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Roundup — 21 Comments

1. #5: could it be that there are no hostages left to exchange, so that is the reason for Hamas’ rejection?

2. The cartoonist, Bob Moran was apparently fired by The Telegraph for his unorthodox opinion on wearing masks, not for loathing the Jews, which is not status-lowering among the British chatterati. NB. Mr. Moran is not yet 40.

3. Here’s someone new for Dominion to sue!
   “Expert Testifies in Court: Dominion Voting Systems Easily Hackable”—
   https://www.foxnews.com/us/dominion-rep-on-trump-campaign-claims-its-physically-impossible-to-switch-votes

   This “expert” must be lying, though, as Dominion tells us precisely the opposite (and why should we question Dominion? Or “Biden”? Or the Media?…for that matter…):
   “Dominion rep tells Fox News, ‘It’s physically impossible’ to switch votes”—
   https://www.foxnews.com/us/dominion-rep-on-trump-campaign-claims-its-physically-impossible-to-switch-votes

   Well that’s a relief, isn’t it?…
   (OTOH, while it may indeed be “physically impossible” to switch votes, is it also electronically impossible? Mechanically impossible? [scratches head]….)

   Still, one may well prefer to believe Dominion. With a name like that…
   Besides that glorious company corroborates The Narrative(TM), which would make them even more reliable than their name suggests….

   File under: Gotta Believe! (Make that “YOU’D BETTER BELIEVE….”)

4. Hamas reportedly said it would return remaining hostages if Israel withdrew and left it in place in Gaza. It seems to think it still has the upper hand.

   RIP to the Israeli troops killed in the building collapse.

5. Maybe the offer was made by the Leaders of Israel knowing that Hamas would reject it. Making the offer might take some of the pressure off coming from the Hostage families. The IDF can now get on with their job.
   Condolences to the Families of the Soldiers killed.
   War is not pretty, it is messy, violent and unpredictable.

6. For Hamas(spit!) hostages are money in the bank. Release hostages, no more leverage. Biden et al could be pushing for the two State solution so when it’s rejected they can say, “See how unreasonable the Jews are!” It depends on how much antisemitism the White House supports.

   I still have trouble believing the depth of antisemitism that’s rearing its ugly head in 2020’s America.

7. #2 – Correct on the immediate, but not on the overall. There was an injunction in place pending a ruling, and the injunction kept the Feds from cutting the wire until the case was heard. The Supreme Court decision removed the injunction, but from what I’ve been hearing the trial is still on and could find against the government.

8. The State of Texas’ actions are entirely constitutional and thus legal. Roberts’ and Barrett’s vote cannot be justified. For clarifications sake, I have used the strike function below.

   US Constitution Article 1 Section 10

   “No state shall, without the consent of Congress, lay any duty of tonnage, keep troops, or ships of war in time of peace, enter into any agreement or compact with another state, or with a foreign power, or engage in war, unless actually invaded or in such imminent danger as will not admit of delay.”

   It is not possible to honestly argue that America is not being invaded and that we are not in a state of war.

9. #5 – Maybe Israel just got Hamas to clearly state their intentions. The Ops tempo doesn’t seem to have changed much. So maybe this was just giving Biden/Blinken what they wanted while demonstrating the foolishness of the position.

10. I haven’t seen any articles about Mexico’s culpability in facilitating the migrant invasion. Where are they? Mexico a needs stern talking-to, maybe a break in diplomatic relations. Maybe the threat of military action after the fashion of Pershing’s Punitive Expedition; or, at the very least, a military buildup on our side of the border.

    Yes, I know, none of that will ever happen while Biden is POTUS.

11. “SCOTUS needs to re-read the Constitution”

    Article IV, Section 4 says: “The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion”

    Both the Executive and Legislative branches of the Federal Government are in violation of the Constitution. In refusing to take appropriate action to stop the invasion, they have lost all legitimacy.

