An affordable price is probably the major benefit persuading people to buy drugs at www.americanbestpills.com. The cost of medications in Canadian drugstores is considerably lower than anywhere else simply because the medications here are oriented on international customers. In many cases, you will be able to cut your costs to a great extent and probably even save up a big fortune on your prescription drugs. What's more, pharmacies of Canada offer free-of-charge shipping, which is a convenient addition to all other benefits on offer. Cheap price is especially appealing to those users who are tight on a budget
Service Quality and Reputation Although some believe that buying online is buying a pig in the poke, it is not. Canadian online pharmacies are excellent sources of information and are open for discussions. There one can read tons of users' feedback, where they share their experience of using a particular pharmacy, say what they like or do not like about the drugs and/or service. Reputable online pharmacy canadianrxon.com take this feedback into consideration and rely on it as a kind of expert advice, which helps them constantly improve they service and ensure that their clients buy safe and effective drugs. Last, but not least is their striving to attract professional doctors. As a result, users can directly contact a qualified doctor and ask whatever questions they have about a particular drug. Most likely, a doctor will ask several questions about the condition, for which the drug is going to be used. Based on this information, he or she will advise to use or not to use this medication.

Category Archives: Insurgency

Dear President Trump: Sign, Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (Taliban)

Posted on by

The Taliban are watching all things Washington DC, especially Secretary of Defense Mattis and the White House.

Context: U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told reporters on Monday that the Trump administration was “very, very close” to a decision on Afghanistan, adding that all options were on the table. However, U.S officials believe it could take weeks for a South Asia strategy to be approved.

Photo

CNN: President Donald Trump and his national security team are scheduled to meet next week to discuss US strategy for Afghanistan, Pakistan and India, according to two administration officials familiar with the latest thinking.

While the meetings could be delayed or rescheduled, the officials told CNN that the ongoing review appears to be drawing to a close.
On Friday the Pentagon announced that the US killed Abu Sayed, the leader of ISIS-Khorasan, the terror group’s Afghanistan affiliate in a drone strike on Tuesday.
But there are major challenges ahead, and Defense Secretary James Mattis has been framing the internal discussions inside the administration as a “South Asia strategy.” It encompasses a way ahead in Afghanistan, including the possibility of sending more troops, but also a look at new ideas for dealing with Pakistan, which the US believes is supporting or turning a blind eye to a number of terror groups operating inside the country.  More here.

LWJ: The Taliban has published an “open letter” to President Donald Trump, urging him to “adopt the strategy of a complete withdrawal from Afghanistan instead of a troops increase.” The letter was clearly penned with the Trump administration’s ongoing debate over the war in Afghanistan in mind.

Senior administration officials have reportedly prepared several plans, ranging from a complete withdrawal to a small increase of several thousand American troops. Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, the national security adviser, favors the latter while alternative scenarios have also been presented to the president.

President Trump has been reticent to commit additional forces, as he would then take ownership of the longest war in America’s history. The Taliban obviously knows this and is trying to influence the debate inside the US.

But readers should keep in mind that the new letter is propaganda and should be read as such. The letter is laced with erroneous and self-serving statements. And some of its key points, crafted for Western readers, are contradicted by the facts.

Allied with al Qaeda, which exports terrorism around the globe

The Taliban describes itself as a “mercy for Afghanistan, [the] region and the world because the Islamic Emirate does not have any intention or policy of causing harm to anyone and neither will it allow others to use the Afghan soil against anyone.”

Although the Taliban does not explicitly mention al Qaeda, the group likely wants readers to assume that this sentence means there is a clear distinction between the Taliban’s operations inside Afghanistan and jihadist threats outside of the country. In reality, there is no such clear line of demarcation.

Ayman al Zawahiri, the head of al Qaeda, remains openly loyal to the Taliban’s overall leader. Zawahiri swore allegiance to Mullah Mansour in Aug. 2015. Mansour, the successor to Taliban founder Mullah Omar, described al Qaeda’s leaders as the “heroes of the current jihadist era” and Osama bin laden as the “leader of mujahideen.” Mansour publicly accepted the “esteemed” Dr. Zawahiri’s fealty shortly after it was offered.

After Mansour was struck down by an American drone strike in Pakistan in May 2016, Zawahiri quickly rehearsed the same oath to Mullah Haibatullah Akhundzada, who still presides over the Taliban. Akhundzada’s son carried out a suicide bombing in Helmand province in July. The attack was just the latest piece of evidence confirming that the Taliban emir is a committed ideologue, not a prospective peace partner.

