Chuck & Hakeem audition for Dumb & Dumber II

In the midst of the Congressional debates surrounding a funding bill for the out-of-control Department of Homeland Security (a name which has always sounded fascist even when we weren't being governed by fascists), Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer and House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries wrote a letter to Senate majority leader John Thune and House Speaker Mike Johnson.

The letter opens with a matter-of-fact, almost docile recitation of ICE abuses in Minnesota and elsewhere that lacked any outrage, then proceeds to its real substance, if you can call it that: a list of ten "reforms" to DHS and ICE policy that are presented as suggestions. (The exact language is, "we believe Congress needs to enact the following guardrails.")

The suggestions include several things that are already mandated by the Constitution under the Fourth Amendment. Other suggestions are banning masks, requiring ID badges and body cameras, and adherence to standards common to every other law enforcement agency.

I don't understand how this is "leadership."

These things being suggested should be demanded. The very idea that DHS would be permitted to ignore the Fourth Amendment, to act as a secret police force unaccountable to the law and without any of the regulation every other law enforcement agency in this country is expected to obey, without the Republicans agreeing to suggested reforms is in itself an outrage.

This letter plays into the regime's and the Republican party's corruption and authoritarian wishes by painting these "reforms" as, well, reforms. The law exists. The Constitution exists. Requiring DHS to abide by them is not a "reform," it's the status quo, it's just not being enforced.

Any letter from Democratic leadership to the Republican leadership on this topic should be a laundry list of all the laws DHS has broken and is breaking, a recitation of the Fourth Amendment and SCOTUS history reiterating its application to immigration and how DHS has been violating it. It should remind the Republican leadership that in supporting the regime and its lawless use of DHS agencies in this way (and others), they and their caucus are violating their oaths of office to protect and defend the Constitution. It should demand the resignation of the Speaker and the majority leader if they continue to refuse to accept the legal and Constitutional protections guaranteed to the public.

Instead we got this. A milquetoast, politely sedate and tepid suggestion that the Republicans ask DHS to please stop committing terrorism. Only it doesn't even name the terrorism.

Chuck and Hakeem need to either finally realize that they are not dealing with people of good faith, they are not dealing with honest brokers, they are not dealing with people that respect the values of a democratic republic; or, if they can't do that, they need to give up their leadership positions. Because they are failing to lead. They are being cowed, they are stuck in a reality that has not existed for two decades in which any member of Congress could be assumed to at the very least not be unAmerican. No more.

The Speaker of the House goes on television and declares that his caucus will never go along with the Fourth Amendment and no elected Democrat says anything about it. That is a failure of leadership.

The GOP leadership negotiates an end to a government shutdown in bad faith, promising something everyone knows will never happen, and enough Democrats go along with it to pass the measure. That is a failure of leadership. 

The minority leaders write a mildly-worded letter to the majority to suggest they tell DHS to not be terrorists. That is a failure of leadership.