Tag Archives: US Virgin Islands

Ken Klippenstein: Leaked DC Troop Deployment Order

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Discontent Among National Guard Ordered to DC Appears Widespread

District of Columbia National Guardsmen have been involuntarily ordered to report to duty at the DC Armory tomorrow through September 25, according to a copy of the order I obtained. Their purpose is to “protect federal property” and “support federal and District law enforcement,” the order says.

The directive follows Trump’s executive order this morning declaring a “crime emergency” in DC, for which reason Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a press conference that he would be deploying the National Guard. Though it wasn’t clear from their remarks what specifically the Guard’s mission would be, the order leaked to me shows that it will include the same federal protection and support to law enforcement mission as in the National Guard deployment to Los Angeles (which I also reported on extensively).

 “They are taking advantage of the fact that DC is not a state,” Joseph Nunn, counsel in the Brennan Center’s Liberty and National Security Program, told me. “DC has even less control over its own affairs than other non-state US territories like Puerto Rico, Guam, and the US Virgin Islands.”

Unlike all U.S. states, DC doesn’t have a governor; so the president doesn’t need to seek their consent to activate the National Guard there.

 “All but one of them are by default, under the command and control of their state governor or territorial governor — the sole exception is DC,” Nunn said.

Concerning as that seems, Guardsmen I spoke to regard the deployment as pointless political theater. (California Guardsmen made the same point to me about their deployment earlier this summer.)

“Huge waste of time and money when their focus is [supposed to be] saving money,” a DC National Guard source told me.

If the nearly half dozen Guardsmen I’ve spoken to about the deployment are at all representative, frustration with the order is widespread. (The memo I obtained, along with other details, leaked almost immediately.) As in the case of Los Angeles, the soldiers seemed most incensed by how performative and unnecessary they saw the mission as. This opposition apparently led some but not all Guardsmen to decline other requests to deploy voluntarily.

“I said no immediately because it’s like signing up for the Gestapo,” the Guard source said. “But I’m sure people will volunteer because they need the money or benefits from being on orders over 30 days.”

Independent: Texas man returns from honeymoon alone after wife is arrested by ICE in US Virgin Islands

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Taahir Shaikh of Arlington says his wife, Ward Sakeik, was detained by ICE in February in St. Thomas

A recently-married Texas couple has spent over 120 days apart after the bride was detained by ICE during their honeymoon in the US Virgin Islands.

Taahir Shaikh of Arlington says his wife, Ward Sakeik, was detained by ICE in February in St. Thomas, despite having a pending green card application and documentation of her stateless status.

“She’s considered stateless, which essentially just means you’re born in a country that doesn’t give you birthright citizenship. And since she was a Palestinian refugee that was born in Saudi Arabia, they weren’t recognized as Saudi nationals,” Shaikh told NBC DFW.

Shaikh said Sakeik was just 8 years old when her family arrived in the U.S. on a visa. Although their asylum request was denied, her lack of citizenship meant the government couldn’t deport them. Instead, they were placed under an order of supervision and required to check in with immigration authorities once a year.

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Since then, Sakeik has graduated from the University of Texas at Arlington and now works as a wedding photographer. She has always complied with immigration rules for 14 years, Shaikh said.

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[Her husband] says they carefully chose to travel to the U.S. Virgin Islands for their honeymoon, believing it wouldn’t jeopardize her pending immigration status.

ICE addressed Sakeik’s arrest in a statement to NBC DFW, writing, “The arrest of Ward Sakeik was not part of a targeted operation by ICE. She chose to leave the country and was then flagged by CBP trying to re-enter the U.S.

“The facts are she is in our country illegally. She overstayed her visa and has had a final order by an immigration judge for over a decade. President Trump and Secretary Noem are committed to restoring integrity to the visa program and ensuring it is not abused to allow aliens a permanent one-way ticket to remain in the U.S.”

ICE concluded, “She had a final order of removal since 2011. Her appeal of the final order was dismissed by the Board of Immigration Appeals on February 12, 2014. She has exhausted her due process rights and all of her claims for relief have been denied by the courts.”

But as the government has already admitted, she has nowhere to go. Period. Stop. That should be the end of the story.

Texas man returns from honeymoon alone after wife detained by ICE
Taahir Shaikh of Arlington says his wife, Ward Sakeik, was detained by ICE in February in St. Thomas

https://www.the-independent.com/news/world/americas/us-politics/wife-arrested-texas-ice-couple-b2774196.html