Dozens of arrests of illegal aliens on sex-related charges across the state line in Massachusetts in just the past few weeks…
A new report reveals more than 660,000 immigrants with criminal histories inside the U.S., including thousands of murderers and rapists…
A fugitive from El Salvador arrested Tuesday near Martha’s Vineyard wanted for “crimes against humanity” in his native country…
All these stories have broken in the past few days, ensuring that illegal immigration will remain a hot topic in New Hampshire politics between now and November.
“It definitely affects Granite Staters, because some of these criminal aliens undoubtedly are living in New Hampshire,” said Jessica Vaughan, policy director for the Center for Immigration Studies.
In New Hampshire, Republicans and Democrats have clearly divergent views on immigration enforcement and border security. Republicans — including gubernatorial nominee Kelly Ayotte — overwhelmingly support a ban on sanctuary city policies, while Democrats in the State House unanimously opposed it.
“We are being ginned up to be concerned about one or two mass murderers,” state Rep. Jodi Newell (D-Keene) said during the House debate over the ban, “and so I think this is unnecessary and harmful.”
Democratic candidate for governor Joyce Craig has adamantly refused to say if she still supports sanctuary city policies, instead claiming that “New Hampshire is not a sanctuary state, and it will not be a sanctuary state when I am governor.”
In fact, several New Hampshire communities, including Keene, are sanctuary cities.
The drumbeat of dreadful news stories from next door in Massachusetts is keeping the immigration issue hot in New Hampshire.
The new Boston Herald analysis of federal immigration enforcement actions since early August finds at least 30 illegal immigrants have been arrested in the Bay State. A majority of those offenders were charged with sex-related crimes.
On Friday, Patrick J. Lechleitner — ICE’s deputy director and de facto acting head — sent a bombshell letter to GOP House members revealing that, “As of July 21, 2024, there were 662,566 noncitizens with criminal histories on ICE’s national docket.” Among that number are 425,431 convicted criminals and another 222,000 illegal aliens facing criminal charges and could be deported — but haven’t been.
Enforcement officials revealed that 13,099 of these illegal immigrants still in the U.S. have been previously convicted of murder while 15,811 have previously been convicted of sexual assault, among other offenses.
And on Tuesday, federal immigration officers arrested yet another criminal illegal immigrant around the Martha’s Vineyard area. The Salvadoran citizen has been arrested or deported from the U.S. eight times already, and is currently wanted in his native country for “crimes against humanity.”
Vaughan told NHJournal the national numbers regarding criminal migrants were only released under pressure from Congress.
“ICE doesn’t publish it normally, but every now and then the number surfaces due to a congressional inquiry,” Vaughan told NHJournal.
Vaughan said the report seemed “to be a little bit of a distraction from the really bad news about the hundreds of thousands of criminal aliens that ICE has released from its custody instead of deporting them, which is the main part of the letter.”
Defenders of Democratic President Joe Biden’s handling of immigration pushed back, telling CBS News that “many of the convicted criminals described in the letter have been in the U.S. for a long time, before the Biden administration took office.” And some are currently incarcerated as well.
Vaughan countered that the problem “has a lot more to do with the Biden administration’s disastrous immigration enforcement policies.”
Meanwhile, the number of criminally convicted illegal immigrants currently residing in the Bay State is still unknown. But the new report hit at the same time still more arrests have been made in Massachusetts.
Earlier this month, a multi-day ICE-led sweep on Nantucket resulted in five arrests. The alleged incidents involved a 41-year-old Guatemalan national charged with committing a sex crime, a 49-year-old Salvadoran national facing 11 charges of sex crimes committed against a child, a 28-year-old Salvadoran national facing “numerous” charges of sex crimes committed against a child, a Brazilian noncitizen charged with committing multiple sex crimes against a Nantucket resident, and a 30-year-old Salvadoran MS-13 gang member charged with multiple counts of assault-and-battery.
ICE agents have been busy in Boston this past month as well.
On Sept. 12, authorities tracked down a 25-year-old Dominican national who had previously been convicted for possession of child pornography. On Sept. 11, Enforcement and Removals Operation agents arrested a 30-year-old Haitian national charged with sexual assault after a Dorchester District Court judge released him on “pre-trial conditions.”
It doesn’t help Craig’s cause that she’s been campaigning with Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey, who endorsed the former Manchester mayor in the primary.
Asked by a Boston television news station if she thought the “vetting” process for new arrivals needed a boost after several sexual assaults against minors, Healey infamously said, “I think we have the right systems in place. It is unfortunate that from time to time, things will happen.”
