By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com

President Trump is expected to sign a new executive order Monday to replace his previous U.S. travel ban, which was blocked by courts.

Reuters reports that Iraq will be removed from the list of countries targeted in the travel ban.

The order would impose a 90-day ban on travel from the U.S. to six Muslim-majority countries – Iran, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.

Iraq was removed from the original order because of new vetting procedures and its work helping the U.S. combat ISIS.

The new order also isn’t expected to impact tens of thousands of legal permanent residents who are green card holders.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services

By Editorial Board
Albuquerque Journal

President Donald Trump’s emerging immigration policies received some much-needed clarity – and realism – last week, and though far from definitive, the outline he provided in his address to Congress and during a private meeting with television news anchors is a path the nation has needed for far too long.

And it certainly is more helpful than some of his campaign rhetoric on the issue.

While his critics have harped continually on alleged “mass deportation” plans – which Trump has denied – the word out of Washington last week was about potential compromises that would be a reasonable blueprint for immigration reform that his predecessor avoided even when Democrats controlled both houses of Congress.

And while many in the news media have been borderline hysterical in reporting deportations under Trump, it is far below the more than 2.5 million deportations under President Obama.

Trump’s apparent outline for an overhaul of a broken system is based on several reasonable principles, starting with border security. That, by the way, was key in the Senate “Gang of Eight” compromise floated in the Senate a few years ago.

It also focuses, appropriately, on deporting illegal immigrants with criminal records – especially those who already have outstanding deportation orders – and the end of the catch-and-release system where those apprehended were simply told to show up for a deportation hearing that many then skipped.

For those reasons, Trump is proposing more Border Patrol agents.

To read more click here. 

FBI Director James Comey

By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com

FBI Director James Comey asked the Justice Department this weekend to publicly deny President Trump’s unsubstantiated claim that President Obama had ordered a wiretap on Donald Trump during his presidential campaign.

The New York Times first broke the story, followed by the Washington Post, both of which cited law enforcement officials.

The request came after Trump’s twitter storm in which he accused Obama, without providing evidence, of wire tapping the Trump Tower.

Obama officials vehemently denied the former president was behind any wiretapping.

Both the Justice Department and FBI have declined to comment publicly.

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• President Trump Under Pressure to Get Answers from Iran on Missing Ex-FBI Agent
• FBI’s Comey Calls JCC Bomb Threats a ‘Top Priority’
• FBI: Muslim Teen Found Hanged from Tree Was Not Murdered
• FBI Arrests NY Man for Allegedly Trying to Join ISIS in Syria

ATF photo

By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com

Gun store burglaries reached record numbers in 2016, marking a 30% increase over 2015.

The 558 reported burglaries at licensed firearms dealers is higher than any period since the ATF began tracking burglaries and robberies five years ago, The Trace reports. 

During the 2016 break-ins, the number of firearms stolen reached 7,488, a 59% increase over 2015, which had previous held the record for gun store burglaries.

Compared to 2012, when the ATF began compiling data on such crimes, burglaries from licensed dealers jumped by 48%, while the number of guns stolen increased by 73%.

Many of those guns end up on the black market.

“These crimes victimize law-abiding federal firearms licensees, causing a threat to their livelihood and even personal safety at times, and the stolen firearms further pose a threat to the safety of our communities,” said ATF spokeswoman Amanda Hils. “ATF special agents and industry operations investigators across the country work alongside our local and state law enforcement partners to prevent, respond to, and investigate these incidents.”

FBI Director James Comey

By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com

Democrats who hoped to learn more about the investigations into Russian meddling in the U.S. elections were disappointed after a closed-door meeting with FBI Director James Comey.

“At this point we know less than a fraction of what the FBI knows,” said U.S. Representative Adam Schiff, the leading Democrat on the House intelligence committee, Newsweek reports. 

Schiff said the committee plans to investigate the potential collusion between Russia and Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

Disappointed that the FBI failed to give the panel a full intelligence briefing, Schiff said Comey will be called back.

“There were very large areas that were walled off, and those walls are going to have to come down if we are going to do our job,” Schiff said.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions during the Trump campaign.

By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com

Attorney General Jeff Sessions maintains he never lied under oath by denying he communicated with Russian officials, but Democrats aren’t so sure.

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee is asking the FBI to investigate whether Sessions lied under oath during his confirmation hearing, the Hill reports. 

Lawmakers penned a letter to FBI Director James Comey and Channing D. Phillips, the U.S. attorney for Washington D.C., urging them to investigate whether Sessions broke the law.

“Efforts by Attorney General Sessions to assert that his testimony was not false or even misleading because he met with the Russian Ambassador in his capacity as a Senator, rather than a campaign representative, appear to be disingenuous at best as the questions put to him did not in any way ask if the meeting was campaign related,” they wrote.

Sessions acknowledged Thursday that he met with Russian officials twice during Trump’s campaign, but insisted the subject of the election was never discussed. Sessions also pledged to recuse himself from future investigations into the Trump campaign.

File photo of a Border Patrol agent.

By Steve Neavling
ticklethewire.com

President Trump’s pledge to hire 5,000 additional Border Patrol agents is no easy task because the agency is already struggling to maintain its current staff.

In hopes of recruiting more people to apply, the government is holding career fairs around the country and in colleges.

“Immigration, it’s a hot topic right now,” said Adam Leasure, a 19-year-old undergraduate at Temple University in Philadelphia, where one career fair was held. “But I think that when they enforce the laws they have to, such as getting the big cartels and that stuff out of the border, I think it’s very important and very interesting.”

Under Obama’s administration, Border Patrol struggled to fill open positions, partly because of the agency’s rigorous screening process.

“Criminal justice students are always interested in federal law enforcement because it actually pays much better than regular, local county or city agencies are going to pay,” said Professor Cheryl Irons, a former prosecutor who teaches criminal law at Temple

Trump has pledged to ramp up the deportation of undocumented immigrants who have committed crimes. But Border Patrol needs more staff to carry out the plan.

Other Stories of Interest

• FBI to Review Young Muslim Man’s Death in Washington State
• Graham: FBI Must Say If It’s Probing Trump-Russia Connections
• Some Senators: DOJ Should Uphold Existing State Marijuana Laws
• PolitiFact: Trump Misleads in Claim about Terrorism Convictions Since 9/11
• Homeland Security Calls Portland Riot ‘Domestic Terrorist Violence’