Amnesty Advocates Portray Repatriated Illegal as First Martyr of Trump’s Policies

amnesty
Neil Munro

Immigration officials have conducted a messy public repatriation of an illegal immigrant in Arizona, giving amnesty advocates a potential martyr in their media-magnified campaign against President Donald Trump’s popular new immigration policies.

The clumsy process provided local media with easy coverage of an emotional stand-off between immigration officers and demonstrators, who temporarily blocked the departure of a van containing the illegal immigrant. The stand-off allowed the two U.S.-born children of the illegal to make their weeping, telegenic appeals via video, TV, and tweets, backed by protestors carrying signs saying “Not One More Deportation.” The dramatic scene was broadcast by sympathetic advocates and journalists — including the New York Times and NBC — who portrayed the episode as the first repatriation under Trump’s directive that existing immigration laws actually be enforced.

Immigration officials even allowed the media to take sympathetic photographs of the Mexican illegal, named Guadalupe Garcia de Rayos, while she was locked in the transport van.

One of the protesting groups is a union-funded organization, Voto Latino, which specializes in registering Latinos to vote.

The woman has been living in the United States illegally since she was 14, and she has married another illegal immigrant. She was detained in 2008 when officials discovered she was illegally using an American’s Social Security number to take a job at a theme park. In 2013, she was ordered home by a judge but was not sent home during President Barack Obama’s terms. Instead, she was required to periodically meet immigration officials until President Trump’s revived enforcement rules required she be returned home.

The New York Times portrayed the repatriation as a betrayal of the illegal migrant, saying: “She Showed Up Yearly to Meet Immigration Agents. Now They’ve Deported Her.” The article continued:

On Thursday, Ms. Rayos’s husband and children received a call from her, telling them she was in Nogales, Mexico, just south of the Arizona border.

His daughter had stayed with protesters until long past midnight. By sunrise, she was back home, packing her mother’s suitcase — her toothpaste, her brush, her favorite pants and shirts.

“Nobody should have to pack her mother’s bag,” she said, her lips quivering, tears filling her eyes. “It isn’t fair.”

The New York Times followed up with a pro-amnesty Monday editorial, declaring:

By no standard of common sense or decency should Guadalupe García de Rayos have been a priority for deportation. Ms. Rayos, a 35-year-old mother of two, was arrested on Wednesday by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Phoenix. On Thursday she was deported to Mexico, a country she left 21 years ago. Her devastated family, including her American-born children, remains in the United States.

Roughly 11 million illegal immigrants are living in the United States, where they help cut the wages paid by American employers and also consume taxes paid by Americans.

After the woman was sent home, her two children — and media people — met her in Mexico for another staged press conference.

Late Thursday night, amnesty advocates also protested in Los Angeles after immigration officers detained some illegal immigrations for possible repatriation.

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