The Senate has passed a bill making Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) the U.S.'s largest interior law enforcement agency with funding for Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda higher than most of the world’s militaries, including Israel’s.
Pending its passage in the House of Representatives, Trump’s bill could mean a massive increase in ICE funding as part of an immigration enforcement agenda worth $150 billion over four years.
This figure is more than the annual military budget of Italy, which at $30.8 billion, is the world’s 16th highest defense spender for this year according to tracker Global Fire Power.
It is also higher than military spending for Israel, ($30 billion), the Netherlands ($27 billion) and Brazil ($26.1 billion).
Remember when republican bitches about how much we spent on immigration?
We’re probably nearing the point where Americans will start trying to get over the border wall and into Mexico.
Luckily CBP got a nice budget increase so they can prevent anyone from leaving too.
I can totally see this coming.
The developed world has a population growth problem. Population growth has slowed or reversed in many countries, but the global economy is designed around infinite growth, fed by an infinitely growing pool of workers and customers. Then when they retire they can be taken care of by the infinitely growing population of young people.
It takes zero imagination to picture this administration forcing “high value human resources” to remain in the country, including putting them on no fly lists. Unfortunately since they are stupid, the brain drain has already started.
I was gonna say. Things might be different if I was in poverty and in central America, but for the rest of us the US just seems like a real awful place to be.
That was the secondary goal, keep people out and in.
Gestapo. They’re Nazi Gestapo. Treat them as they deserve.
Well we were the most prosperous country in the world while being racist to the hilt. I’m guessing the GOP thinks that might be the secret sauce.
I’m officially ready to be radicalized.
I’m this country, not wanting to go to a concentration camp makes you a radical
Not wanting to go to a concentration camp is understandable, especially if you have a high paying job.
Not wanting OTHER people you’ve never met to go to concentration camps? Whoaaa there Che, put down that AK-47!
Daily reminder to all ICE agents. By signing up for ICE, you have signed yourself up for a lifetime of fear and criminal liability. There are Nazi concentration camp guards that were tried for their crimes in their 90s. There is no statute of limitations on crimes against humanity. Your names are recorded; your deeds are known. And you will face justice for your crimes. And do not count on a blanket pardon saving you. Crimes against humanity are violations of international law that cannot be pardoned.
fuck legal systems, we all know the next democrat will pardon them or refuse to prosecute them.
they need to live in fear from decent human beings,
surely this neck gaiter will protect me from consequences
There’s no way they need all those people and resources if they’re only going after illegal immigrants. They’re going to start disappearing their other targets too. People of Colour, Democrats, LGBTQ, scientists. Get in line. I hope you’re ready for what we know is coming.
First they came for the immigrants…
It’ll be trans people first. Then gays. Eventually blacks. Then democrats.
Honest question: why couldn’t the bill be repealed if Dems win the house and senate at midterms?
If Democrats win the house and Senate at midterms and have a veto proof majority in the Senate, then yeah, maybe they could pass a new bill that repeals all these things.
If they don’t have a veto proof majority, then Trump will just veto it.
The Federal budget is passed annually, and all spending bills must originate in the House.
Its incredible what people will support with actual money and loss of freedom if they are sold racist lies
That means this is their new military.
Pretty clever if you think if it. They don’t try to convince their current one but build one up besides them while starving them of their resources.
It does seem a lot like Schutzstaffel. They’ll need their very own Stasi too.
Building a paramilitary beholden to Party-aligned officials as a stopgap until the Party seizes total control of the actual military is boilerplate fascism.
EDIT: And when they do seize control the military, it usually doesn’t end well for the paramilitary.
Who do you think they’re going to Merc? Is it Jigsaw?
We should quit paying our taxes
Leave the US. If you have expertise you’ll be easily welcomed into most countries, if not, there is are a lot of countries you can still move to that are not police states. Either way you’ll stop paying/supporting and supporting US fascism with your work. The immigrants your government is so eager to deport have been through worse.
