How Chinese criminal networks fuel illicit markets across the Americas Brookings
from news.google.com
Trump XOs
“The sanctuary politicians in Washington failed once again to protect American citizens by refusing to honor our ICE arrest detainer.”
A criminal illegal alien with a long record of DUIs, drugs, and two prior deportations was released back onto the streets of Washington state after allegedly causing a six-car pileup involving a school bus while driving a semi-truck without a license, even though federal immigration authorities had lodged a detainer and requested custody.
The US Department of Homeland Security announced that ICE filed an immigration detainer for Juan Hernandez-Santos, a Mexican national accused of causing the December 4 wreck in Lacey, Washington, when the 18-wheeler he was driving slammed into another vehicle, triggering a multi-car chain reaction that included a school bus on I-5 near Martin Road. Because of Washington’s sanctuary policies, local authorities refused to honor the ICE detainer and released him instead of transferring him to federal custody.
Democrats have a knack for downplaying political violence when it suits their political narrative, but Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) took it to a new, disgraceful low on Thursday.
During a House Committee on Homeland Security hearing, the Mississippi Democrat, who previously chaired Nancy Pelosi’s handpicked January 6 Select Committee, decided to rewrite history. He referred to the targeted assassination attempt on American soldiers by Afghan Rahmanullah Lakanwal as an “unfortunate accident.”
You really have to see the transcript to believe the level of disconnect on display here.
Thompson was questioning DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and NCTC Director Joseph Kent. He attempted to trap them in a bureaucratic gotcha moment regarding asylum paperwork. In the process, he revealed exactly how the Left views threats to our nation. Thompson looked at Secretary Noem and casually referred to “the unfortunate accident that occurred with the National Guardsman being killed.”
One night after hyping “disturbing images” out of Florida during a Border Patrol operation, ABC’s World News Tonight was at it again on Friday. This time, anchor David Muir and correspondent Pierre Thomas labeled the videos “alarming” and “harrowing” despite each of the three examples having a perfectly reasonable explanation.
Muir kicked off the segment by declaring, “We move on to the alarming new images this evening. A woman seen being chased by federal agents near New Orleans, screaming to be left alone. She’s a U.S. citizen being chased by Border Patrol, but Homeland Security is now saying tonight it comes amid similar scenes playing out across the country as President Trump’s immigration crackdown grows. Pierre Thomas with the images tonight.”
Thomas began his report with “harrowing video showing a woman frantically running away from federal agents in Louisiana. President Trump’s nationwide immigration crackdown intensifies.”
As it turns out, the episode was just a case of mistaken identity, “Masked border agents chasing that woman on foot as she screams in fear. Running into her house as her stepfather races outside. Initially thinking she was being kidnapped. Demanding answers. That woman was a 23-year-old U.S. citizen. DHS saying in a statement, “All agents left the area as soon as they determined the individual in question was not who they were looking for.’”
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced Friday that more than 400 illegal aliens have been arrested in the Charlotte, North Carolina, area as part of an ongoing federal operation targeting criminal offenders who were previously released under local “sanctuary” policies.
In a statement, a DHS spokesperson said the initiative, known as “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” continues to focus on “some of the most dangerous criminal illegal aliens” in the region.
“This immigration enforcement surge in the Charlotte area has led to the arrest of over 425 illegal aliens since operations started,” the spokesperson confirmed.
Operation Launched After More Than 1,400 ICE Detainers Were Ignored
DHS announced in mid-November that federal agents would be deployed to Charlotte after local jurisdictions failed to honor more than 1,400 Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainers.
The Pentagon on Thursday night shared video footage of what was the 22nd strike on drug-trafficking vessels operating off the coast pf Venezuela since September. The latest strike comes as Democrat lawmakers have repeatedly accused the Trump Administration of “war crimes” over the strikes.
Prior to Thursday’s strike, U.S. forces had carried out 21 maritime strikes in the Caribbean, resulting in 83 confirmed deaths according to Pentagon figures and independent tracking. The operations have relied primarily on MQ-9 drones and naval assets to destroy high-speed vessels departing Venezuelan waters.
Thursday’s strike targeted a drug boat operating in the Eastern Pacific, the Pentagon announced in a press release.
“On Dec. 4, at the direction of Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted a lethal kinetic strike on a vessel in international waters operated by a Designated Terrorist Organization,” the Pentagon announced. “Intelligence confirmed that the vessel was carrying illicit narcotics and transiting along a known narco-trafficking route in the Eastern Pacific. Four male narco-terrorists aboard the vessel were killed.”
The Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control holds a hearing on Chinese drug trafficking through Latin America to the United States on Tuesday, December 9.
The hearing seeks to “uncover how the Chinese mafia drives synthetic opioid trafficking to the United States in the context of increased Chinese investment and trade with Latin America and the Caribbean.”