12. #2 Powerline posted a link to the Fifth Circuit Court ruling in favor of the preliminary injunction, and Scott Johnson believes that the 4 dissenting justices probably agreed with it.

    https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2024/01/what-is-to-be-done-11.php

    Yesterday the Supreme Court summarily vacated the Fifth Circuit order, with Justices Thomas, Alito, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh dissenting. Both the order and the dissent are for reasons unstated, but see the Fifth Circuit opinion linked above for the rationale of the dissenters. It’s a good opinion. The dissenters must agree with it.

    Injunctions (and especially preliminary injunctions) rest on a balancing act that is largely within the discretion of the district court. Although ultimately ruling against Texas on the request for a preliminary injunction, the district court judge found merit in some of Texas’s claims. Texas then appealed Judge Moses’s denial of the injunction to the Fifth Circuit. The Fifth Circuit granted the preliminary injunction pending appeal.

    Although the Supreme Court has vacated the Fifth Circuit’s order granting the preliminary injunction pending appeal, a hearing on Texas’s appeal before the Fifth Circuit is still to be held on February 7. I should think the Supreme Court order puts a damper on Texas’s prospects in the Fifth Circuit.

    My question is: what part of that opinion did the 2 conservative-ish justices DISagree with?

    The legal question in the State’s complaint, as I understand it, does not deal with immigration per se (illegal or otherwise), but with the right of the state to place certain items (chattels) that it owns on property that it owns, or has jurisdiction over. Texas claims, first, that the feds have no legal right to destroy the state’s property so placed, with certain allowances for life-preserving rescue; and second, that the destruction of the barrier wire results in undue hardship to the State.

    (As LI puts it: Texas sued the Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, and U.S. Border Patrol, claiming “the Border Patrol illegally destroyed state property.”)

    It’s more complex of course, and “who controls the borders” is certainly implicated, but that is the core of this particular suit, so far as I can tell.

    What is concerning to me is the evidence Texas introduced that the Border Patrol is not only cutting the wire that protects the State’s property, but actively aiding the incoming hordes in crossing the river and passing through the broken barrier.

    And thus my question of what the dickens Roberts and Barrett are actually supporting by lifting the injunction and allowing the wire-cutting — and thus the invasion — to proceed.

    Warning: Long Wall of Text ensues, even with footnotes and citations omitted.

    (References to “the court” are to the District Court’s original judgement; c-wire is short for concertina wire; TRO stands for Temporary Restraining Order.)

    https://lrl.texas.gov/scanned/archive/2023/52708.pdf

    On October 24, 2023, Texas sued Defendants in federal court
    alleging common law conversion, common law trespass to chattels, and
    violations under the Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”). Among other
    relief, Texas sought a preliminary injunction based on its trespass to chattels
    claim.
    …
    Although the court would ultimately deny a preliminary injunction on
    sovereign immunity grounds, the court made numerous fact findings
    supporting Texas’s trespass to chattels claim.
    As a general matter, the court rejected Defendants’ claims that the Border Patrol was justified in cutting the c-wire: (1) to inspect, apprehend, and detain illegal aliens; and (2) to prevent or address medical emergencies. To the contrary, the court found that the Border Patrol cut the c-wire “for no apparent purpose other than to allow migrants easier entrance further inland.”

    While noting it was “aware of at least fourteen incidents of wire cutting,” the court focused on a September 20 incident that was captured on video and was, in the court’s view, “most illustrative.”

    In that incident, Border Patrol agents cut two additional holes in the c-wire 15 feet away from an existing hole and installed “a climbing rope for migrants.” Meanwhile, a Border Patrol boat “passively observ[ed] a stream of migrants” crossing the
    river who were never “interviewed, questioned as to citizenship, or in any
    way hindered in their progress into the United States.” Instead, after letting
    the migrants through, the Border Patrol sent them to “walk as much as a mile
    or more” with no supervision in hopes they would proceed to the nearest
    immigration processing center.