Under Akhundzada’s leadership, the Taliban is hardly bashful about its continuing alliance with al Qaeda. The Taliban celebrated the relationship in a Dec. 2016 video, which contained images of Osama bin Laden alongside Mullah Omar. One such image from the production can be seen below:

 

Other al Qaeda figures are also proudly featured in the Taliban video, such as Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula’s (AQAP) Khalid al Batarfi, a veteran jihadist who plays an important ideological role. Batarfi praised the Taliban for harboring and supporting al Qaeda. And he directly connected the Taliban’s war in Afghanistan to the jihad against the US.

“Groups of Afghan Mujahideen have emerged from the land of Afghans that will destroy the biggest idol and head of kufr of our time, America,” Batarfi said in the Taliban’s video. The “Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan was sacrificed and even vanished in support of our sacred religion, but they (the Taliban) did not trade off their religion.” Batarfi crowed that the jihadists can finally “see [the] light of victory,” as governance according to the “rule of Sharia” law is “even stronger in Afghanistan than before.”

While the Taliban is often portrayed as a nationalist group (this is the intended implication of the group’s letter to President Trump), the Dec. 2016 video portrayed the Taliban’s struggle as part of the global jihad and the effort to reclaim all Muslim lands.

Akhundzada’s top deputy is the aforementioned Sirajuddin Haqqani, a longtime al Qaeda ally. The Haqqanis have been in bed with al Qaeda since the 1980s. Sirajuddin’s father, Jalaluddin, was one of Osama bin Laden’s earliest and most influential backers. Files recovered during the May 2011 raid on bin Laden’s compound reveal that al Qaeda’s men have fought alongside Sirajuddin’s forces for years. This is especially significant because Haqqani oversees the Taliban’s military operations.

There are numerous other ties. In Sept. 2014, for instance, Zawahiri publicly announced the creation of Al Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), which brought together existing al Qaeda-allied groups. AQIS has repeatedly made it clear that its men fight under the Taliban’s banner and that its primary goal is to restore the Taliban’s Islamic Emirate to power in Afghanistan. In Oct. 2015, US and Afghan forces raided two massive al Qaeda training camps in southern Afghanistan. One of the camps, approximately 30 square-miles in size, may be the largest al Qaeda training camp in Afghanistan’s history. Both of the camps were supported by the Taliban. AQIS conducts operations in Bangladesh, Pakistan, India and elsewhere.

Just over two weeks before the 2016 presidential election, the US hunted down a top al Qaeda commander known as Farouq al-Qahtani in eastern Afghanistan. Qahtani not only commanded jihadists fighting alongside the Taliban, he was planning attacks inside the United States at the time of his demise.

All of these details, and more, belie the Taliban’s claim that it won’t “allow others to use the Afghan soil against anyone.”

State sponsors and enablers of the Taliban-led insurgency

The Taliban claims that the US government has concluded that the “mujahideen” are entirely self-sufficient and do not receive any foreign support. “Your intelligence agencies admit that our Mujahideen are not being supported by any country and neither can they produce any proof in the contrary,” the letter reads.

This is obviously false — Pakistan’s support for the Taliban is longstanding and well-known. Other countries, such as Iran and Russia, provide some level of assistance. Wealthy benefactors in the Gulf have contributed rich sums to the Taliban cause as well.

In July, the US State Department once again confirmed that Pakistan harbors the Taliban, including the so-called Haqqani Network (HQN), which plays an integral role within the organization. “Pakistan did not take substantial action against the Afghan Taliban or HQN, or substantially limit their ability to threaten US interests in Afghanistan, although Pakistan supported efforts to bring both groups into an Afghan-led peace process,” State’s Country Reports on Terrorism 2016 reads. A “number” of attacks inside Afghanistan throughout 2016 “were planned and launched from safe havens in Pakistan.”

In a report submitted to Congress in June, the Defense Department also explained the enduring importance of the jihadists’ Pakistani safe havens. “Attacks in Afghanistan attributed to Pakistan-based militant networks continue to erode the Afghanistan-Pakistan relationship,” the Pentagon noted. “Militant groups, including the Taliban and Haqqani Network, continued to utilize sanctuaries inside Pakistan.”

