet allow 11 million people to live in America who are below the radar and who are not known. What kind of security does that allow?

The New York Times on Tuesday had a fascinating profile of Bush during his days as Texas governor where he strongly opposed efforts to ban children of illegals from schools and a host of other anti-immigrant legislation.

On the Nixon to China theory, Bush may be the only president who can deliver this bill. A Democrat would face overwhelming opposition from the right which Bush also faces, but he has a much better chance of countering it.

Bush has put his neck on the line here and a defeat will damage his fadingpolitical credibility even more. Get ready for a battle royal over the next few months.

O’Reilly for Council Dinner

THE Ireland-U.S. Council has certainly snagged a prominent guest of honor for their 44th annual New York dinner in November.

Sir Anthony O’Reilly, former head of Heinz, founder of the American Ireland Fund and now chairman of Independent Newspapers in Ireland, will be the main speaker at the event.

O’Reilly has not been seen that much in recent years in the U.S. and has essentially left the management of the American Ireland Fund in the capable hands of others.

Thus it will be interesting to see the man considered Ireland’s most successful businessman ever in America back on U.S. shores for the event.

“He has made a contribution to building business links between America and Ireland from his earliest days,” said Ireland-U.S. Council President Mike Gibbons. “He was a consistent champion of Ireland’s push for modernization, liberalization and more rapid economic growth.”