Public Health Policy Reviews 46:
VALKYRIES 6 – Kirstjen Nielsen, “Shield Maiden” of the DHS and Amber Heard – Border Access for ME, but not for Thee…
Kirstjen Nielsen, the 6th United States Secretary of Homeland Security. Photo courtesy of the DHS.
“When a stranger resides with you in your land, you shall not wrong him. The stranger who resides with you shall be to you as one of your citizens; you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt.” – The Holy Bible: King James Version – (Lev. 19:33-34).
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During the Trump administration, Kirstjen Nielsen was the physical personification of US immigration policy as the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) from 2017 until 2019.
Nielsen took command of the DHS on December 5th, 2017. Following her appointment, she implemented the controversial Trump administration family separation policy. Secretary Nielsen also supported Mr. Trump’s immigration policy centerpiece, his proposal for a border wall between the United States and Mexico. At over eighteen feet high, the wall was supposed to stop illegal immigrants from crossing into the United States unimpeded.
There was also significant opposition from the US public to the Trump administration’s suppression of illegal immigration, travel bans on citizens from Middle Eastern countries, and increased police patrols in Muslim American communities. The National Democratic Party, legal experts, immigration rights advocates, and minority rights groups accused Mr. Trump and his supporters of racism, xenophobia, and cultural bias.
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Kirstjen Nielsen (left) took the oath of office as the sixth US Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security in 2017. Photo image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.
“I was hungry, and you gave me food, I was thirsty, and you gave me drink, I was a stranger, and you welcomed me.” – The Holy Bible: King James Version – (Matthew 25: 31-40).
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In June 2018, Kirstjen Nielsen held a press briefing with White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders amid growing public outcry about the family separation policy.
Nielsen accused the media and Democratic Party members in Congress of mischaracterizing the administration’s policy. She dismissed the suggestion that the administration used family separations as political leverage to force Congress to support Donald Trump’s immigration policies.
Former Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen with Nielsen with Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto in 2018. Photo image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.
When asked whether Mr. Trump ever made countering White supremacy a priority, Kirstjen Nielsen replied that Trump wanted the DHS to prevent “any form of violence” threatening Americans. Nielsen resigned as head of DHS in April 2019 after a rocky tenure.
Although there has been no public news regarding Secretary Nielsen since she left DHS, human rights organizations urged Fortune 500 companies to refuse to hire senior Trump administration officials like Nielsen involved in planning, carrying out, or defending the separation of migrant children from their parents. Nielsen is also associated with Mr. Trump’s policies on the border wall and against “sanctuary cities.”
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Donald Trump’s Border Wall
“The Wall.” Image by Analogicus from Pixabay.
During the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump framed his policy arguments for a wall on the southern border by focusing on crime from Mexicans and terrorism from Muslim immigrants.
After President Donald Trump took office on January 20th, 2017, he began petitioning Congress for $5.7 billion for a wall on the southern border between the United States and Mexico. Soon after, the Trump administration began construction on a brand-new seven-and-a-half mile-long bonded steel wall installed along the Mexican border in Naco, Arizona.
In January 2017, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 13767, formally directing the US government to begin constructing a border wall using existing federal funding. Photo image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.
Outside organizations launched numerous efforts to intermittently fund and build portions of the border wall from February 2019 to February 2020. In August 2020, the Department of Justice (DOJ) arrested former Trump Chief Strategist Steve Bannon and other fundraisers for a private organization called “We Build the Wall” on fraud charges.
On his first day in office, in January 2021, President-elect Joe Biden halted all border wall construction, a direct reversal of Donald Trump’s policy.
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Sanctuary Cities
Former United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions. Photo image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons.
Yet, over time, President Biden’s horrible policies on border security and illegal immigration have forced his administration to uphold all of Donald Trump’s border policies.
In 2017, the Trump administration also began aggressive Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations across the US. The sanctuary city debate is yet another contentious social and economic “wedge” issue that national Republican party leaders use effectively against President Joe Biden and national Democrats.
Donald Trump directed his first Attorney General, Jeff Sessions, to take “hardline” political policy positions against sanctuary cities and the sanctuary city movement. AG Sessions’ operations in the Justice Department pressured local jurisdictions to cooperate with federal immigration agents and enforce the United States immigration laws. Trump administration efforts included emphasizing cases in which illegal migrants committed violent crimes and condemned sanctuary cities as places of safety for these criminals.
In 2022, Republican Governors Greg Abbott and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis began busing and flying thousands of illegal migrants to six sanctuary cities in multiple “blue states” across the United States.
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Border Access for ME, but not for Thee…
Amber Heard (left) and Johnny Depp (right) in Sydney, Australia, 2015.
Donald Trump began his campaign for the US presidency in 2015 by stressing the importance of limiting immigration into America, both legal and illegal.
This concern was punctuated by what is perhaps Trump’s most notorious political proclamation about Mexican emigres and asylum seekers to date: “They are not our friend, believe me. They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They are rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.”
We here at Public Health Policy Reviews find it interesting that in the same year that Donald Trump became the voice of a transnational revolt against migrants traveling from the Southern hemisphere to the North – wealthy Western White social elites like Amber Heard and Johnny Depp were exhibiting their disdain for border rules and customs statutes.
On April 18th, 2016, Amber Heard pleaded guilty in the Australian courts to providing a false immigration document after she illegally imported two dogs she co-owned with Johnny Depp into Australia in May 2015.
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Johnny Depp (left) and Amber Heard (right) recorded an apology video in 2015 for violating Australian customs quarantine rules as part of a court agreement to avoid jail time. Video screen grab courtesy of YouTube.
Heard, 38, was still married to her ex-husband Depp, 61, in 2015 when the “Aquaman” actress brought their two Yorkshire Terriers – “Pistol” and “Boo,” into the country without declaring the pets, despite the country having a strict quarantine policy.
The two celebrity actors failed to submit the dogs through customs and adhere to Australia’s 10-day quarantine rule. A conviction on the two illegal importation counts could have sent Amber Heard to prison for up to 10 years.
After pleading guilty to falsifying travel documents in court, the actress avoided jail time, and Australian legal authorities closed the case. As part of an agreement with the Australian courts and customs, Heard and Depp filmed an apology video in which the “Pirates of the Caribbean” actor urged viewers to “declare everything.”