[worry]

[Morgoth]

Have these people at any point broken any american laws? From what I understand, travelling to the US to apply for asylum is perfectly legal.

[Aptorian]

The reporting states that a large group of immigrants broke through the Mexican border side and rushed the American side. Supposedly some of the immigrants threw stones etc. No way to know if that's just Trump propaganda but basically the USA stance would be that the immigrants tried to enter the country illegally and were a danger to it's officials, justifying the use of force.

The footage I've seen certainly looks dangerous. It was a pretty large group of people

The border is open again from what I saw this morning.

[Tiste Simeon]

Morgoth, on 26 November 2018 - 07:26 AM, said:

Have these people at any point broken any american laws? From what I understand, travelling to the US to apply for asylum is perfectly legal.

Well they're not white skinned so ʅ(ツ)ʃ

[Gorefest]

Tiste Simeon, on 26 November 2018 - 12:22 PM, said:

Morgoth, on 26 November 2018 - 07:26 AM, said:

Have these people at any point broken any american laws? From what I understand, travelling to the US to apply for asylum is perfectly legal.

Well they're not white skinned so ʅ(ツ)ʃ

Neither is Trump.

[QuickTidal]

This shit is fucking reprehensible, and indefensible, and evil.

These acts needs to be permanently stapled to the lives of Trump and all of his ilk for this happening. No one should every forget these things, and I hope they hang around the necks of people like Trump and Nielsen for the rest of their natural born lives like a brand that marks them out as the evil, inhumane POS they are.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 26 November 2018 - 05:38 PM

[Gintokian]

QuickTidal, on 26 November 2018 - 05:37 PM, said:

This shit is fucking reprehensible, and indefensible, and evil.

These acts needs to be permanently stapled to the lives of Trump and all of his ilk for this happening. No one should every forget these things, and I hope they hang around the necks of people like Trump and Nielsen for the rest of their natural born lives like a brand that marks them out as the evil, inhumane POS they are.

Fucking despicable the shit they do. And the justifications make me sick.

[worry]

I would put it this way: seeking asylum is a human right. Any blockade (be it literal structures, threats/personal intimidation, deliberate administrative delays, what have you) against that right is itself already an illegal act of aggressive, dehumanizing violence. And all of that has been implemented by the Trump administration on the Southern border in an ongoing campaign against immigrants, particularly non-white immigrants. That is before you even get to the tear gas. Others I've seen have called it an act of war -- and during war it would certainly be a war crime -- but we're ostensibly not at war with Mexico and aren't going to be, so I don't even know what you'd call this. But any politician who rationalizes this, in fact anyone Dem Rep or other who even hints at 'forgive and forget' come 2020, should be sent to The Hague right along with every member of this administration.

[Aptorian]

I suspect the human right to seek asylum is going to disappear pretty soon.

[worry]

Well, that's one way to make a conversation about the "leader of the free world" tear-gassing refugee children even more depressing. I wonder if I can still type from the fetal position.

[Mentalist]

worry, on 26 November 2018 - 07:13 PM, said:

I would put it this way: seeking asylum is a human right. Any blockade (be it literal structures, threats/personal intimidation, deliberate administrative delays, what have you) against that right is itself already an illegal act of aggressive, dehumanizing violence. And all of that has been implemented by the Trump administration on the Southern border in an ongoing campaign against immigrants, particularly non-white immigrants. That is before you even get to the tear gas. Others I've seen have called it an act of war -- and during war it would certainly be a war crime -- but we're ostensibly not at war with Mexico and aren't going to be, so I don't even know what you'd call this. But any politician who rationalizes this, in fact anyone Dem Rep or other who even hints at 'forgive and forget' come 2020, should be sent to The Hague right along with every member of this administration.

It's not an act of war, since the people who are being tear gassed are presumably not Mexican citizens, nor are they on Mexican territory. They are in a no-man's land between borders.

The US government has authority to maintain the integrity of its border as a sovereign nation. HD would be a better person to ask whether human right legislation overrides national security concerns from a legal point of view.

America's process when it comes to admitting people claiming refugee status is unquestioningly broken. Still, it doesn't help anyone to rush a border (where the Border Guards are, in theory, authorized to use lethal force). It's their job to make sure that people cross the border in an organized fashion in lines, by following procedure set up by someone higher up.