The US is an odd duck when it comes to taxes…
The USA is one of the few countries of the world which levies personal income tax on all its citizens: not only on its residents - citizens or non-citizens - but also on its citizens who do not live in the country. All citizens of the United States are taxed under the same personal income tax system, regardless of whether they live in the country or abroad.
You only have to pay them if you move back to the US (and want to work). It’s not like other governments disclose your finances to the US.
Absolutely not true. If you want anything to do with US banking, social security, Embassy services, you better pay up. And every bank you open abroad is literally required to disclose to the IRS that you have a bank account with them. Source: I live abroad.
No, but there will be a war front that you can position yourself on the not-scum side of.
As if any cops would even attempt to stop them instead of joining in. Calling the police is just giving them backup.
I left earlier this year. I’m a tan skinned Latina trans woman immigrant, basically their #1 target. I’m still absolutely terrified for my friends and family.
I truly hate that I’m still chained to the US via my citizenship. A part of me hopes they denaturalize me so I don’t have to pay them shit.
Can’t you denounce your citizenship? It’s also not possible for them to force you to pay taxes on income you don’t earn in the US - unless you want to return at some point. I hope you’re some place safe that respects your identity now.
Renouncing US citizenship is no easy task, and I’d rather not do that before I get new citizenship
Totally fair - being stateless is objectively worse that being hated by your state (I don’t mean that sarcasticly, it’s fucked up on so many levels)
There are too few places to escape to in modern society, given the rise of authoritarian globally. I was planning on Germany until the Russia/Ukraine conflict. Now I find it more prudent to stay in the U.S. and relocate to a low population area. For the handful of dense urban environments in the U.S. there are far more wide open spaces with no people.
Head in the sand is always an option, until it’s not.
It’s all relative. It’d be just as easy to argue the head in the sand argument at an American who thinks they’re just gonna pack up to a random city in Europe and avoid the consequences of what’s happening globally. I understand we’re all just trying to feel like we have agency over our own lives and don’t exist at the whim of a handful of billionaires, so to each their own.
Fascism is always a possibility anywhere in the world. The difference is that it’s here and now in the US. I sure as shit would be doing everything I could to not be there anymore if I were there. It’s fucking scary enough watching it from Canada and I won’t have any hesitation to flee if the tanks start rolling in this direction.
I would have been gone years ago I just don’t really have the means to leave
People with far fewer resources than some of the poorest Americans make treks across continents. I’m sure most Americans could figure it out if they really wanted to.
Sure. We’ll just start walking from the American continents to… Well, fuck
Have you considered getting one of those floaty things with pushy arms that go in water?
I was gonna say that you can’t just row across the ocean, but apparently you can.
If you gain the sponsoring for an ocean rowboat, you can then secure sponsorship for the 3-4 months-worth of food since restaurants and gardens are hard to come by in the ocean. I understand that fish live in the ocean, but fishing eats into your 17 hours per day during which you’ll need to row. Also, trying to handle fish on the open ocean in a small boat is an incredibly risky maneuver. Even worse, once you catch the fish, you gotta set your boat on fire so that you can cook it and not get parasites.
All told, it’s significantly cheaper to just fly, but that’s unhelpful advice to someone who just told you that they can’t afford to uproot their life and fly to another country. You might ask, how can you not afford that, and the problem is that hiking across countries smaller than my state gives you opportunities to work odd jobs in exchange for shelter, food, and money. But since planes and airports generally don’t hire random passengers, it puts you back in that “I’m fucked” boat that you suggested.
Also, all this is giving your unserious comment the credence that you weren’t talking about taking a gondola ride across the Atlantic.
Thats a brilliant deep dive. Thank you.
I guess that’s how most immigrants make it to the US?
No.
Literally most fly in, and then just say they are here to visit, then stay.
Your understanding of modern immigration is similar to what you see on Fox News.
