Yawn...They're Doing It Again

Who? The Editorial Board of the Tribune-Review.

What are they doing? Richard Mellon Scaife's braintrust is, yet again, failing to disclose his financial ties to the think-tank they reference in an editorial. Take a look:

The Obama administration's lax immigration enforcement includes failure to reform immigration courts that illegal aliens routinely ignore.

Mark Metcalf, a former Miami immigration court judge, extensively details the problems in a new Center for Immigration Studies (cis.org) report, "Built to Fail: Deception and Disorder in America's Immigration Courts."

Media Matters lists about $1.4 million dollars in grants from foundations controlled by Richard Mellon Scaife between 1991 and 2007. This does not count the additional grants of $150,000 and $125,000 from the Sarah Scaife Foundation in 2008 and in 2009, respectively.

Of course no mention of the millions of dollars of Scaife Foundation money funneled to the CIS can be found in the editorial on Scaife's editorial page. That would be transparent but that's not how the right wing propaganda machine works.

Now take a closer look at the editorial. Or you can read the report first hand, if you like. Notice something? The Obama Administration is being criticized for (now wait for it) not cleaning up a mess left behind by the Bush Administration.

From the editorial:

He says deportation orders are rarely enforced -- in part because immigration judges lack authority to enforce their own orders -- even when those targeted ignore them or skip court. Among 1.9 million aliens freed to await trial from 1996 through 2009, 40 percent vanished.

Department of Justice statistics mask the grim truth, too. Justice contends 39 percent of aliens missed immigration court dates in 2005 and 2006; Mr. Metcalf says the real figure is 59 percent.

Look at the dates. Tell me again who was president from 2001 to 2009? This can't be Clinton's fault can it? I mean he was President from 1996 to 2001. Those were also the Lewinsky years. Brought to you, in part, by the Scaife funded Arkansas project. Thanks, Dick.

There's some more from Metcalf's report:

From 2002 through 2006 — in the shadow of 9/11 — 50 percent of all aliens free pending trial disappeared. Court numbers show 360,199 aliens out of 713,974 dodged court.

In the Shadow of 9/11 the Bush Administration allowed this to happen?

And it's Obama's fault for not cleaning it up in 2 years.

This is Scaife's braintrust at work.

Thanks again, Dick.