On April 21, 2022 the Department of Justice issued a press release that announced, Juan Orlando Hernández, Former President of Honduras, Indicted on Drug-Trafficking and Firearms Charges, Extradited to the United States from Honduras.  The subtitle of that DOJ news release provided a bit more specificity, Hernández Allegedly Partnered with Some of the Largest Cocaine Traffickers in the World to Transport Tons of Cocaine through Honduras to the United States.

Juan Orlando Hernández, aka JOH, 53, the former President of Honduras, will make his initial appearance tomorrow, April 22, before Magistrate Judge Stewart D. Aaron in federal court in New York after being extradited today from Honduras. A federal court unsealed drug-trafficking and weapons charges today in a superseding indictment against Hernández.

 

The indictment charges that from at least in or about 2004, up to and including in or about 2022, Hernández, the former two-term President of Honduras, participated in a corrupt and violent drug-trafficking conspiracy to facilitate the importation of hundreds of thousands of kilograms of cocaine into the United States. Hernández allegedly received millions of dollars to use his public office, law enforcement, and the military to support drug-trafficking organizations in Honduras, Mexico, and elsewhere.

The Justice Department is committed to disrupting the entire ecosystem of drug trafficking networks that harm the American people, no matter how far or how high we must go.

 

As the DEA Administrator will explain in more detail, today’s charges are part of our broader efforts to disrupt the activities of the most violent and extensive drug-trafficking organizations and gangs.

 

The Justice Department is taking a comprehensive approach to protecting our communities and our country from violent crime and from the scourge of deadly drugs.

 

We will work to support the communities most impacted by drug addiction and abuse

We will work with our partners to hold drug traffickers accountable for their crimes.

And we will confront corruption and criminal conduct anywhere that undermines the security of the American people.

If the Attorney General is truly committed to protecting America and Americans why has he utterly ignored the importance of our immigration laws to combat transnational criminals, international terrorist organizations and drug cartels and, in so doing, violated the findings and recommendations of the 9/11 Commission that determined that border security is national security??

The importance of effective immigration law enforcement to protect America and Americans was my focus in my earlier article, AG Garland Ignores Vital Immigration Law Enforcement

In that article I called upon my 30 years of real-world experience as a former INS Special Agent.  My highly diverse career included a four year assignment as the first INS Special Agent assigned to the Unified Intelligence Division of the DEA (Drug Enforcement Administration in New York City whereupon I was promoted to the position of Senior Special Agent and assigned to the Organized Crime, Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF).

During my testimony at one of the first Congressional hearings at which I testified about immigration law enforcement I made the point that you only have one opportunity to make a first impression.  For millions of people around the world, the way America enforces and administers the immigration laws provide that first impression because those are the first laws that they are likely to encounter. 

The Biden administration’s immigration policies coupled with the insanity of supposed Criminal Justice and Bail Reform have created a very dangerous first impression- particularly to the enemies of our nation and the criminals who seek to ply their respective “trades” here.

In the United States violations of our borders and our laws will not only be tolerated but richly rewarded.

On March 20, 2013 I testified before a hearing conducted by the Senate Judiciary Committee on the topic, Building An Immigration System Worthy Of American Values..  As bad as things were under the Obama administration. The Biden Administration policies have made things exponentially worse.

The conclusion of my prepared testimony for that hearing in 2013 will serve as the conclusion for my commentary today:

Law enforcement is at its best when it creates a climate of deterrence to convince those who might be contemplating violating the law that such an effort is likely to be discovered and that if discovered, adverse consequences will result for the law violators. Current policies and statements by the administration, in my view, encourages aspiring illegal aliens around the world to head for the United States. In effect the starter’s pistol has been fired and for these folks, the finish line to this race is the border of the United States. 

Back when I was an INS special agent I recall that Doris Meissner who was, at the time, the commissioner of the INS, said that the agency needed to be “customer oriented.” Unfortunately, while I agree about the need to be customer oriented what Ms Meissner and too many politicians today seem to have forgotten is that the “customers” of the INS and of our government in general, are the citizens of the United States of America.