Sanctuary Cities: Good or Bad?
Thirty-two year old Kathryn Steinle is dead and she shouldn’t be.
On July 6, 2015 "Kate" was shot in the back and killed by Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez while walking with her father on Pier 14 of the Embarcadero tourist area in San Francisco, California.
It has been reported by USA Today that Lopez-Sanchez used a federal officer's personal .40 caliber pistol that was stolen from the officer's vehicle not long before the shooting occurred.
It's not clear as of this writing how Lopez-Sanchez obtained the weapon from that robbery.
Lopez-Sanchez has a long police record and has been deported from the United States at least five times.
Sanctuary Cities
San Francisco is termed a “sanctuary city.” Los Angeles is the granddaddy of sanctuary cities in the US beginning in 1979.
A sanctuary city is usually defined as a city that will not allow any public, city or tax funds or other resources to be used to enforce laws that fall under the responsibility of the Federal Government.
The original reason for these guidelines was to prevent profiling of Hispanic people in Los Angeles by trying to determine who was in the US legally and who was not.
The sanctuary city idea morphed into more detail as it eventually said that immigration was passing the buck to the US Federalizes and not considering it a local responsibility.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) claims that over 10,000 illegal aliens have been released from custody statewide in California with no notification to any federal immigration agencies. Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez was one of those released.
In the aftermath of the murder immigration officials and San Francisco police are playing a blame game with each other as to who failed to file the proper paperwork.
Isn’t safety of citizens everyone’s responsibility?
Sanctuary Cities in Montana
Montana introduced a bill that had “state sanctuary” wording in it in 2005. As did a bill in Helena in 2004. Another bill in Butte-Silver Bow County in 2005 has been removed from (FAIR – Sanctuary Polices Across The US Pages 14-16).
I have no confirming information as to the passage of these bills or resolutions in the State of Montana.
I do know that a map of the US was featured on a newscast on Tuesday night with two cities shown with red dots as being sanctuary cities in Montana. No city names were given.
States Rights
We do have states rights accorded us by the 10th Amendment to the US Constitution that says, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
So we can pick and choose the rights we want to enforce or not enforce?
Are we supposed to ignore illegal aliens coming into our communities and using services that the rest of us pay for, murder our citizens, and expect the Federal Government to take full responsibility?
Then turn around and violate Federal Law by legalizing pot and just ignore those same laws?
Some Final Thoughts
In my opinion every city, state, or municipality must do their due diligence to keep the people safe. Rubber stamping illegal immigration for some politically correct, feel good, racial diversity position, opens the door for bad to accompany the good.
Not everyone who comes to America is a bad person. But there are Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez’s who cross our borders numerous times who are very bad people.
There is simply no excuse possible for the deportation of a criminal five times.
That alone should justify some sort of increase in Immigration enforcement.
You can’t have it both ways. Either we have laws or we don’t. We either protect our citizens or we don't.
We can't have a civilized society, or a nation, if the highest officials of law enforcement choose to obey some laws while ignoring others.
I’m not sure how safe I would feel in a sanctuary city today.
What about you? Comments below.