The hearing comes as Democrats continue to claim that the Trump administration is issuing illegal orders in their strikes against narco-terrorist drug boats in the Carribean.
President Donald Trump hosted a Cabinet meeting at the White House Tuesday, where Secretary of War Pete Hegseth gave a spirited defense of the much debated military strikes on a drug-trafficking vessel in the Caribbean on September 2.
The Washington Post reported on Friday that Hegseth gave an order to “kill everybody” before the strikes on the “suspected drug boats.” After two men allegedly survived the initial strike, according to the Post’s sources, the mission commander ordered a second strike to take them out to comply with Hegseth’s directive. “The two men were blown apart in the water, the Post reported.
Democrats contend that the second strike to take out the survivors could have been a violation of the laws of war.
Amid talk of potential war crimes, the New York Times on Monday reported additional details refuting the Washington Post’s version of events, clarifying that Hegseth had ordered the attack, but not the killing of survivors.
A homeless illegal alien who had previously been deported from the United States on two separate occasions was arrested after stabbing a man on a light rail line in Charlotte, North Carolina. The vicious assault comes as the city is still reeling from the brutal murder of Iryna Zarutska, a Ukrainian refugee who was fatally stabbed by a homeless man with an extensive criminal history.
Oscar Solarzano was arrested on charges of first-degree attempted murder, assault with a deadly weapon causing serious injury, breaking and entering, carrying a concealed weapon and being intoxicated and disruptive, according to a report from the New York Post. He is currently being held without bond.
Solarzano, 33, allegedly charged onto the Charlotte light rail on Friday evening before viscously stabbing the victim with a large knife, police said. The Honduran illegal alien allegedly broke onto the train, while intoxicated, before starting a fight with the victim and ultimately stabbing him, causing serious injuries,
The victim was hospitalized with serious injuries at Novant Health Presbyterian Hospital in stable condition, ABC News reported. His address on court records matches that of a homeless shelter in Charlotte.
WITNESS “is a global organization that helps people everywhere harness the power of video and audiovisual technology to tell their stories, document the truth, and defend human rights – today and in a future increasingly shaped by AI.” And in whatever pursuit that even is, they have published a video recommending people record ICE agents engaged in lawful arrests of illegal aliens. Unclear where they got the idea that humans have a “right” to break the law, but I digress.
According to the video, people have “the right to film interactions” between illegals and ICE agents. This recommendation comes after there have been record numbers of doxxing incidents targeting agents and their families. And when you see videos like this, it’s not even remotely surprising.
The video even goes as far as to recommend people get any and all information, such as badge numbers and uniforms. It’s unclear exactly why people would need this information, but you can do the math.
Detroit is synonymous with autos, Los Angeles with motion pictures, and Texas with oil. Pittsburgh still conjures steel. When a product or service anchors a region’s economy, that sector has power. Politicians court industry. Industry demands representation and, ideally, protection.
What’s true regionally is just as true nationally. That’s why K Street exists and lobbyists make big bucks. Fortunes rise and fall, but if our GDP slips even 3%, the usual talking heads sprint to the cameras to declare the American economy on the verge of collapse — and always under whichever Republican is in office. When a Democrat presides over a faltering economy, the political media prefers to drive the getaway car.
Harassing users did nothing to stop the poison. Blowing up supply at sea does. Every sunken shipment dents the cartels’ profits. Every explosion represents a tangible loss.
If any of us invented a product that added 3% to national GDP, we’d enjoy the influence over policy and legislation that naturally comes with living in a representative republic with a market economy. Innovation and competition fuel prosperity.
By handing out CDLs to ineligible drivers, the state “sent unsafe foreign drivers onto highways across America and put countless families in danger.”
Washington state says it accidentally issued nearly 700 commercial driver’s licenses over the past seven years to non-US citizens who did not qualify to have them. Washington is a so-called “sanctuary state” for illegal immigrants.
The revelation comes as the Evergreen State sits in the crosshairs of the Trump administration’s CDL crackdown following the case of Harjinder Singh, an illegal alien who allegedly made an illegal U-turn in a semi-truck and killed three people in Florida in August. Singh, who crossed the border illegally in 2018, failed the required tests and allegedly did not speak English.
Washington still issued him a commercial driver’s license, which he then used to obtain a California CDL. After the fatal crash, Florida’s attorney general asked the US Supreme Court to permanently bar Washington and California from issuing commercial licenses to noncitizens. Washington has until Jan. 27 to respond.
On Thursday, a suspected cartel smuggler was killed during an officer-involved shooting with Border Patrol.
Allegedly, the suspect crossed the river and attacked a Border Patrol, who then opened fire.
The shooting happened in Starr County, Texas — near the border.
Thankfully, no agents were injured during the shootout.
