AUDIO INTERVIEW & ARTICLES: Sheriffs, “Sick and Tired” of Obama, March on D.C.

Former Arizona sheriff Richard Mack, the founder and president of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association, who successfully sued the federal government over the Brady Bill, marched through the nation’s capital and met with representatives and senators in Washington D.C. on December 10, along with scores of other serving sheriffs, in an effort to stop President Barack Hussein Obama’s executive order granting amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants.

Dave Gahary spoke with Sheriff Mack that day to to get an update on the march in this quick interview (5:44).

Sheriffs from Across America Converge on D.C. for Anti-Amnesty March

By Dave Gahary

Former Arizona sheriff Richard Mack, the founder and president of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association (CSPOA), who successfully sued the federal government over the Brady Bill, is in Washington D.C. today along with scores of other serving sheriffs who are marching through the nation’s capital and meeting with representatives and senators, in an effort to stop President Barack Hussein Obama’s executive order granting amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants.

“Well, we have about 50 sheriffs here from all over the country, and this is the first time that the National Sheriffs Association has stood with me and the CSPOA in supporting the same cause,” Mack told AMERICAN FREE PRESS in an exclusive interview.

“We agree that the President of the United States is acting outside the law,” he continued, and that he has no authority to set aside law or make law and to pick and choose what parts of the Constitution he wishes to follow because of its political expediency.”

AFP asked what their goals were.

“First and foremost, we want to remind Congress that they can defund anything that the president is trying to do,” Mack answered. “We want Congress to defund any movement that would support amnesty, and they have the authority and power to do this and we just want them to have the courage and we want them to know that the sheriffs of this country and the people of this country want something to be done. So we want Congress to provide security at the border and we want them to defund to any proposal by the president for amnesty.”

“We’re also standing against the damage and destruction that is happening to our country, economically and spiritually and criminally, because of the lawlessness going on and being supported by our own federal government,” he continued. “The government allows millions and millions of illegal aliens to cross over into America. We don’t know who they are, we don’t know what intentions they have in mind, we don’t know if they’re diseased, we don’t know if they’re cartel members or the Mexican mafia, we don’t know if they are terrorists, and we know darn well, it’s already been documented, that terrorists come into our country through the southern border and even the northern border because of the lax security.”

Mack explained what may be one of the motivating factors that might explain the lax enforcement of this country’s immigration laws: handouts of cushy and lucrative contracts to big business political supporters.

“Constitutionally and lawfully the federal government is required to protect the borders of this country,” Mack said. “When they refuse to do it, and then spend millions and billions of dollars to try to stop the problems afterwards, is absolutely ridiculous and it’s hypocrisy and stupidity at its worst. And charging the taxpayers for that, when you don’t do your job in the first place, is malfeasance of office and it’s treason.”

“We want to put the White House and the Congress on notice that what they have been doing is hurting the infrastructure of our counties, hurting the crime rates in our counties, and were sick and tired of having to pick up after the federal government when it refuses to do its job,” Mack said.

Mack explained why we all must do our part.

“We must all do what the Founding fathers said: ‘pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor to his holy cause of liberty.’ We can’t just [read newspapers] like this anymore, we need to [read] and do. If we’re not gonna be doers, then really there’s not much sense in [reading].”

Dave Gahary, a former submariner in the U.S. Navy, is the host of AFP’s ‘Underground Interview’ series.

Be sure to check out all of AFP’s free audio interviews. You’ll find them on the HOME PAGE, ARCHIVES & AUDIO section.

Sheriffs, States Plan to Resist Obama’s Illegal Alien Amnesty

• Republicans say president thumbing nose at Constitution

By Keith Johnson

The federal behemoth known as the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is ready, willing and able to put in motion President Obama’s new plan for amnesty for millions of illegal aliens. It hasn’t even been a month since the president’s executive action on immigration and DHS has already gone on a hiring spree to process the more than 4 million illegal aliens that will be granted amnesty.

On December 1, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services announced it was “taking steps to open a new operational center in Crystal City, a neighborhood in Arlington, Virgina, to accommodate about 1,000 full-time, permanent federal and contract employees in a variety of positions and grade levels. The initial workload will include cases filed as a result of the executive actions on immigration announced on Nov. 20, 2014.”

As one might expect, the move has come under fire by House Republicans, who are citing it as yet another example of how the president is thumbing his nose at the Constitution.

“This facility is a clear symbol of the president’s defiance of the American people, their laws, and their Constitution,” said Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.). “He is hiring federal employees to carry out a directive that violates the laws Congress has passed in order to foist on the nation laws Congress has repeatedly refused to pass.”

Meanwhile, a new directive by DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson has been subject to intense criticism by civilian law enforcement around the country for its weak stance on immigration enforcement.

In one of a series of new DHS policy memos, Johnson instructs federal law enforcement personnel to use “prosecutorial discretion” in the apprehension and detention of illegal aliens. To some sheriffs serving in counties along the southern U.S. border, this means that the vast majority of those residing in this country need not live in fear of deportation if they can simply refrain from committing serious crimes.

“While the public and media’s attention was on President Obama’s executive action, DHS simultaneously issued orders to ignore America‘s immigration laws,” wrote Sheriff Paul Babeu of Pinal County, Arizona. “This directive is the ‘smoking gun’ showing ICE [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] doesn’t plan to arrest or take action on any of the nearly 20 million illegals already in the United States, which is far greater than the 5 million as stated by the president. President Obama makes illegals his priority, rather than securing the border and enforcing the law. Immigration laws will only sometimes be used for the most serious violent felons, while nearly 20million illegals get a free pass. This is not prosecutorial discretion, but an intentional and flagrant disregard of law and we will all suffer consequences.”

While some sheriffs are sounding the alarm to their local constituents, others are taking their grievances directly to Capitol Hill. On December 10, Bristol County, Massachusetts Sheriff Thomas Hodgson and about 50 other duly elected peacekeepers joined up in Washington to meet with Republican senators and members of Congress who oppose the DHS directives.

In yet another noble effort to turn this all around, 17 states—led by Texas—have formed a coalition and joined in a federal lawsuit to challenge the DHS directives on the grounds that they will extend legal benefits like federal work permits, Medicare and Social Security to individuals who are openly violating immigration laws.

“The president’s unilateral executive action tramples the Constitution’s Take Care Clause and federal law,” said Texas’s attorney general on December 3. “The Constitution’s Take Care Clause limits the president’s power and ensures that he will faithfully execute Congress’s laws—not rewrite them under the guise of ‘prosecutorial discretion.’ The Department of Homeland Security’s directive was issued without following the Administrative Procedure Act’s rulemaking guidelines and is nothing but an unlawfully adopted legislative rule: an executive decree that requires federal agencies to award legal benefits to individuals whose conduct contradicts the priorities of Congress.”

Let’s just hope that at least one of the pending challenges to Obama’s thoroughly unconstitutional decree succeeds.

Keith Johnson is a writer based in Tennessee.