quote:

Originally posted by 2BobTanner:
There’s going to be a “deep dive” into the History books now. Researching exactly what was said <snip>

I agree, particularly with respect to whether the jurisdictional issue might be used for allowing the executive order to stand. However, I suspect that President Trump and his advisors suspected or even expected that the order would be overturned initially but also knew that might serve as a rallying cry to force legislative action (if the courts say Congress has the power to further define jurisdiction) or even a Constitutional amendment if they can't. It's about getting the ball started and keeping it rolling at this point.

Center for Immigration Studies
Border Patrol Agent Killed in Shootout in Vermont
Report: Suspect was German national who overstayed H-1B nonimmigrant visa

By Andrew R. Arthur on January 22, 2025
Maland
Overlooked amidst the hoopla of the inauguration and a flurry of executive actions on President Trump’s first day in office was the tragic killing on Monday of 44-year-old Border Patrol agent David “Chris” Maland during a highway shootout in upstate Vermont. Reports indicate that the suspect is Felix Bauckholt, a German national who had overstayed an H-1B employment-based nonimmigrant visa. This case raises a lot of questions even as it underscores the dangers of immigration enforcement.

The Event. Around 3:15 p.m. on January 20, Agent Maland was involved in a traffic stop of a vehicle near mile marker 168 on Interstate 91 between the Vermont towns of Newport and Orleans, approximately 20 miles from the U.S.-Canada border.

According to the FBI: “During the course of the traffic stop, an exchange of gunfire occurred, and Agent Maland was struck. Additionally, one subject was killed, and one subject was injured and is currently being treated at an area hospital.”

Local reporting, from CBS affiliate WCAX in Burlington, Vt., provides additional information about those allegedly involved in the crime:

The two suspects — a man and a woman — were on the radar of authorities before Monday’s incident and were reportedly looking to buy real estate — in the Northeast Kingdom. The man who was killed has been identified by the FBI as a German national in the U.S. on a current visa. The woman, who was wounded, is an American, and is now in federal custody. Authorities have not released any other information on what prompted the shooting, the identity of the suspects, or if other agents were involved.
Apparently, the pair had spent five days at the nearby Newport City Inn and Suites, and the employees there were familiar with the female suspect because she wore a mask throughout her stay — a mask she refused to remove even during the check-in process.

Chastity Deroehn, who works at the hotel, told WCAX: “I did ask her to lower it [the mask] so I could check her ID, and she refused to. But we don’t push the issue when it comes to stuff like that. We just do the best we can”.

The killing of Agent Maland shook the staff at the hotel, with the manager telling the outlet that they rely on Border Patrol, agents to provide “law enforcement services, especially late at night”.

That tracks statements made by Vincent Illuzzi, the state’s attorney in nearby Essex County, Vt., who told AP: “We have limited law enforcement and [Border Patrol agents are] often primary responders in emergency cases.”

That’s a familiar story for anyone who’s spent time in the more isolated areas near the southwest or northern borders. Cops are scarce, so Border Patrol takes up the slack even when incidents aren’t immigration related.

The Suspect. The suspect in the shooting is allegedly one Felix Bauckholt, and his tale is a unique one.

A German national, Bauckholt reportedly came to the United States on a nonimmigrant H-1B visa in 2022, but for some reason that visa expired and he attempted to change his status to F-1 student.

As USCIS explains, the H-1B nonimmigrant category “applies to people who wish to perform services in a specialty occupation, services of exceptional merit and ability relating to a Department of Defense (DOD) cooperative research and development project, or services as a fashion model of distinguished merit or ability”.

It’s unclear which of those classifications Bauckholt fell under.

The F-1 nonimmigrant visa category is for alien students, and it’s pretty uncommon for an H-1B visa holder to switch to it. Usually, aliens lawfully here as students seek H-1Bs — not the other way around.

Aliens on H-1Bs can be admitted initially for three years (and extended thereafter), so it’s not clear why Bauckholt’s allegedly expired so relatively quickly.

Of course, the biggest question, assuming that all of the reported facts are true, is why Bauckholt got into a gun fight with a Border Patrol agent on a highway in northern Vermont. That one may never be answered.

Chris Maland. Maland, an Air Force veteran who had worked security duty at the Pentagon on 9/11, was assigned to Newport Station in the Border Patrol’s Swanton (Vt.) sector. Swanton sector has responsibility for 295 miles of the Northern border as well as for 24,000 square miles spread across New Hampshire, Vermont, and upstate New York.

Maland had spent nearly a decade in the Border Patrol and had apparently transferred to Vermont from Texas. While unconfirmed, online memorials indicate that he left behind a wife and two children.

Rep. Mark Green (R-Tenn.) — chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, which has jurisdiction over the Border Patrol — issued the following statement on Tuesday:

I am heartbroken by the loss of Agent David Maland, a dedicated Border Patrol agent who was horrifically shot in the line of duty while serving at our northern border. We owe an immense debt of gratitude to Agent Maland for nearly a decade of service protecting our communities in the force. We must never forget that the men and women in green on the frontlines of this border crisis defend our homeland at great personal cost. Far too often these courageous public servants, like Agent Maland, pay the ultimate price. Please join me in prayer for Agent Maland’s loved ones and fellow agents as they mourn this tragic loss and honor his memory.
The Killing of Agent Javier Vega. Maland is just the latest Border Patrol agent to be killed in the line of duty, the last being Javier Vega Jr. , who died after he was shot attempting to fend off a robbery in August 2014 near Santa Monica, Texas. Like Maland, Vega was a veteran.