And, once again, public displays like this will NOT in themselves undermine any institutions in a country where the majority of people trusts the system to (generally) work in their best interest.

[worry]

To be clear, I wasn't personally saying it was an act of war, only that people were having trouble defining what this was because it is so outlandish -- that said, the rationale there isn't who was being fired upon but that the US was firing into Mexico. But I don't see the US not bullying its way past that regardless, so it's moot.


Regarding the admittance of asylum seekers, it's not a process that is broken, it's a process that is deliberately -- and illegally -- being choked by a hostile admin. All due respect to you and HD, but I don't need more information on the subject of legality here. I know I'm not a lawyer, but I deal with immigration law (including asylum petitions) pretty regularly and this isn't a matter of human rights legislation vs. national security, it's a matter of a rogue administration subverting and defying the law (which states quite clearly: "Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section or, where applicable, section 1225( of this title.")

The admin has been whittling away avenues to asylum since it took power, has radically redefined what qualifies via unilateral, radically precedent-breaking decisions by A.G. Jeff Sessions, and it is lashing out now due to some recent defeats in court over immigration issues (including, let's not forget, its appalling family separation policy). For instance, last week a judge ordered them to stop defying the very plain language quoted above: Link. They have deliberately slowed processing down to a trickle on the Southern border, and they are also illegally trying to force asylum seekers out of the country while their cases are being processed. I don't expect you to read a bunch of Trump tweets or interviews, but he has stated plainly that the goal isn't to process asylum in an orderly fashion, it is to keep these people out. Period.


So now, he is threatening to "shut down" the southern border all together. On top of being (again) illegal, it should also tell you something about what is actually going on here: they want to manufacture a crisis on the border. They want to get as many Americans as possible scared of an invasion, of criminals, of violent brown people so they will swallow that "national security" line. Were a few people, out of the thousands stranded there, trying to find a way through the fence (in order to assert their right, mind you)? Maybe. Did a couple people throw rocks? I'll grant that. Does anything about that justify shooting tear gas into crowds of men, women, and children? No, not now, not ever. But if one wanted to make it look like a dangerous war zone -- the same way they did in Ferguson, the same way they did at the DAPL protests, where they blew a woman's arm nearly off with supposedly nonlethal weapons -- shooting tear gas into now-panicked crowds is a reliable way to do it.

So you can talk about what it's their job to do, you might even be able to successfully defend it in a court of law -- our police departments do it all the time, and in fact a CBP officer murdered a kid by shooting over the border a few years ago and was acquitted, so lord knows nobody is likely to get punished for this -- I don't believe it's legal, but I certainly know it's not moral. Like it wasn't moral for southern diner owners to protect the security of their diners from black men, women, and children asserting their rights. And again, seeking asylum -- whether through a port of entry or otherwise -- is their right as human beings, not just by international law but by U.S. law. I will say this again: stopping them from asserting that right is the violent act. A few attempts to climb a fence, even a few rocks thrown, are nothing in comparison to t dehumanizing suppression of human rights. You can't justify the tear gas, like you can't justify the German shepherds sicced on those people in the diners, like you can't justify the whip taken to a slave who disobeyed his master, no matter how "legal".

[worry]

If that's tl;dr, I can't argue with that, sorry!
I'll defer to a couple very good stories from Buzzfeed's immigration reporters today:



and eyewitness testimony from the mother in the now-infamous photo:

[Mentalist]

worry, on 27 November 2018 - 02:52 AM, said:

To be clear, I wasn't personally saying it was an act of war, only that people were having trouble defining what this was because it is so outlandish -- that said, the rationale there isn't who was being fired upon but that the US was firing into Mexico. But I don't see the US not bullying its way past that regardless, so it's moot.


Regarding the admittance of asylum seekers, it's not a process that is broken, it's a process that is deliberately -- and illegally -- being choked by a hostile admin. All due respect to you and HD, but I don't need more information on the subject of legality here. I know I'm not a lawyer, but I deal with immigration law (including asylum petitions) pretty regularly and this isn't a matter of human rights legislation vs. national security, it's a matter of a rogue administration subverting and defying the law (which states quite clearly: "Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien’s status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section or, where applicable, section 1225( of this title.")