    The court first rejected as a factual matter Defendants’ claim that the
    Border Patrol’s actions were intended to “inspect, apprehend, and process”
    incoming aliens.

    The court found no alien was “inspected” at all. Moreover,
    if agents intended to inspect, they could have done so without doing anything
    to the wire. As the court noted, “Border Patrol agents already possess access
    to both sides of the fence . . . to the river and bank by boat and to the further inland side of the fence by road.” Nor was wire-cutting necessary to “apprehend” or “process” aliens. Indeed, no one was “apprehended” or placed in “custody”—as the court found, aliens coming through the holes
    were merely waived [sic] along in the “hope that [they] will flow in an orderly
    manner . . . to the nearest processing center.” Moreover, agents let “some
    4,555 migrants [in] during [the September 20] incident, but only
    2,680 presented themselves for processing.” Accordingly, the court found
    that “[n]o reasonable interpretation of the definitions [of ‘apprehension’
    or ‘detention’] can square with Border Patrol’s conduct.”

    The court also rejected Defendants’ argument that wire-cutting was
    generally necessary to prevent “medical emergencies.” To be sure, the court
    (and the parties) recognized that “injury, drowning, dehydration, and fatigue
    are real and common perils in this area of the border,” and so “medical
    emergencies justify cutting or moving [Texas’s] fence.” But the court
    rejected the notion that medical emergencies could justify any and all
    destruction of the c-wire. “While an ongoing medical emergency can justify
    opening the fence, the end of that exigency ends the justification.” So, for
    example, “cutting the wire to address a single individual’s display of distress
    does not justify leaving the fence open for a crowd of dozens or hundreds to
    pass through.” The court also rejected Defendants’ argument that cutting
    the c-wire could be justified because it would assist in the “prevention of
    possible future exigencies.”

    And yet, with all that said, the District Court found (in layman’s terms) that the US could cut the State’s wire anyway, just because it wanted to, and had sovereignty over the Texas land just because it was on the border.

    After reading through the District court opinion, 99% seems to support the claims by Texas (Plaintiff) and only gives credence to the feds (Defendants) in one particular angle, which looks (to me) to be a minor technicality compared to the immensity of the other claims, to wit, that the actions of the Border Patrol, bad as they were, did not constitute a “final agency action” and therefore could not be enjoined (see the last excerpt below).

    However, I did like these statements by the district judge.
    https://casetext.com/case/state-v-us-dept-of-homeland-sec-1

    The U.S.-Mexico border presents a unique challenge that is equal parts puzzling to outsiders and frustrating to locals. The immigration system at the heart of it all, dysfunctional and flawed as it is, would work if properly implemented. Instead, the status quo is a harmful mixture of political rancor, ego, and economic and geopolitical realities that serves no one. So destructive is its nature that the nation cannot help but be transfixed by, but simultaneously unable to correct, the present condition. What follows here is but another chapter in this unfolding tragedy. The law may be on the side of the Defendants and compel a resolution in their favor today, but it does not excuse their culpable and duplicitous conduct.
    …
    Border Patrol agents can be seen cutting multiple holes in the concertina wire for no apparent purpose other than to allow migrants easier entrance further inland. Any rational observer could not help but wonder why the Defendants do not just allow migrants to access the country at a port of entry. If agents are going to allow migrants to enter the country, and indeed facilitate their doing so, why make them undertake the dangerous task of crossing the river? Would it not be easier, and safer, to receive them at a port of entry? In short, the very emergencies the Defendants assert make it necessary to cut the wire are of their own creation.

    Here is where I cannot fathom the judge’s reasoning and denial.
    An “ultra vires” claim means “Beyond the legal power or authority of a person or official or body.”

