Earlier this month 32 year old Kate Steinle was murdered in San Francisco by an illegal alien who had previously been deported five times.
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“It is very clear to me that we have to improve cooperation between local, state and federal law enforcement”, Feinstein said during a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the issue Tuesday. At the hearing, Steinle also recalled the day his daughter was killed, describing how they were walking hand-in-hand on Pier 14 in San Francisco when a shot rang out.
It comes just weeks after Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, an undocumented immigrant who has a felony record, allegedly shot Kate Steinle. Steinle’s death has touched off a national debate on “sanctuary cities” like San Francisco, where officials can not detain a suspected undocumented immigrant unless additional requirements are met.
Sanchez had been turned over to San Francisco by federal officials in March on a decades-old drug warrant, but was released by the sheriff’s office the next month.
“Congressional Republicans are ramping up pressure on President Barack Obama over the contentious issue of “sanctuary cities” – grilling administration officials, proposing a flurry of bills and threatening to block funding for cities that provide safe harbor to undocumented immigrants”.
“Our family realizes the complexities of immigration laws, however, we feel strongly that some legislation should be discussed, enacted and/or changed to take these undocumented immigrant felons off our streets for good”.
“We feel that if Kate’s Law saves one daughter, one son, a mother or a father, Kate’s death won’t be in vain”, Steinle said.
Immigration officials acknowledge great difficulty in keeping track of the large number of foreign students coming into the U.S.-now in excess of one million each year. She therefore called on members of Congress to start implementing immigrations laws that put Americans – not criminals – first.
Rev. Gabriel Salguero, co-lead pastor of the multicultural Lamb’s Church of the Nazarene in New York City, answers a question while testifying before a Senate Judiciary hearing to examine the Administration’s immigration enforcement policies, in Washington, Tuesday, July 21, 2015. Deportations didn’t stop him; sanctuary city policies let him thrive. “And I think they should be removed from the United States, and I think we ought to cooperate with law enforcement to achieve that end”. “Things can not continue this way”.
“Enforcing the immigration laws of the United States is not a voluntary or trivial matter”. KTVU Fox 2 have details for you throughout the day, including some of the testimony from Kate Steinle’s father.
Republican presidential hopeful Donald Trump criticized USA immigration and trade policies on Saturday in speeches that veered from accusing Mexico of deliberately sending criminals across the border to professing respect for the Mexican government and love for its people. He is calling for mandatory minimum prison sentences of five years for repeat offenders who enter the US illegally. Sen. That much is to be expected, I suppose, but they are picking up allies in unusual places. Immigrant rights activists, however, say that requiring local law enforcement to comply with ICE requests has been ruled unconstitutional in federal court.
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Democratic Senator Richard Durbin warned of a chilling and disruptive effect if immigrant communities come to fear local law enforcement and view police officers as an arm of USA immigration enforcement.
