Shots fired at San Antonio ICE office a result of left wing hysteria?

Early Tuesday morning, gunshots rang out in San Antonio. They were directed at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) office. Luckily, no one was killed or wounded in the attack. FBI special agent Christopher Combs who runs the San Antonio wing of the bureau condemned the attack and said it could have caused “the assassination of a federal employee.” All evidence of the shooting was recovered inside ICE offices which makes it certain that it was targeted. The FBI will be opening an investigation into the incident. ICE officials pulled no punches in casting the blame. Daniel Bible who heads the local ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) office had this to say,

“political rhetoric and misinformation that various politicians, media outlets, and activist groups recklessly disseminate to the American people regarding the ICE mission only serve to further encourage these violent acts.”

This is just another episode in a series of attacks on ICE facilities by radical leftists and immigration activists. The Federalist recently provided a list of similar incidents.

• On July 12, immigration activists ripped down an American flag outside an ICE office in Aurora, Colorado and replaced it with a Mexican flag. They then vandalized the building with spray paint.

• On July 14, a self-described “anti-fascist” and “anarchist” assaulted an ICE facility in Tacoma, Washington. Using a rifle and flammable material, he started a car on fire and attempted unsuccessfully to detonate a propane tank. He was shot dead by police.

• On July 16, 11 leftist immigration protestors were arrested for illegally storming an ICE office in Washington DC.

Counting this latest attack, there have been 4 within the past month. Bible was spot on in his implication of the radical left in these incidents. The root of violence against ICE is unfortunately, the political rhetoric of the radical left.  

If there is any doubt of the validity of the previous statement, one need only take an overview of the prevailing talking points of the radicals. Back in June, socialist representative Ocasio-Cortez made headlines once again for a remark about ICE facilities for detaining illegal aliens. In her own words, “The United States is running concentration camps on the southern border. And that is exactly what they are. They are concentration camps and if that doesn’t bother you, I don’t, I got nothing. Like we can have — I wanna talk to the people who are concerned enough with humanity and that never again means something.” One of the cardinal rules of politics is to not make comparisons to Hitler, the Nazis or the Holocaust. Dissecting American politics objectively, nothing on either side is directly comparable to the Holocaust. Making that comparison cheapens the genocide itself and is a slap in the face to its survivors. The claim itself is very untrue considering that the nature of a concentration camp is to extract physical labor, murder on a mass scale or detain political prisoners –all of which contrast with ICE facilities. A recent walkthrough of an ICE facility in Adelanto California revealed it the migrants housed there had access to all of the following: medical, dental and mental care, legal counsel, a law library, outdoor soccer fields, XBOX video games, unlimited phone calls, physical contact visitations and other services while never being locked in cells.

A few days ago presidential hopeful Kamala Harris accused president Trump and his administration of running a “campaign of terror” in reference to his immigration policy. She missed the fact that the raids she refer to were carried out on illegal aliens who had no right to be in the country in the first place and immediately played the race card by insinuating it was an attack against Hispanics. Harris demagogued the perfectly reasonable position which holds that illegal aliens should be deported into an attack based solely on skin color.

An Illinois state senator recently made headlines for a mock assassination of the president that occurred at his fundraiser. One man dressed in Hispanic attire wore a mask that is unmistakably meant to be Trump posed with another who brandished a fake rifle. The phony Trump then pretended to be shot. Mock assassinations of elected officials are a bit inflammatory and that point is not controversial. Governor Pritzker (D) called the incident “insensitive and wrong.” State senator Martin Sandoval, the politician whose fundraiser this occurred at tried to distance himself from it as well writing “The incident that took place is unacceptable, I don’t condone violence toward the President or anyone else. I apologize that something like this happened at my event.”

What was really the crux of over the top rhetoric in recent weeks was the saga of the movie The Hunt. It received widespread media attention for being about rich leftists flying to a private island to murder Trump supporters for sport. Victims slated for killing are labeled “MAGA types” which is a reference to Donald Trump’s campaign slogan make America great again. They are also referred to as “Deplorables”, another Trumpian term deriving itself from a Hillary Clinton speech in which she called half of the president’s supporters a “basket of deplorables.” If any inkling persists that these terms could refer to something else it is rendered void by the fact that the film’s original title was “Red State vs. Blue State.” The very fact that someone conceptualized creating a movie about the murder of political opponents is shocking in the highest order of magnitude. Killing those who disagree with one’s perspective on politics and choice of presidential candidate is not entertainment in any way, shape or form.

With the state of the political discourse and that of the wider culture like this, acts of political terrorism such as what occurred at the ICE facilities can only be expected. Mock assassinations, ICE facilities cast as concentration camps and entire movie devoted to senseless, politically motivated murder have no place American culture. It is about time that everyone takes a step back and tones down the volume and venom of the debate for the unity and stability of America demands it.

Photo credit: “Officials blame ‘political rhetoric and misinformation’ after shots fired at San Antonio ICE office” via USA Today

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