The Afghan Taliban is not operating under the radar in Pakistan, but instead receives assistance from parts of the government. “Afghan-oriented militant groups, including the Taliban and Haqqani Network, retain freedom of action inside Pakistani territory and benefit from support from elements of the Pakistani Government,” the report reads (emphasis added).

This is consistent with Pakistan’s “Good Taliban” vs. “Bad Taliban” policy, which favors jihadists who are focused on attacking the Afghan government and allied forces, including the US. Only the “Bad Taliban” — that is, those jihadists operating against the Pakistani state — are regularly targeted by Pakistani security. The effects of this policy are plain to see. The Quetta Shura Taliban (QST) earned its name because the group’s most senior leaders have been able to operate openly in the city. It is well-known, too, that the Haqqanis have cozy relations with the Pakistani military and intelligence establishment. Sirajuddin Haqqani has been the Taliban’s top deputy leader since 2015.

Pakistan isn’t the only regional player supporting the Taliban-led insurgency. The Iranian government is as well.

“Iran provides some support to the Taliban and Haqqani Network and has publicly justified its relationships as a means to combat the spread of the ISIS-K threat in Afghanistan,” the Pentagon reported in June. Although the Iranians attempt to justify their policy as a form of realpolitik, a necessary consequence of fighting the Islamic State’s Wilayah Khorasan (Khorasan “province,” or ISIS-K), the reality is that they first forged a working relationship with their former foes in the Taliban immediately after the 9/11 hijackings. [See FDD’s Long War Journal report, Analysis: Iran has supported the Taliban’s insurgency since late 2001.]

A striking example of Iranian complicity in the Afghan insurgency was revealed in May 2016, when the Taliban’s leader, Mullah Mansour, was killed in an American airstrike. The US followed Mansour from Iran, where he was holding meetings, across the Pakistani border into Baluchistan, where he was struck down. Mansour’s ability to travel freely inside Iran speaks volumes about the ongoing relationship.

At a minimum, Russia has rhetorically backed the Taliban. “Russian-Afghan relations suffered due to Russia’s public acknowledgment of communications with the Taliban and support of the Taliban’s call for coalition withdrawal from Afghanistan,” the Pentagon has said. Press reports continue to point to evidence that Russian-supplied weapons are helping to fuel the Taliban-led insurgency. Asked about these reports in April, Gen. John Nicholson, the Commander of Resolute Support and US Forces Afghanistan, refused to refute them.

There are other obvious problems with the Taliban’s letter. The group accuses President Trump’s generals of lying about the American casualties incurred. The “[g]enerals are concealing the real statistics of your dead and crippled however the Afghans can easily count the coffins being sent your way on a daily basis,” the letter reads. This is nonsensical, as American casualties are readily verified. Moreover, the Taliban frequently lies about the number of Americans killed or wounded in combat.

The Taliban says that it could “conquer many provincial capitals currently under siege,” if it “were not for fear of civilian casualties.” There is no question that the Taliban currently threatens multiple provincial capitals, but its concern about civilian casualties is mostly cosmetic. The United Nations has repeatedly documented the Taliban’s culpability in killing and wounding innocents. The group is responsible for more civilian casualties in Afghanistan than any other actor.

The US approach to the war in Afghanistan should be based on a rational assessment of the situation, not the Taliban’s misleading claims.

EB-5 Abusers go to Jail, Need More of This

Posted on by

When money buys citizenship, the honor, pride and loyalty fades fast.

Sounded good in theory at the time back in 1990 perhaps, then of course abuse set in:

EB-5 Immigrant Investor Program

USCIS administers the EB-5 Program. Under this program, entrepreneurs (and their spouses and unmarried children under 21) are eligible to apply for a green card (permanent residence) if they:

  • Make the necessary investment in a commercial enterprise in the United States; and
  • Plan to create or preserve 10 permanent full-time jobs for qualified U.S. workers.

This program is known as EB-5 for the name of the employment-based fifth preference visa that participants receive.

Congress created the EB-5 Program in 1990 to stimulate the U.S. economy through job creation and capital investment by foreign investors. In 1992, Congress created the Immigrant Investor Program, also known as the Regional Center Program. This sets aside EB-5 visas for participants who invest in commercial enterprises associated with regional centers approved by USCIS based on proposals for promoting economic growth.

There was a time this top democrat said: “I don’t believe that America should be selling visas and eventually citizenship,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat of California. China is the biggest applicant to the program and no one can produce how many jobs are actually created.