The admin has been whittling away avenues to asylum since it took power, has radically redefined what qualifies via unilateral, radically precedent-breaking decisions by A.G. Jeff Sessions, and it is lashing out now due to some recent defeats in court over immigration issues (including, let's not forget, its appalling family separation policy). For instance, last week a judge ordered them to stop defying the very plain language quoted above: Link. They have deliberately slowed processing down to a trickle on the Southern border, and they are also illegally trying to force asylum seekers out of the country while their cases are being processed. I don't expect you to read a bunch of Trump tweets or interviews, but he has stated plainly that the goal isn't to process asylum in an orderly fashion, it is to keep these people out. Period.


So now, he is threatening to "shut down" the southern border all together. On top of being (again) illegal, it should also tell you something about what is actually going on here: they want to manufacture a crisis on the border. They want to get as many Americans as possible scared of an invasion, of criminals, of violent brown people so they will swallow that "national security" line. Were a few people, out of the thousands stranded there, trying to find a way through the fence (in order to assert their right, mind you)? Maybe. Did a couple people throw rocks? I'll grant that. Does anything about that justify shooting tear gas into crowds of men, women, and children? No, not now, not ever. But if one wanted to make it look like a dangerous war zone -- the same way they did in Ferguson, the same way they did at the DAPL protests, where they blew a woman's arm nearly off with supposedly nonlethal weapons -- shooting tear gas into now-panicked crowds is a reliable way to do it.

So you can talk about what it's their job to do, you might even be able to successfully defend it in a court of law -- our police departments do it all the time, and in fact a CBP officer murdered a kid by shooting over the border a few years ago and was acquitted, so lord knows nobody is likely to get punished for this -- I don't believe it's legal, but I certainly know it's not moral. Like it wasn't moral for southern diner owners to protect the security of their diners from black men, women, and children asserting their rights. And again, seeking asylum -- whether through a port of entry or otherwise -- is their right as human beings, not just by international law but by U.S. law. I will say this again: stopping them from asserting that right is the violent act. A few attempts to climb a fence, even a few rocks thrown, are nothing in comparison to t dehumanizing suppression of human rights. You can't justify the tear gas, like you can't justify the German shepherds sicced on those people in the diners, like you can't justify the whip taken to a slave who disobeyed his master, no matter how "legal".

If the law is giving them the right to seek asylum once they enter the country , but there's no clear delineation as to how they are allowed to enter the country then yes, the system is broken .

I totally respect your position regarding human rights trump everything, end of story. But the very existence of national borders, and the necessity of paperwork and restriction of mobility rights speaks against universal acceptance of these mobility rights. And the fact that people aren't insisting that we do away with borders means that a significant percentage of people (maybe majority, maybe not) believe that the border should exist in some fashion.

NO, firing tear gas at civilians is not OK. but neither is it OK to convince civilians that if they force their way through a border that is there to make sure they enter the country in an organized fashion they will have a shot at a better life.

Honestly, call me paranoid, but this feels like the same type of brainwashing Russian TV did to people in Crimea and Donbas. And to a whole lot of people (those who place more value in their own security, as symbolized by national border, rather than abstract refugees on TV) this makes Trump look like he's in the right

[worry]

First off, I just wanted to say in my previous post when I said "All due respect" I meant it -- I would usually concede to you, or HD, or Amph, etc. in matters of law. On these matters in particular though, even for a layman, I think I'm relatively plugged in. Also I want to say that I used the word "you" pretty freely, sometimes you-you and sometimes the general you without really making it clear, so I hope it didn't come across that I was ascribing too much to you-you.

I guess my point to your first thing is that while I see what you're saying, I'm saying there is a very simple delineation in the law for how that is done, and the Trump administration is deliberately blocking it. Maybe it seems like semantics at that point, but the distinction between "the pipeline is broken" vs. "men in body armor are blocking the entrance to the pipe" is important imo.


