At least these staged raids are getting bigger.

by Jeff Davis

The Los Angeles Daily News reports that “In what federal authorities are calling the largest sweep of criminal and fugitive immigrants, federal agents over the past two weeks have arrested more than 1,300 Southland immigrants in their homes, in jails and at work, officials announced Wednesday. As part of a stepped-up national crackdown on illegal immigrants, five teams of Immigration and Custom Enforcement agents raided homes in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura counties from Sept. 19 through Tuesday.”

Notice that the mainstream media almost always uses words like “immigrants” instead of “illegal aliens” or “foreigners.”

The article notes “Some arrests were easy, while others involved agents peering into clothes dryers or squeezing deep into crawl spaces to find hidden suspects. Most of those arrested were from Mexico, El Salvador and Guatemala. ‘Too often in the past, (deportation) orders were ignored and aliens thought that after getting an order of removal they could slip back into society,’ said Julie Myers, assistant secretary for ICE. ‘Those days are no longer.’”

Yeah, Julie, pander to that Republican base! Not that we believe a damned word you say, but it is nice to hear the government at least make the correct noises for a change.

The same article continues “Immigrant-rights groups decried the raids for stirring fear in the community, noting that more than 100 of those arrested had no criminal or court record. [I guess immigration law doesn't count.] Officials said 797 inmates were taken from local jails, including 240 from those overseen by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Ventura County turned over 125 inmates, and the state prison in Lancaster had 41.”

And this HADN’T BEEN DONE before? How long, exactly, did it take ICE to notice that the jails in Los Angeles are full of Mexican criminals? Bet that came as a stunning revelation.

Anyway, the long and the short of it is they supposedly rounded up about 1,300 illegals this time. That shouldn’t be hard to do in Southern California, where you can probably find two million illegals in L.A. alone. Still, a raid that nabs over one thousand illegals is a refreshing change from these little token raids where they’re snatching up 25 here, 35 there, 65 somewhere else. Now, the big questions: How many of the 1,300 illegals they scooped up will actually be PHYSICALLY REMOVED FROM THE UNITED STATES? And how many will be allowed to slip out the back door of the jail when the TV cameras are turned off?