Bill Melugin of Fox News has the details:
BREAKING: Per multiple border law enforcement sources, a U.S. Border Patrol agent shot & killed a suspected cartel smuggler after he came across the river & allegedly assaulted the agent in Starr County, TX, (Rio Grande Valley) this afternoon. I’m told it happened in Border…
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) December 12, 2025
There must have been a time in American history when six sitting lawmakers urging members of the military to defy the commander-in-chief would have been viewed as outright sedition — and those lawmakers would have quickly faced justice. In the age of Trump, however, those days are long gone.
Touting their prior military and intelligence service, Democratic Sens. Elissa Slotkin (MI), who organized the video, Mark Kelly (AZ), and Reps. Chris Deluzio (PA), Maggie Goodlander (NH), Chrissy Houlahan (PA), and Jason Crow CO), launched a surreal video on Tuesday in which they called on troops to refuse to carry out what they consider to be President Donald Trump’s “illegal” orders.
Here is their statement, which the lawmakers read to viewers in turns:
We want to speak directly to members of the military and the intelligence community who take risks each day to keep Americans safe.
We know you are under enormous stress and pressure right now.
Americans trust their military. But that trust is at risk.
This administration is pitting our uniformed military and intelligence community professionals against American citizens. Like us, you all swore an oath to protect and defend this Constitution. Right now, the threats to our Constitution aren’t just coming from abroad, but from right here at home.
President Donald Trump’s administration announced that it will end Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Burmese nationals.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has now concluded that conditions in Burma have stabilized enough for citizens to return.
The move continues the administration’s broader effort to scale back TPS programs that have been repeatedly extended under previous administrations.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said the decision returns the program to its intended purpose.
Noem said Burma has made “notable progress in governance and stability,” pointing to the end of its state of emergency, plans for elections, ceasefire agreements, and improvements in local governance.
Burma, also known as Myanmar, was designated for TPS in May 2021 by then–Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.
President Trump is making sure American children are safe again.
Attorney General Pam Bondi has announced the results of Memphis Safe Street’s task force recent crackdown on crime.
Bondi while speaking to members of the press revealed 3,100 arrests were made by the task force and 121 missing children were found.
Watch Bondi make the announcement here:
Here’s a backup if needed:
🚨 HOLY CRAP! AG Pam Bondi confirms the location of 121 MISSING CHILDREN in Memphis, the m*rder rate has been “cut in HALF” and the crime rate is the lowest in 20 YEARS now that the feds have gotten involved
3,100 arrests and 500 illegal weapons seized
TRUMP SUCCESS 🇺🇸🔥 pic.twitter.com/5KyR59x3Zp
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 25, 2025
California is violating federal law, according to a new lawsuit filed by the Department of Justice.
The state effectively in-state tuition to illegal immigrants, which violates a federal prohibition against the practice. University of California does so, for example, by allowing for in-state tuition rates to illegal immigrants who attended school for three years in the state and graduated from high school.
Federal law forbids states from offering better tuition deals to illegal immigrants who reside in the state than it does to Americans from other states.
This illegal “unequal treatment,” according to the lawsuit filed on Nov. 20.
Plaintiffs include Governor Gavin Newsom and the regents for the state university and community college systems.
We discuss polling, economy, battleground states, and more.
Our Guests Are:
WASHINGTON has formally declared Venezuela’s Cartel de los Soles a foreign terrorist organisation.
The move strikes at the core of tyrant Nicolás Maduro’s power structure and labels his inner circle as “narco-terrorists”.
Federal Appeals Court Ruling Limits Trump’s Plans to Fast-Track Deportations Democracy Now!
from news.google.com
Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Scott Turner announced during a press conference in Memphis on Monday that the federal government will be launching a tip-line that will allow residents to report illegal aliens or wanted criminals residing in public housing units.
“At HUD, we do believe that public housing should be safe. We believe that, and that’s our conviction. A safe community starts with safe housing. If the housing is safe, the community is safe, and we want to take good care of the most vulnerable people in our country,” Turner said while flanked by Attorney General Pam Bondi and Tennessee Governor Bill Lee.
The secretary said the line will allow public housing residents to call the HUD Office of the Inspector General to report “criminals, illegal aliens, sex offenders, human traffickers, and those guilty of gang activity, drug distribution, and fraud.”
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel today joined 20 other attorneys general in a letter urging the U.S. Department of Agriculture to allow noncitizens to receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits.
Nessel and the coalition warn that USDA’s new guidance doesn’t give food assistance to several groups of immigrants, including those who were granted asylum or entered the United States as refugees, parolees, or other humanitarian entrants.
“The USDA’s unlawful guidance on SNAP eligibility is yet another example of the Trump Administration sowing chaos and confusion for our residents,” Nessel said. “The law is clear on who qualifies for SNAP, and the USDA must correct these errors immediately to ensure families are still able to put food on the table.”