The second paragraph, I'm not quite sure if you're making an affirmative argument or just explaining your view of things as they are, so to speak, but all I can say to that really is that things as they are aren't set in stone and aren't always going to be that way. Lots of awful things were just they way it was, and then people changed them. And I probably don't need to make this argument, but you know a "significant percentage" of people don't believe in climate change or evolution either, but that has to change, and this has to change too. And it doesn't have to be all or nothing -- I mean, I don't want people moving more cane toads to Australia or anything like that, but we can have that without the other.

To the third thing, I guess I fear repeating myself, and I'll try not to, but again: the violence was the blockade, before anyone tried to get through it, before the tear gas. The violence is in the CBP shutting down of ports of entry or simply refusing people outright (which they have been doing, repeatedly, along the border). I would also say that the caravan has traveled thousands of miles over many months, and they don't necessarily have all the information you or I have. Maybe they think children are still being stolen from their parents at ports of entry (and with good reason, because they are). Maybe they think that once you're in the custody of the Dept. of Homeland Security -- and you will be because Trump has explicitly called for the halt of releases -- you maybe aren't treated so nice. All that said, it takes too much credulousness -- that this admin, that DHS, that CBP haven't earned -- to believe this was anything beyond one more desperate act by a fraction of a fraction of a desperate and weary group of refugees, that was met with extreme and brutal force by wolves who smelled blood.


To the fourth thing, I think -- and hope -- that after family separation, kids in cages, and concentration camps, people aren't so easily falling for the official line. But who am I to argue against paranoia?

[HoosierDaddy]

I try to stay away from these discussions, now. I don't like politics anymore. I don't like law anymore. My international law courses mainly revolved around maritime laws and treaties. Border control in the US is specifically controlled by the USA upon attempts to enter.

It's a mess and growing larger as a wedge issue. The US is not party to the Hague when they don't want to be, so no remedy there to that nonsense taking place down. The legal answer is to find someone here legally/or granted residency who was injured. Otherwise, non-residents not in the US have no standing to bring a claim against these actions.

This isn't a legal problem for the most part; it is a political problem.

I might be wrong: see sentence three. YMMV.

Back to happy things!

[Gorefest]

There seem to be rather conflicting reports from the area when you read different sources. I'm reading that a number of protesters were throwing rocks at border police, breaking through the Mexican cordon and storming the American border area. Although the use of teargas may be considered excessive (I'm not going to venture there as I genuinely don't know the circumstances; tear gas is a legal albeit rather excessive tool for riot control in most countries as far as I know), I do have to question why any parent would drag a child into such a situation in the first place.

[Tapper]

Gorefest, on 28 November 2018 - 09:41 AM, said:

There seem to be rather conflicting reports from the area when you read different sources. I'm reading that a number of protesters were throwing rocks at border police, breaking through the Mexican cordon and storming the American border area. Although the use of teargas may be considered excessive (I'm not going to venture there as I genuinely don't know the circumstances; tear gas is a legal albeit rather excessive tool for riot control in most countries as far as I know), I do have to question why any parent would drag a child into such a situation in the first place.

Because they are desperate and don't want to be seperated from their children in case they get arrested?
It's a damned if you do, damned if you don't scenario. Take them with you: they suffer what you suffer but at the least they are with you. Don't take them with you: you leave them at the mercy of others in the caravan, possibly forever if you are arrested/expatriated back to your country of origin. In their shoes I'd name the first option as the lesser evil every single time, gambling on the humanity of the border police/ the US bureaucracy.

[Cause]

America cant just let everyone in. There has to be control. I cant say if the clash was necessary and to what extent Trumps new policy played a role I just don't know enough but every country has borders and needs to follow a system. If the American system is broken as described above these clashes will keep happening.

The other thing I find interesting, don't know if its true but apparently asylum seekers are obligated by international law to settle in the first country they can in which they are safe. I understand this is also partially what all the fighting is about in regards to immigrants in Europe and especially Syrian refugees. I don't blame refugees, if I had to leave my country Id aim for the best country I could. However I can see why countries might get annoyed by this perceived asylum shopping.

I was actually going to start a whole thread about immigration. I'm very pro immigration, especially for people who have to flee for their lives. However there are certainly real world practicalities at stake.

[Primateus]

https://www.thedaily...llion-in-income

D'awww, isn't that sad?