Sorry, I thought I’d made it clear enough that I was taking the piss.
All right well I’m not going to do this back and forth about it with you. You know nothing about me or my situation.
You are right. My comments shouldn’t be taken as precise advise for specific situations, but I stand by the generalities. I’m general though, if a family with less than a grade 5 education can make a cross-continent trek in hopes of a better life, most US citizens are well positioned to immigrate elsewhere.
You know literally nothing about immigration, do you?
Beyond personal experience and the experiences of colleagues, friends and family going to/from a wide variety of countries, and how different countries structure their legal immigration process, not much I guess.
Riiiiiigth…
Yup
Too late for that now…they’ll just take all your money, house, claim you’re not a citizen, force you to work for 1/256th of that you earn now and keep the bribe from companies that bought you.
Well either choice leads to imprisonment of some type so I’ll go out blasting rather than perpetuate it
Be safe.
Then your government will acquire yet more debt. And if everything crumbles down for them, there will be your offspring paying for that debt and their taxes for generations.
I don’t know what’s worse, honestly. I just know everyone needs to fight back and resist, and they’ll get exhausted fighting everywhere in the world. But it they don’t have to fight, they’ll just keep doing their shit.
Offspring? In this economy?
This shit can’t be bankrolled any more. I personally didn’t have offspring because the future is far too bleak to even dream of subjecting another human being to what’s to come. Yeah, we need to start fighting and needed to quite some time ago.
Nice of you to assume I’m gonna have kids.
I’m not great with English, sorry. The message I was trying to get through was for “you all” as a group of people.
The government can just print money, they don’t actually strictly need your taxes (see MMT). The only actual path is withholding labour and mass protests (with at least a credible threat of violent escalations).
Printing money is how you get hyperinflation. You cant just print money without it flooding the market. If you do that too often, the money becomes worthless.
Fuck it! Either the dollar fails because no one wants to come to the US… or you just keep printing money. Either way you’re fucked.
Yeah, I don’t see a lot of ways this ends well. Maybe a prolonged national strike. But even that isn’t likely to happen.
I haven’t contributed to the economy in any meaningful way and have managed to make money without working any real job since the last place I worked at shuttered in 2020, withholding my labor. I’ve been doing my part. And I’m only one person so there’s not much else I can do unless more people are also doing it.
Or leave. Stop supporting the country in the most literal sense.
Leaving would make it worse. Every single person who wants to leave as a result of this is the opposition. Without us, they have free reign.
If the majority of the intelligencia class leaves the US will be critically harmed in one of its most lucrative areas. The US has done an excellent job of attaching to talent over the past century, if that talent simply up and leaves it places the US at a disadvantage economically, socially and intellectually (importantly including science and engineering fields).
This is incredibly bad logic that you have constructed so that you can have the reality you want.
Your simple solutions are like that of Elon Musk suggesting a submarine for a cave rescue just because you think it would be a cool way to do it. It has no backing of reality behind it.
You’re totally right, no other dictator has ever taken an oppressive position to their intelligentsia and those that remained in fascist nations have been super effective at degrading it from within… Just look at the USSR, Italy, Spain or Chile under their fascist leaders. They all were super supportive of their institutions of higher learning and those that remained stopped all kinds of atrocious government actions. They were all better off for staying put. /s
I think you may be underestimating just how many engineering folks have zero morals and find it ‘fun’ to build bombs and missiles and sensors. They don’t require ethics courses for a reason
Even if everyone left, he’s still got a bunch of nukes and other powers that could affect the rest of us.
It’s status quo at this point. It’s either leave or gear up for civil war.
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We’re all in danger of being illegal.
If you’re white, you’re alright…
You gotta be willing to play the Nazi game too…the whites that hate this shit are not considered white by the Nazis
If you’re
illegalhuman, get the hell outta there right now…
More like emigration budget! Amirite?!