The absences coincide with “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) initiative launched over the weekend that had already resulted in over 200 detentions across the region.
It has been revealed that over 30,000 students were absent from classes on Monday in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools District, as US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations increased in the area, according to data from school officials. The situation highlights how American public school systems have been inundated with non-US citizens.
The absences coincide with “Operation Charlotte’s Web,” a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) initiative launched over the weekend that had already resulted in over 200 detentions across the region. According to WBTV, federal agents made a “record-breaking” 81 arrests on Saturday, with more than 130 illegal immigrants arrested in the first two days of the operation.
A federal judge on Friday blocked the IRS from sharing details of suspected illegal immigrants with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The 94-page ruling said that the plaintiffs – two labor unions and a nonprofit that provides tax advice – and the people whom they represent face “an imminent risk” that their confidential address information will be used by ICE for civil immigration enforcement.
“Accordingly, upon consideration of the parties’ submissions, the relevant legal authority, and the entire record, the Court concludes that Plaintiffs are entitled to a stay of the Address-Sharing Policy and other appropriate injunctive relief, and that Plaintiffs’ APA claim regarding the broader Data Sharing policy should not be dismissed,” the ruling said.
Pope Leo has come out in support of a rare special message released by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in recent days that lamented a “climate of fear and anxiety around questions of profiling and immigration enforcement.”
Without mentioning U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration by name, 216 of 224 bishops voted in favour of releasing the message that condemned the “vilification” of migrants and expressed concerns over the fear and anxiety immigration raids have sown in communities, as well as the denial of pastoral care to migrants in detention centres.
Speaking to reporters late Tuesday as he left the papal country house south of Rome, Leo urged Catholics and all people of goodwill to listen to what they said.
“I think we have to look for ways of treating people humanely, treating people with the dignity that they have,” he said. “If people are in the United States illegally, there are ways to treat that. There are courts, there’s a system of justice.”
The Hysa Organized Crime Group (HOCG), also known as the Albanian Mafia, has been accused of operating casinos on behalf of the Sinaloa Cartel.
The news comes from a joint action with the United States Treasury and the Government of Mexico. The Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) have been working with their North American counterparts to investigate HOCG’s actions.
Today, Treasury issued sanctions and has taken steps to cut off numerous Mexico-based gambling establishments involved in cartel-related money laundering.
We will continue to target those involved in supporting terrorist drug cartels.
— Treasury Department (@USTreasury) November 13, 2025
The Trump administration is threatening to hit Pennsylvania where it hurts, warning the state it could lose tens of millions in federal dollars after a suspected terrorist managed to snag a commercial truck license.
Federal officials say Pennsylvania broke safety rules by handing out non-domiciled Commercial Driver’s Licenses to foreign nationals who shouldn’t have qualified. In a letter to state leaders, the Department of Transportation said Pennsylvania issued CDLs to migrants without verifying their legal status. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said the agency will withhold $75 million in federal funding unless Harrisburg cleans up its CDL program quickly.
The fight erupted after the arrest of Akhror Bozorov, an illegal migrant from Uzbekistan accused back home of ties to terrorism. Bozorov, who authorities say spread jihadist propaganda online and recruited for extremist groups, picked up a Pennsylvania-issued CDL before immigration agents arrested him this month.
The construction industry’s use of illegal labor force has been revealed by the Trump administration’s “Operation Charlotte’s Web” in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Construction has reportedly come to a near halt in Charlotte as the Trump administration’s immigration campaign remains in full swing.
Reports of stymied construction projects have flooded social media during the first week of the immigration enforcement operation.
A man who claims to be a subcontractor in the construction industry in Charlotte posted a video blasting ICE for chasing off the workers he usually encounters every day.
In other social media posts, Mexican restaurants are closing up shop since so many illegals are no longer out and about in the town. In one, an ice cream shop owner said he has told his Hispanic employees to stay home.
Another man hyperbolically complained that “no one is safe,” despite that immigration agents are only seeking lawbreaking illegals.
One man working at a Charlotte barber shop told agents he became a naturalized U.S. citizen ten years ago, but can’t say it to the agents in English.
Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum on Tuesday firmly ruled out allowing any US military strikes on Mexican soil, after President Donald Trump said he would support such action to curb drug trafficking. She reiterated that Mexico will co-operate on intelligence but will not permit foreign intervention.
from www.france24.com
At her Tuesday morning press conference, President Claudia Sheinbaum responded to U.S. President Donald Trump’s latest threats of intervention in Mexico, as well as new travel advice for Mexico that was issued by the Canadian government.
Among other issues, Sheinbaum spoke about the people who remain in custody after being detained in Mexico City’s central square on Saturday for allegedly attacking police at the end of a large anti-government protest march.
Here is a recap of the president’s Nov. 18 mañanera.