Inconvenient Immigration Facts

 - Donald Trump hired undocumented immigrants in 1991 to avoid paying overtime on the Trump Tower construction project. Other Trump Organization properties, including a New Jersey golf club, employed undocumented immigrants. (The New York Times, 4/27/1991; 4/9/2019)

- Melania Trump was paid for 10 modeling jobs in the United States worth $20,056 that occurred during August, September, and October of 1996 before she had legal permission to work in the country. (AP News, 11/4/2016)

- Elon Musk arrived in the USA on a J-1 student visa to study at Stanford in 1995, but worked without authorization before transitioning to an H-1B work visa. (The Guardian, 10/26/2024)

These are inconvenient facts which should be cited widely whenever the Trump Administration or its supporters claim they are merely applying immigration law as written and enforcing existing statutes. Before terrorizing minority communities or violating the civil rights of Americans and immigrants alike, this administration should first apply these rules to themselves and suffer the consequences accordingly.

Militant Immigration Policies are Republican Climate Change Policies

The Trump/GOP spending bill allocates a total of $75 billion to ICE for enforcement and deportation operations, including detention and hiring of additional personnel. This includes $45 billion for expanding detention facilities and $29.9 billion for enforcement and deportation. 

The far right knows that global climate change will lead to much more mass migration from climate refugees, survivors of blight, famine, asylum seekers from corrupt, dictatorial governments and drug cartels, etc. Their solution is to criminalize, deport, detain, and ultimately starve millions and millions of people - potentially billions of potential migrants by 2050.

Just read a summary of Steve Bannon's favorite book "The Camp of the Saints" for insight into how the far right regards immigrants from the global south. No doubt Stephen Miller has read it, also. But rest assured Donald Trump hasn't read it because, well, he doesn't read.

Anyway, it's important to understand that the near future will see much more militarized borders and more intrusive immigration enforcement goon squads. That's the Republican solution not just to immigration, but also to global climate change: more fossil fuel pollution, a total disregard for sustainable energy, and a standing army approach to a militant war on illegal immigration while also completely banning many forms of previously legal immigration.

Photo: Agents from ICE and Homeland Security brace for confrontation with immigration rights supporters in Los Angeles on June 8, 2025. Taurat Hossain/Anadolu/Getty

Job Openings for Trump Voters

 Attention Trump voters! 🍊 🍋 🍒 🥑 

Right now, there are many job openings in central California to pick fruits and vegetables. The pay is low, the labor is non-union, the hours are long and difficult, and the worksite is in challenging outdoor conditions, but you love America so much and we are counting on YOU in order to fulfill President Trump’s pledge to lower prices at the grocery store!

The workday starts early, so get out there and make America great again!

Enjoy Your Last Thanksgiving

 Too political? Maybe. But it's what I've been thinking about today, so I made this.

God or Government?

Curiously, many of the strongest proponents of a particular monotheistic worldview have no problem rejecting someone's humanity on the basis of their government-issued paperwork.

Why?  It turns out that, according to most Christian Evangelicals (who overwhelming support Donald Trump's immigrant policies), we are all the children of God... but casting out the foreigner (because they didn't meet the altogether arbitrary standard of government approval) is totally legit.

So much for Leviticus 19:33!  "When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him. You must treat the foreigner living among you as native-born and love him as yourself, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God."

America Is Not "Full"

Donald Trump recently claimed that "our country is full."  That is a lie.  America is not "full."  The USA has some of the lowest population density amongst most developed countries.

The Catch-22 of Immigration

1. Extract resources from developing countries to create a first-world economy which burns massive amounts of carbon.

2. Create global climate disruption due to increased carbon in the atmosphere.

3. Developing countries suffer from droughts, fires, floods and hurricanes - resulting in ecological and political instability.

4. Struggling people in developing countries suffering from these conditions grow desperate enough to emigrate, seeking economic opportunity and political stability.

5. First-world countries then deny these immigrants entry after their extractive economic model has destroyed living conditions for these immigrants in their home countries.

Illegal Space Aliens in the Caravan?

Donald Trump has claimed that there could be "Middle Easterners" in the migrant caravan from Central America.  Trump said "there's no proof of anything, but there could very well be" when pressed by CNN reporter Jim Acosta for concrete evidence that people of Middle Eastern descent or that suspected terrorists were among the group.

By that same logic, there very well could be space aliens "mixed in" with the caravan.  There's no proof of anything, but there could very well be.

Terry Bressi is a personal hero

I have been watching his Checkpoint USA YouTube channel for years and his work is a very important act of citizen journalism.

Borderless Volleyball

Remember: borders are just arbitrary lines drawn by politicians on pieces of paper.

Americans and Mexicans playing volleyball over the contentious US/Mexico border