The trump administration's agenda towards illegal, undocumented immigrants and Muslims have once again come to another rendezvous point with the murder of 14-year old Muslim girl whose body was found last Sunday afternoon in Virginia. At the same time, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has filed a detainer against her killer, Darwin Martinez Torres because according to them, he has been living in the U.S. illegally.
Conservative media's immigration bias
Conservative Media outlet The Daily Caller claimed that a spokesperson for ICE named Carissa Cutrell told them that Torres was involved in the crime.
Due to the fact that Republicans support a sanctuary city crackdown and it is conservative-led states that are leading those crackdowns nationwide, Daily Caller has some interest in focusing its media attack on illegal immigrants -- especially those who commit violent crimes -- in order to give the appearance that they have a "direct line" to ICE. So, that they claimed to have gotten the scoop from an ICE official is likely but also not worth verifying since other reports were coming in at the time with the same information.
Local law enforcement initially said that the killing of Nabra Hassanan was not a crime of hate but rather a crime of rage. As the week progressed, however, an autopsy would reveal whether she was sexually assaulted, which could change everything.
In the meantime, the Daily Caller writer seemed to try and hype up their article for their conservative readers by leaving their permalink intact the intended title: "Authorities refuse to disclose immigration status of El Salvadorian immigrant who murdered Muslim teen" to their changed title: "ICE Places Detainer On Salvadoran Immigrant Suspected Of Murdering Muslim Teen".
This further reveals their intention with the article they were writing as they clearly forgot to change the URL after they realized they had a non-story.
Immigration enforcement propaganda
Before they were put on hold, ICE distributed weekly reports on behalf of the Trump administration which attempted to "shame" sanctuary cities who rejected their requests for detainers.
The weekly distributed reports only lasted for three weeks before law enforcement pointed out that the information in them was inaccurate. The conservative Judicial Watch organization recently filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for those weekly reports demanding to find out why they were stopped.
The actions DHS took against a Brooklyn, NY bakery since last year, showed what appeared to be a test of how the federal government is working to pressure undocumented workers out of their jobs. States have also taken action to force law enforcement officials to release information on undocumented immigrants they have detained for deportation since Congress has stalled President Trump's efforts to build a large deportation force.
Law enforcement officials in many of the cities targeted have resisted the legislative crackdown because of the risk they present to their community policing programs they've built over the years. These programs were designed to connect with communities that have illegal residents -- specifically Hispanic ones -- in order to help them target more hardened criminals which are likely illegal as well. Thus far, Darwin Torres apparently does not have a record or have been known to ICE before the murder. Torres' hearing is scheduled for July 19.
