• San Francisco sheriff defies federal immigration authorities

    In defiance of federal immigration officials, San Francisco Sheriff Michael Hennessey announced that as of 1 June he would no longer hand over illegal immigrants arrested for low-level crimes to immigration authorities; Hennessey’s actions come in support of San Francisco’s sanctuary city policy which prohibits local officials from cooperating with federal authorities unless immigrants are suspected felons; illegal immigrants arrested for minor crimes like public intoxication or shoplifting will not be held in jail; the new policy does not bar individual sheriff’s deputies from cooperating with federal immigration officials

  • One ton of marijuana, rescued hikers, arrest sex offenders seized on border

    Border patrol agents in Arizona and California had a busy Memorial Day weekend intercepting large quantities of drugs, rescuing stranded hikers, and arresting two sex offenders; border patrol agents in the Tucson section of the U.S.-Mexico border interdicted more than a ton of marijuana along with four firearms; a total of 2,140 pounds of marijuana was intercepted with an estimated value of $1.7 million in Arizona alone;

  • Border securityHeightened border security helps fuel billion dollar smuggling business

    As the United States makes it more difficult to cross its borders illegally, business for human traffickers has been booming with smugglers making billions of dollars a year; traffickers make an estimated $6.6 billion each year by bringing immigrants across the U.S.-Mexico border; in May, x-ray machines at checkpoints in southern Mexico found 513 people crammed into two trailers, leading to the largest bust yet; the United States has inadvertently generated a boom in the smuggling business by making the border harder to cross; drug cartels are believed to have entered the lucrative market