Vega’s killer, Gustavo Tijerina Sandoval — an illegal migrant from Mexico who had been deported multiple times — was convicted and received the death penalty in June 2018. That conviction was affirmed at the state level in 2022, and in May 2024, the Supreme Court denied certiorari in his case.

Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, writing for herself and Justice Sotomayor, dissented from that decision on procedural grounds.

Interestingly, in its online memorial for Agent Vega, CBP stated that it was believed that Tijerina Sandoval and a co-defendant in the killing “had committed numerous similar robberies at the direction of a Mexican cartel”.

That’s something to think about in light of President Trump’s recent executive order directing the State Department, DHS, DOJ, and the Director of National Intelligence to make recommendations on designating cartels and other criminal organizations as “specially designated global terrorists”.

Border Patrol agents have been vilified at the highest level of government over the past few years, but it appears the tide is turning. As Chairman Green so aptly made clear, “We must never forget that the men and women in green on the frontlines of this border crisis defend our homeland at great personal cost.”

*

“Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance.” (Psa 33:12)

quote:

Originally posted by reloader-1:
There’s already clear grounds that the children of diplomats and invading armies aren’t included.

Why not individuals illegally in the country? It is an exact parallel.

It will be a legal battle that will have to be decided by the Supreme Court.
But it's a fight worth having...

Birthright Citizenship Isn’t Real

Donald Trump yesterday issued a new executive order declaring that so-called “birthright citizenship” does not apply to the children of foreign nationals residing illegally within the United States. The order reads, in part:

(a) It is the policy of the United States that no department or agency of the United States government shall issue documents recognizing United States citizenship, or accept documents issued by State, local, or other governments or authorities purporting to recognize United States citizenship, to persons: (1) when that person’s mother was unlawfully present in the United States and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth, or (2) when that person’s mother’s presence in the United States was lawful but temporary, and the person’s father was not a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident at the time of said person’s birth.

There is a common misconception in the United States that the Fourteenth Amendment to the US Constitution mandates that the US government grant citizenship to anyone and everyone born within the borders of the United States. This misconception is largely due to the fact that, for several decades, US courts and technocrats have conspired to redefine the original meaning of the amendment, and thus apply it to every child of every tourist and foreign national who happens to be born on this side of the US border.

Some have even attempted to define access to birthright citizenship as some sort of natural right. This is a common tactic among some libertarians who have twisted the idea of property rights to extend the idea of a “right” to the governmental administrative act known as “naturalization.”

Even when looking at the issue strictly in terms of procedural legal rights, however, it is clear that the current definition of birthright citizenship is in conflict with the law as originally intended and interpreted.

To understand the central point of contention, let’s note the text of the Fourteenth Amendment itself, which states that citizenship shall be extended to: “[a]ll persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof…” Note that there are two qualifying phrases here. The persons in question must be both born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.

It is this second qualification that remains a matter of debate.

What does it mean to be subject to the jurisdiction of the United States? This issue is explained by legal scholar Hans Spakovsky who notes that advocates of granting birthright citizenship to anyone born in the United States

erroneously believe that anyone present in the United States has “subjected” himself “to the jurisdiction” of the United States, which would extend citizenship to the children of tourists, diplomats, and illegal aliens alike.

But that is not what that qualifying phrase means. Its original meaning refers to the political allegiance of an individual and the jurisdiction that a foreign government has over that individual.

The fact that a tourist or illegal alien is subject to our laws and our courts if they violate our laws does not place them within the political “jurisdiction” of the United States as that phrase was defined by the framers of the 14th Amendment.

This amendment’s language was derived from the 1866 Civil Rights Act, which provided that “[a]ll persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power” would be considered citizens.

Sen. Lyman Trumbull, a key figure in the adoption of the 14th Amendment, said that “subject to the jurisdiction” of the U.S. included not owing allegiance to any other country.

The courts themselves have historically recognized this distinction, noting that the whole purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment was to grant citizenship to former slaves who obviously were not connected to any other country or sovereign. In the Slaughter-House Cases, 83 U.S. 36 (1872), the court ruled:

That [the Fourteenth Amendment’s] main purpose was to establish the citizenship of the negro can admit of no doubt. The phrase ‘subject to its jurisdiction’ was intended to exclude from its operation children of ministers, consuls, and citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States.