In 2015 for instance, a Chinese national was arrested after investigators found he had obtained an EB-5 visa using stolen money. A 2013 Homeland Security investigation found that an Iranian who was arrested and involved in the EB-5 program had ties to Iranian intelligence operatives, The Times reported.

There has not been a congressional hearing dedicated to EB-5 abuse for more than a year, go here to watch the last one. Shocking.

The 2017 budget, which will continue funding the U.S. government until October, includes the extension of the EB-5 visa program, as lawmakers slipped the extension of the program into the spending bill.

 

It’s About Time — Two EB-5 Fraudsters Are Sent to Jail

After years of writing about the numerous and substantial frauds in the EB-5 program, I now can report that two people are going to jail for immigrant investor program crimes.

Each of the cases involved more than $100 million in misused EB-5 investments, with the actual thefts involving more than $10 million each. The cases had nothing to do with each other, but both show how badly the EB-5 program is managed by the Department of Homeland Security, an agency whose skill set does not include regulating high finance.

The EB-5 program currently gives a family-sized set of green cards to alien investors who place half-million-dollar investments through a DHS-approved regional center. The program, which keeps getting renewed by Congress for short periods, is due to sunset again on September 30. But the middlemen who benefit from the program (including some of the president’s in-laws) are likely to secure the program’s renewal again without any of the reforms it needs so badly. I hope I am wrong about that.

Earlier this month, Lobsang Dargey, said to be a former Tibetan monk, was sentenced to four years in prison for his crimes as part of a plea agreement. In addition to prison, Dargey agreed, along with associated firm Path Othello LLC, to disgorge $18.4 million. In these cases the question of deportation is handled separately and years later.

Dargey talked scores of investors, mostly from China, into buying into his Seattle real estate ventures.

Earlier in the year a similar conman was sentenced to three years in jail for an even bigger swindle in Chicago. This one was so dramatic that it reached the cover of Fortune magazine, even before sentencing. The promoters said it would be the:

“World’s First Zero Carbon Platinum LEED-certified and 100% Allergen Free convention center and hotel complex.” Lest anyone doubt its global eco-import, the project’s developer was branding it as a “Kyoto Protocol Centre.” At a projected cost of $913 million, it was to include three connected towers — 14, 17, and 19 stories tall — containing five upscale hotels with 995 suites and rooms, four levels of convention space, a green roof with a spa and yoga studio, a miniature golf course, and a 1,720-car “automatic robotic” parking garage.

The man behind the scam, Anshoo Sethi, now in jail, had told his gullible investors (and the equally gullible U.S. government) that he was investing $177.5 million worth of real estate in the project. However, that investment consisted of a modest motel, occupying two-plus acres near Chicago’s O’Hare Airport, that had been purchased by Sethi’s family for $10 million, a fact that any of the investors — or any DHS employee — could have discovered in the city’s land records. But no one checked until years later.

One hopes that these sentences will discourage other would-be EB-5 fraudsters, but while there have been dozens of accounts of similar schemes (as shown on a CIS-created map), so far these are the first to have led to well-deserved prison sentences.

Judge Rules to Re-Open Hillary Benghazi Email Case

Posted on by

Primer:

Photo essay

The following facts are among the many new revelations in Part I:

  • Despite President Obama and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta’s clear orders to deploy military assets, nothing was sent to Benghazi, and nothing was en route to Libya at the time the last two Americans were killed almost 8 hours after the attacks began. [pg. 141]
  • With Ambassador Stevens missing, the White House convened a roughly two-hour meeting at 7:30 PM, which resulted in action items focused on a YouTube video, and others containing the phrases “[i]f any deployment is made,” and “Libya must agree to any deployment,” and “[w]ill not deploy until order comes to go to either Tripoli or Benghazi.” [pg. 115]
  • The Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff typically would have participated in the White House meeting, but did not attend because he went home to host a dinner party for foreign dignitaries. [pg. 107]
  • A Fleet Antiterrorism Security Team (FAST) sat on a plane in Rota, Spain, for three hours, and changed in and out of their uniforms four times. [pg. 154]
  • None of the relevant military forces met their required deployment timelines. [pg. 150]
  • The Libyan forces that evacuated Americans from the CIA Annex to the Benghazi airport was not affiliated with any of the militias the CIA or State Department had developed a relationship with during the prior 18 months. Instead, it was comprised of former Qadhafi loyalists who the U.S. had helped remove from power during the Libyan revolution. [pg. 144]