    Having considered the evidence presented at the November 7, 2023 hearing, the posthearing document production, and the arguments of counsel, the Court finds that the Plaintiff has not, at this preliminary stage, shown a substantial likelihood that it will establish the existence of a final agency action. Of course, the Court does not suggest that the Plaintiff cannot establish final agency action when this case proceeds to be heard on the merits. As the Defendants note, the documents within the federal government’s possession that mention the Plaintiff’s concertina wire potentially number in the millions. (ECF No. 43 at 2.) Discovery may produce information that sheds new light on the nature of the directives to cut or otherwise interfere with the Plaintiff’s concertina wire. But at this early stage of the case, the Court finds insufficient evidence of final agency action. Absent such final agency action, the Court need not address the Plaintiff’s claims that the Defendants are engaging in arbitrary and capricious action or exceeding their statutory authority.
    …
    The evidence presented amply demonstrates the utter failure of the Defendants to deter, prevent, and halt unlawful entry into the United States. The Defendants cannot claim the statutory duties they are so obviously derelict in enforcing as excuses to puncture the Plaintiff’s attempts to shore up the Defendants’ failing system. Nor may they seek judicial blessing of practices that both directly contravene those same statutory obligations and require the destruction of the Plaintiff’s property. Any justifications resting on the Defendants’ illusory and life-threatening “inspection” and “apprehension” practices, or lack thereof, fail.
    …
    Here, based on the evidence presented at the November 7, 2023 hearing and the documents submitted thereafter, the Court finds that there is insufficient evidence at this juncture to support a substantial likelihood of success on the Plaintiff’s ultra vires claim.
    …
    V. CONCLUSION

    Accordingly, it is ORDERED that the Plaintiff’s Motion for a Preliminary Injunction Order or Stay of Agency Action (ECF No. 3-1) is DENIED.

    IANAL – but I am often flabbergasted by the way that lawyers and judges apply what looks like reason to achieve nonsensical results.

    The Circuit Court dismissed that reasoning in a footnote!

    Because we decide Texas is likely to succeed on this claim [trespass to chattels], we need not decide whether Texas is also likely to succeed on its APA claims that Defendants have acted
    arbitrarily and capriciously and, alternatively, that Defendants have acted ultra vires. We
    express no opinion on those claims.

    This part of the Circuit’s vacated opinion seems IMO to be crucial, as it MAY be what the SCOTUS majority objects to. IOW, they believe that the DHS has both intergovernmental and jurisdictional immunity.
    Does anyone here doubt that the Democrats would run with this understanding of sovereign immunity to justify the feds doing anything they wanted on ANY property in the country?
    They are getting close to that anyway.

    Next, Defendants argue that they enjoy intergovernmental immunity
    against Texas’s claims. We again disagree. Defendants have no
    intergovernmental immunity because Texas is exercising its rights only as a
    proprietor, and, as the district court found, Texas is neither directly
    regulating the Border Patrol nor discriminating against the federal
    government. … (… the intergovernmental immunity doctrine only prohibits state
    laws “that either regulat[e] the United States directly or discriminat[e]
    against the Federal Government or those with whom it deals”)

    Finally, Defendants argue they enjoy jurisdictional immunity under
    the Immigration and Nationality Act (“INA”). They are again mistaken.
    The INA bars lower courts from issuing injunctions against certain
    immigration statutes, … That bar does not apply here, however. To cut Texas’s c-wire,
    Defendants did not rely on any of the statutes covered by the INA bar.
    … Accordingly, an injunction against the Defendants would, at most, have only a “collateral effect on the operation” of the covered statutes, which is permissible.

    And this.

    We next consider whether Texas has shown it would be irreparably
    injured absent a stay. The district court found Texas would suffer irreparable
    harm “in the form of loss of control and use of its private property.” We see
    no error, clear or otherwise, in this finding.

