You may or may not have heard of the alleged failings of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, including unchecked corruption and sytemic flaws over the past year. I wondered if this was intra-bureau politics or if it was a real problem and if so, has anything changed?
Apparently not.
According to this AP story, we not only have a problem with ethics in Border Patrol, but suffer from widespread corruption throughout the immigration system.
On the California border, at least nine immigration officers have been arrested or sentenced on corruption-related charges in the past 12 months. One of those convicted of smuggling in illegal immigrants turned out to be an illegal immigrant himself, who had used a fake birth certificate to get hired by the Border Patrol.
On the Texas border, at least 10 officers have been charged or sentenced in corruption schemes over the past year, including four Border Patrol agents — all assigned to the same highway checkpoint — who admitted taking money to let both drugs and migrants pass. The numbers are a snapshot, but the picture is clear. There's no shortage of "sure things" among U.S. immigration workers....
"After the next attack, when they find out that an employee was bribed by a terrorist or bribed by a spy, it's going to be too late," said Michael Maxwell, an ex-police chief who headed internal affairs at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services...
"It's outrageous, absolutely outrageous, how little attention is being focused on this issue when you look at the ramifications on national security," said Maxwell, who informed Congress that complaints included some allegations of employees providing material support to known terrorists or being influenced by foreign intelligence services.
Here's the kicker:
In February, Maxwell resigned as director of the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Office of Security and Investigations and sought whistle-blower protection after he began complaining to Congress about what he describes as rampant corruption...
Whistle blower protection? Just what the hell was going on?
Here's a clue from back in March, 2006:
Michael Maxwell... claims that senior agency officials had been retaliating against him for telling Congress about what he described as serious national security vulnerabilities that persisted despite his warnings to those running the agency.
In a letter to USCIS Director Emilio Gonzales from Senator Chuck Grassley, Maxwell apparently, had a lot to say:
...Maxwell indicated that he was personally instructed not to talk to Members of Congress.In this April interview with Lou Dobbs, Maxwell says the system is bad, really bad:
At the close of the interview, Maxwell was advised to inform my staff immediately if he believed that he had been subject to retaliation for his cooperation with Congress and/or for anything associated with the ongoing Congressional inquiry into internal corruption at USCIS and its ability to prevent immigration benefits from being improperly granted to terrorists and their associates.
Based on the information provided by Maxwell and others, I continue to be concerned that USCIS is not fully capable of executing this mission...
DOBBS: Michael, let's turn first -- you said to the House Subcommittee on International Terrorism, the integrity of the U.S. immigration system has been corrupted. The system is incapable of insuring the security of our homeland. How bad is it?
MICHAEL MAXWELL, FORMER IMMIGRATION OFFICIAL: It's as bad as you want to let your imagination wander. Every major process, the citizenship process, the asylum process, the refugee process is rife with loopholes that you can drive a truck through. The system can be gamed.
DOBBS: You believe that the issue is the potential for the terrorists to take advantage of the system. Is that correct?
MAXWELL: Absolutely. Absolutely. We know they are embedding here in society. The Assistant Secretary Julie Myers on the 5th of last month -- or of this month, just before my testimony, came out and said exactly that, that terrorists are embedding in our society and they are using the legal immigration system to do it.
Was Maxwell's lone voice unfounded, just another guy with an axe to grind? Increasingly, NO:
Sultan Farakhan, an immigrant benefits application adjudicator, was terminated from employment Friday at the National Benefits Center in Lee's Summit, Mo., one of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services' largest immigration application processing centers. "They are upset with the fact that I spoke out," Farakhan said Friday. "I don't understand why they want to keep the truth hidden, because this is about the national security of our country. "Going after me is a waste of time. They need to fix the system. I truly believe terrorists have slipped through ... and they are here and waiting." ... Farakhan, who requested whistle-blower protection from Congress last month, said many employees were not aware that a simple keystroke would have allowed them to fully check the background of applicants against the terrorist database... Farakhan's assertions were confirmed by several otheradjudicators interviewed under condition of anonymity, and in federal documents and e-mails obtained by the Daily Bulletin. Whistle-blower protection... condition of anonymity... We have a serious problem in USCIS, from the boots on the ground to the top brass. Given the congressional track record on immigration, this serious problem may be infecting the Capitol as well. The United States at current rate cannot sustain the influx of illegals and their children, and another coordinated terrorist attack could be fatal to the nation. It is imperative that we vote for the right guy in November. More to come. *UPDATE* Would a fence help? Watch this.
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