Let more liberal hand-wringing begin. A member of Donald Trump’s transition team, Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, has announced that Trump’s immigration advisers are considering a registry of immigrants from Muslim nations with active terrorist organizations within their borders. This is a proposal, not set in stone.
Furthermore, Kris Kobach is reportedly on Trump’s short list for U.S. Attorney General.
Kobach has had previous experience writing law implementing a national registry of immigrants. After the 9/11/2001 attacks, Kobach, then a member of George W. Bush’s Justice Department, designed the National Security Entry-Exit Registration System (NSEERS). Persons from nations at high risk for terrorism were required to undergo fingerprinting and questioning upon entry to the U.S. Some male non-residents were required to register at government offices and periodically check in.
The program was abandoned in 2011 after it was deemed redundant, and certain civil rights groups (read: ACLU) criticized it for ‘unfairly’ targeting Muslims.
I must admit I cringed a little when I read the title of an article in The Hill calling it a “Muslim Registry.” But Kobach is not calling for a blanket registry of all Muslims, merely those who are not citizens and are coming from terror-rich nations. It is hardly a call to reinstate Executive Order 9066 of 1942, which resulted in the forced relocation and internment of Japanese-Americans in World War II.
Like it or not, we are a nation at war. Having knowledge of non-citizens who wish to enter the nation from parts of the world with terrorist groups that seek war on us seems reasonable.
I can also tell you some aspects of Kris Kobach that the media will never report.
I have met Mr. Kobach on several occasions, and did volunteer work when he first ran for Kansas Secretary of State. He boasts spectacular academic achievements: he graduated at the top of his undergraduate class at Harvard, and received a doctorate in political science at Oxford University and his Juris Doctorate from Yale. Pretty heady stuff for a boy from Kansas.
What’s more, he is also a lover of the Constitution and interprets it as an originalist.
Kobach is a former Constitutional law professor at the University of Missouri — Kansas City, and he was the sole conservative on the faculty there. Moreover, he would provide seminars on basic Constitutional knowledge to outside groups, and provide them gratis. A friend of mine who teaches in a Kansas City area school district once asked Mr. Kobach to speak at her elementary school on civics and the Constitution. He was happy to do so — again, free of charge. Who does that, other than one who truly loves the Constitution?
Kobach is indeed tough on illegal immigration, and is a border hawk. Yet he also adheres to the Constitution he loves. There’s more to Kris Kobach and his proposed registry than the media want you to know.
Registries aren’t inherently unConstitutional. It technically wouldn’t violate the 2d Amendment to have a registry of all gun owners – but it sure as heck would not be something we want! It would very likely be abused in short order.
And, as you point out, it doesn’t apply to citizens, only to those who are here at our sufferance.
But, neither did the Patriot Act (notwithstanding a lot of rhetoric from the left claiming otherwise). And, look what it turned into.
Of course, we already have a database we can use for this. Every single person who (legally) enters this country goes into it. Of course, you have to care enough to actually keep an eye on it and go find people who disappear or never register as leaving.
One other pre-emptive point to be made: islam is not just a religion, it’s a political movement that advocates the overthrow of the US gov’t. That makes it (by law) an adequate reason to deny entry to the US to someone. Or, to track them once they enter.
I’m fine with a Muslim registry. I mean, who wants socks for Eid?
Bwahahahahahahaha!
3 Comments