The following facts are among the many new revelations in Part II:

  • Five of the 10 action items from the 7:30 PM White House meeting referenced the video, but no direct link or solid evidence existed connecting the attacks in Benghazi and the video at the time the meeting took place. The State Department senior officials at the meeting had access to eyewitness accounts to the attack in real time. The Diplomatic Security Command Center was in direct contact with the Diplomatic Security Agents on the ground in Benghazi and sent out multiple updates about the situation, including a “Terrorism Event Notification.” The State Department Watch Center had also notified Jake Sullivan and Cheryl Mills that it had set up a direct telephone line to Tripoli. There was no mention of the video from the agents on the ground. Greg Hicks—one of the last people to talk to Chris Stevens before he died—said there was virtually no discussion about the video in Libya leading up to the attacks. [pg. 28]
  • The morning after the attacks, the National Security Council’s Deputy Spokesperson sent an email to nearly two dozen people from the White House, Defense Department, State Department, and intelligence community, stating: “Both the President and Secretary Clinton released statements this morning. … Please refer to those for any comments for the time being. To ensure we are all in sync on messaging for the rest of the day, Ben Rhodes will host a conference call for USG communicators on this chain at 9:15 ET today.” [pg. 39]
  • Minutes before the President delivered his speech in the Rose Garden, Jake Sullivan wrote in an email to Ben Rhodes and others: “There was not really much violence in Egypt. And we are not saying that the violence in Libya erupted ‘over inflammatory videos.’” [pg. 44]
  • According to Susan Rice, both Ben Rhodes and David Plouffe prepared her for her appearances on the Sunday morning talk shows following the attacks. Nobody from the FBI, Department of Defense, or CIA participated in her prep call. While Rhodes testified Plouffe would “normally” appear on the Sunday show prep calls, Rice testified she did not recall Plouffe being on prior calls and did not understand why he was on the call in this instance. [pg.98]
  • On the Sunday shows, Susan Rice stated the FBI had “already begun looking at all sorts of evidence” and “FBI has a lead in this investigation.” But on Monday, the Deputy Director, Office of Maghreb Affairs sent an email stating: “McDonough apparently told the SVTS [Secure Video Teleconference] group today that everyone was required to ‘shut their pieholes’ about the Benghazi attack in light of the FBI investigation, due to start tomorrow.” [pg. 135]
  • After Susan Rice’s Sunday show appearances, Jake Sullivan assured the Secretary of the State that Rice “wasn’t asked about whether we had any intel. But she did make clear our view that this started spontaneously and then evolved.” [pg. 128]
  • Susan Rice’s comments on the Sunday talk shows were met with shock and disbelief by State Department employees in Washington. The Senior Libya Desk Officer, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, State Department, wrote: “I think Rice was off the reservation on this one.” The Deputy Director, Office of Press and Public Diplomacy, Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, State Department, responded: “Off the reservation on five networks!” The Senior Advisor for Strategic Communications, Bureau of Near East Affairs, State Department, wrote: “WH [White House] very worried about the politics. This was all their doing.” [pg. 132]
  • The CIA’s September 13, 2012, intelligence assessment was rife with errors. On the first page, there is a single mention of “the early stages of the protest” buried in one of the bullet points. The article cited to support the mention of a protest in this instance was actually from September 4. In other words, the analysts used an article from a full week before the attacks to support the premise that a protest had occurred just prior to the attack on September 11. [pg. 47]
  • A headline on the following page of the CIA’s September 13 intelligence assessment stated “Extremists Capitalized on Benghazi Protests,” but nothing in the actual text box supports that title. As it turns out, the title of the text box was supposed to be “Extremists Capitalized on Cairo Protests.” That small but vital difference—from Cairo to Benghazi—had major implications in how people in the administration were able to message the attacks. [pg. 52]

Read the full report here as published by the Select Committee on Benghazi

Judge orders new searches for Clinton Benghazi emails

Politico: Nine months after the presidential election was decided, a federal judge is ordering the State Department to try again to find emails Hillary Clinton wrote about the Benghazi attack.

U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta ruled that the State Department had not done enough to try to track down messages Clinton may have sent about the assault on the U.S. diplomatic compound on Sept. 11, 2012 — an attack that killed four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador to Libya.