That second sentence is key: ”The phrase ‘subject to its jurisdiction’ was intended to exclude from its operation ... citizens or subjects of foreign States born within the United States.” This was further confirmed by the Court in 1884 (in Elk v. Wilkins, 112 U.S. 94) when the Court stated that the idea of birthright citizenship did not apply to Native American tribes which were nonetheless within the borders of the United States:

“[The Fourteenth Amendment] contemplates two sources of citizenship, and two sources only: birth and naturalization. The persons declared to be citizens are ‘all persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof.’ The evident meaning of these last words is, not merely subject in some respect or degree to the jurisdiction of the United States, but completely subject to their political jurisdiction, and owing them direct and immediate allegiance. And the words relate to the time of birth in the one case, as they do to the time of naturalization in the other. Persons not thus subject to the jurisdiction of the United States at the time of birth cannot become so afterwards, except by being naturalized, either individually, as by proceedings under the naturalization acts; or collectively, as by the force of a treaty by which foreign territory is acquired. Indians born within the territorial limits of the United States, members of, and owing immediate allegiance to, one of the Indian tribes (an alien though dependent power,) although in a geographical sense born in the United States, are no more ‘born in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,’ within the meaning of the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment, than the children of subjects of any foreign government born within the domain of that government, or the children born within the United States, of ambassadors or other public ministers of foreign nations.”

In short, the court recognized that the tribal lands were within the legal jurisdiction of the United States, but this did not mean that everyone born within those borders was automatically granted citizenship. Those tribal members believed to be subjects of “foreign” tribal governments were therefore not “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States in a way that conferred automatic citizenship.

Congress further reinforced the court’s interpretation by adopting new legislation granting citizenship to all tribal members in 1924. Had the Fourteenth Amendment really granted automatic citizenship to everyone born within the borders of the United States, no such legislation would have been necessary.

In the year 2024, however, advocates of the new and novel interpretation of “birthright citizenship” insist that the child of foreign nationals automatically becomes a citizen of the United States based entirely on the location of birth.

This is a rather odd way of doing things. In historical practice nearly everywhere, citizenship depends largely on the citizenship of parents, or on the parents’ place of birth, and not on the place where parents happen to temporarily reside when the child is born. Thus, historically and globally, the child of foreign nationals is himself a foreign national. This is true, for instance, of children born to American nationals overseas.

Only in the United States does there appear to be widespread confusion about this.

Of course, some libertarian or “classical liberal” readers might argue that such legal precedents are meaningless, and that everyone “deserves” the legal “right” of citizenship. How citizenship is any sort of natural right or property right, however, remains a mystery. Has the child somehow “homesteaded” his citizenship? Obviously not. Has the child entered into a contract with a legitimate property owner to acquire the “property” of citizenship? To ask these questions is to see the absurdity of them.

On the other hand, it is important to note that a lack of citizenship in any particular place does not negate anyone’s property rights. Real property rights—what Rothbard called “universal rights”—exist regardless of one’s citizenship, where he lives, or where he happens to have been born.

Read more: https://mises.org/power-market...itizenship-isnt-real

quote:

Originally posted by WaterburyBob:

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
Fox reports Murkowski is voting against Hegseth..

Might be time for a recess ...

Fox News reports Hegseth already cleared Senate cloture to advance to final floor vote. Bitch is irrelevant.

https://www.breitbart.com/clip...defy-trump-dei-order

Dick Durbin encourages federal workers to fight Trump’s removal of DEI. Good luck with that. Dick.

It is official- John Ratcliff confirmed as the next CIA Director.

https://www.foxnews.com/politi...ngressional-approval

quote:

Originally posted by reloader-1:
There’s already clear grounds that the children of diplomats and invading armies aren’t included.

Why not individuals illegally in the country? It is an exact parallel.

Spot on. "And subject to the jurisdiction thereof" means complete federal jurisdiction. Can the federal government compel an illegal alien to serve on jury duty? No. Can the federal government compel an illegal alien to register for the draft? No.

Why did it take an act of Congress to make American Indians US citizens? Because they were considered to be citizens of another nation - their tribe, even though they were in the confines of the US. They were not subject to "complete" jurisdiction.

Ultimately, if the USSC decides that anchor babies are citizens, fine, they can stay, but your illegal alien parents have to leave. Take them with you, or don't.

Thinking this is a good place to drop this!

What a difference a few days make in our country. MAGA is here I think for a long time to come . I am anticipating much more winning and return to civility. Thank you 45/47 your years in power will be a blueprint for tomorrow

https://x.com/theltcolusmc/sta...STKIJkWWAZRssXvXabXw

quote:

Originally posted by sjtill:
I may not be tired of winning, but since I’m an old guy sometimes I need to sit down and catch my breath.

I was just about to post something similar! The winning in this thread and in the news is advancing faster than I can keep up with it!

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:

"F*ck Trump"

Sorry, Mr. Haitian man, I don't think you are his type.


.

quote:

Originally posted by bronicabill:
I was just about to post something similar! The winning in this thread and in the news is advancing faster than I can keep up with it!

I pulled my hamstring trying to catch up.

quote:

Originally posted by 12131:

quote:

Originally posted by WaterburyBob:

quote:

Originally posted by HRK:
Fox reports Murkowski is voting against Hegseth..

Might be time for a recess ...

Fox News reports Hegseth already cleared Senate cloture to advance to final floor vote. Bitch is irrelevant.

If they screw up the Hegseth confirmation, wait until the recess and put in Eric Prince. That'd make heads explode on both sides.