    The district court found that Defendants’ employees have repeatedly
    “damage[d], destroy[ed], and exercis[ed] dominion over state property” and
    “show[ed] that they intend to prevent [Texas] from ‘maintaining operational
    control over its own property.’”
    …
    Finally, we turn to the public interest prong. …
    The district court, incorporating its TRO opinion by reference, focused its public
    interest analysis on two distinct bases: preventing unlawful agency action and
    deterring illegal immigration. Agreeing that the first ground plainly serves the
    public interest and weighs in Texas’s favor, we need not consider the second.
    …
    “There is generally no public interest in the perpetuation of unlawful
    agency action.”
    …
    And there is “substantial public interest in having governmental agencies abide by the federal laws that govern their existence and operations.” … The district court found that the Border
    Patrol exceeded its authority by cutting Texas’s c-wire fence for purposes
    other than a medical emergency, inspection, or detention. Moreover, the
    public interest supports clear protections for property rights from
    government intrusion and control. Accordingly, we find no abuse of
    discretion in the district court’s weighing of the public interest prong.

    The Democrats would certainly prefer that they be allowed “the perpetuation of unlawful
    agency action,” since they engage in so much of it.

13. NOTE it is impossible to correct the formatting of government documents to be aesthetically pleasing.

14. Musk states the obvious, and what’s been obvious since the early days of this bogus administration:
    “Elon Musk Says Biden Administration ‘Actively Aiding Illegal Immigration’ “—
    https://blazingcatfur.ca/2024/01/24/elon-musk-says-biden-administration-actively-aiding-illegal-immigration/

    Of course, one mustn’t say the obvious when it comes to “Biden”…
    …and so, time for “him” to kneecap Musk BUT GOOD…

15. Update on the hostage negotiations…
    “Archterrorist Marwan Barghouti may be released in hostage deal;
    “Several foreign intermediaries are cautiously optimistic about a new prisoner swap plan with Hamas.”—
    https://www.israelnationalnews.com/news/384080

    Law of the Suq:
    First say, NO WAY.
    Then say, NOPE.
    After that, say NO.
    Then…

    It ain’t over till it…ain’t over…

16. “We next consider whether Texas has shown it would be irreparably
    injured absent a stay. ”
    Good grief! For the court to then rule against the stay seems to imply (?) that Texas is only it’s physical property, and not it’s residents.
    I don’t understand how the court can presume that Texas residents won’t be injured by an invasion of alien lawbreakers.
    (And worse: bear the cost of the care of the invaders!)

17. Remember the Alamo !?!?!?!
    ‘ Texas Military Department Not Allowing Border Patrol to Cut Wire in Shelby Park;
    ‘ “We remain absolute in our actions to secure our border, preserve the rule of the law, and protect the sovereignty of our State.” ‘—
    https://legalinsurrection.com/2024/01/texas-military-department-not-allowing-border-patrol-to-cut-wire-in-shelby-park/

    (Updated in the 21st Century to: “Remember the Ammo”…)

18. They remove all doubt

    https://twitter.com/DrEliDavid/status/1749870020627157174

19. Actually, Palestinian Rules(TM) are…They TELL you what they WANT you to believe.
    It’s not actual “lying” because they REALLY WANT you to believe it and—who knows?—maybe, since THEY ALSO want to believe it themselves, they therefore ACTUALLY DO believe it.

    Kinda like “Biden” and “his” Media poodles, when you think about it….
    (File under: “Faith”?)

    Conclusion? It’s probably most prudent to conclude that they’re lying all the time (and about EVERYTHING).
    Even so, they JUST MIGHT BE telling the truth at certain times—possibly—no matter how unlikely that might be (and even if it might be by accident) but that’s not terribly helpful.
    And so…Caveat Emptor.

20. Barry — Thanks for the legal insurrection article!
    “We remain absolute in our actions to secure our border, preserve the rule of the law, and protect the sovereignty of our State.”
    In addition to the Alamo /Ammo, this battle reminds me of our right to self defense! Even down to protecting our very home & property, under our 2nd Amendment!!
    The Biden admin are armed & traitorous criminals!!

21. BREAKING NEWS!!
    https://babylonbee.com/news/texas-places-razor-wire-around-the-alamo-for-final-stand-against-biden

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