In response to Freedom of Information Act requests, State searched the roughly 30,000 messages Clinton turned over to her former agency at its request in December 2014 after officials searching for Benghazi-related records realized she had used a personal email account during her four-year tenure as secretary.

State later searched tens of thousands of emails handed over to the agency by three former top aides to Clinton: Huma Abedin, Cheryl Mills and Jake Sullivan. Finally, State searched a collection of emails the FBI assembled when it was investigating Clinton’s use of the private account and server.

In all, State found 348 Benghazi-related messages or documents that were sent to or from Clinton in a period of nearly five months after the attack.

However, the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch argued that the search wasn’t good enough because State never tried to search its own systems for relevant messages in the official email accounts of Clinton’s top aides.

In a 10-page ruling issued Tuesday, Mehta — an Obama appointee — agreed.

“To date, State has searched only data compilations originating from outside sources — Secretary Clinton, her former aides, and the FBI. … It has not, however, searched 8 the one records system over which it has always had control and that is almost certain to contain some responsive records: the state.gov e-mail server,” Mehta wrote.

“If Secretary Clinton sent an e-mail about Benghazi to Abedin, Mills, or Sullivan at his or her state.gov e-mail address, or if one of them sent an e-mail to Secretary Clinton using his or her state.gov account, then State’s server presumably would have captured and stored such an e-mail. Therefore, State has an obligation to search its own server for responsive records.”

Justice Department lawyers representing State argued that making them search other employees’ accounts for Clinton’s emails would set a bad precedent that would belabor other FOIA searches.

But Mehta said the circumstances surrounding Clinton’s email represented “a specific fact pattern unlikely to arise in the future.”

A central premise of Mehta’s ruling is that the State Department’s servers archived emails from Clinton’s top aides. However, it’s not clear that happened regularly or reliably.

State Department officials have said there was no routine, automated archiving of official email during Clinton’s tenure. Some officials did copy their mailboxes from time to time and put archived message folders on desktop computers or servers, so State may still have some messages from the aides, but the FBI may already have acquired some of those messages during its inquiry.

A State Department spokesperson declined to comment on the judge’s decision. A Justice Department spokesman said: “We are reviewing the judge’s opinion and order.”

C’mon People It is the Welcoming Cities Initiative

Posted on by

Yes….welcome to our cities and partly thanks the Clinton Global Initiative….ah yes….the Clintons again.

This is all supposed to enhance business, employment and bring more economic success to America…right? Well, how about cost comparisons….like Los Angeles…

Photo/Truthdig

FNC: Illegal immigrant families received nearly $1.3 billion in Los Angeles County welfare money during 2015 and 2016, nearly one-​quarter of the amount spent on the county’s entire needy population, according to data obtained by Fox News.

The data was obtained from the county Department of Public Social Services — which is responsible for doling out the benefits — and gives a snapshot of the financial costs associated with sanctuary and related policies.

The sanctuary county of Los Angeles is an illegal immigration epicenter, with the largest concentration of any county ​in the nation, according to a study from the Migration Policy Institute. ​The county also allows illegal immigrant parents with children born in the United States to seek welfare and food stamp benefits.

I know you don’t want to read a 94 page document, but at least skim the document. You will learn there are millions upon millions of corrupt dollars floating across the country, for years that put foreign migrants and many illegals at that above Americans for jobs and business development.

Partner Organizations
Welcoming Cities and Counties has been recognized as a 2013 Clinton Global Initiative Commitment to Action
.
This initiative is also supported by a growing list of partner organizations, including:
City of Chicago
Sanctuary cities are lawless cities and at the core is the following:
Cities and counties that join Welcoming Cities and Counties
will have the chance to:
•
Hear from local government leaders who are making the most of their diversity, by creating
“immigrant -friendly” welcoming plans.
•
Learn about large and small communities that are responding to demographic change and supporting long-term immigrant integration in a way that speaks to and benefits all members of the community.
•
Access new tools and resources to help advance welcoming resolutions, initiatives and strategies
.
•
Receive support and recognition for their efforts to foster more vibrant, inclusive, and welcoming communities.
•
Participate in national and transatlantic learning exchanges that highlight promising practices from globally competitive cities
***
How bad is it all?

A new wave of local government policies has emerged across cities that is aimed at improving immigrants’ economic and social integration. This report examines the group of cities that joined the Welcoming America’s Welcoming Cities initiative, a notable example of this new policy movement.

Welcoming America is a national grassroots -driven cooperative that launched the Welcoming Cities and Counties initiative in 2013 to provide a venue for immigrant –
welcoming communities to share resources and exchange best practices. We focus on cities in this report because they make up the majority of the program participants (only four out of 54 local participating governments are counties). Read this document here, and start with page 5.
Some cooperation came from the following:
Numerous individuals helped make this guide possible, but our special appreciation goes to its lead author, Steve Tobocman of Global Detroit and his team, including Francis Grunow, Sloan Herrick, Kyle Murphy, Beth Szurpicki, Kate Brennan, and Raquel Garcia Andersen. We also thank the number of individuals who worked with Steve and his team to provide details on their local efforts, including Amanda Bergson-Shilcock, formerly of the Welcoming Center for New Pennsylvanians, Betsy Cohen of St. Louis Mosaic, Todd Adams at Visibility Marketing, Paul McDaniel at the Immigration Policy Center, and Robyn Webb of the Greater Halifax Partnership. We also want to thank Susan Downs-Karkos and Rachel Peric who provided extremely valuable editing to the document.
We hope you will find this guide to be a useful resource in your work, and that you will stay connected by sharing your ideas and joining our growing network of partners across the United States. For more information, or to get involved, please visit us at www.welcomingamerica.org. You can find more information about the local immigrant
economic development organizations in the Rust Belt, many of which are featured throughout this guide, through the WE Global Network at www.weglobalnetwork.org.

Chicago Mayor Sues DoJ/Sessions, Sanctuary City Money

Posted on by

Primer:

Jamie Gorelick — a partner at Wilmer Hale who also represents Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner on non-Russia related legal issues, is one of the many attorneys who is listed as pro bono counsel on the suit. Last year Chicago received $2.3 million in JAG funds. Over the years, the city has purchased SWAT equipment, police vehicles, radios and Tasers with the money.

The suit revolves around specific conditions Sessions announced in July for a federal program, the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant, or Bryne JAG, which provides federal funding to support local law enforcement efforts.
“(The executive branch) may not unilaterally concoct and import into the Byrne JAG program sweeping new policy conditions that were never approved (and indeed were considered and rejected) by Congress and that would federalize local jails and police stations, mandate warrantless detentions in order to investigate for federal civil infractions, sow fear in local immigrant communities, and ultimately make the people of Chicago less safe,” attorneys for the city wrote in Monday’s filing. More here.

‘Sanctuary city’ Chicago sues Trump administration

Chicago (AFP) – The city of Chicago filed suit Monday against the Donald Trump administration for withholding funds from so-called “sanctuary cities” that fail to cooperate with tougher federal efforts cracking down on undocumented immigrants.

The lawsuit, the first of its kind, challenges the Trump administration’s requirement that cities detain suspects for questioning by federal immigration authorities or see their grant funding for municipal police departments withheld.

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel on Monday called the policy counterproductive.

“By forcing us, or the police department, to choose between the values of the city and the philosophy of the police department… I think it’s a false choice, and it undermines our actual safety agenda,” Emanuel told CNN.

“We will always be a welcoming city,” he continued, adding that local police departments rely on the cooperation of the immigrant community — both documented and undocumented.

“Our police department is part of a neighborhood, part of a community, built on the premise of trust,” the mayor said.

“We want you to come to Chicago if you believe in the American dream,” he added.

The federal grant at the center of the lawsuit provided $2.3 million to Chicago last year to purchase police equipment, such as cars, computers, radios and Tasers, Emanuel said.

The federal government’s new rules would tie the grant to requirements that, among other things, cities give federal immigration authorities unlimited access to local police stations to interrogate arrestees, Chicago officials said.

The city is asking a federal court to declare such requirements unlawful.

Trump has targeted sanctuary cities as part of his promised crackdown on illegal immigration, and the Department of Justice implemented the new funding requirement last month.

Supporters of “sanctuary city” policies say requiring local police to fully cooperate with immigration enforcement erodes with the communities they serve and frustrate law enforcement efforts.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) criticized the lawsuit in a statement that accused Emanuel of “protecting criminal aliens and putting Chicago’s law enforcement at greater risk.”

The head of the DOJ, US Attorney General Jeff Sessions, last week said the policy would improve safety for immigration officers who now have to track down suspects who already had been detained and released by local police.

“By forcing police to go into more dangerous situations to re-arrest the same criminals, these policies endanger law enforcement officers more than anyone,” Sessions said.