They Broke the Law. The Cop Is the Villain.How ProPublica and The New York Times Spin Enforcement Into a Crime

Folks, read this one slowly. The trick is in the writing.

ProPublica and The New York Times Magazine just ran a 5,000-word story about Ingram, Texas. It’s a town of 1,900 people on the Guadalupe River, still rebuilding after the flood. The local police signed up for ICE’s 287(g) program. Officers stopped drivers for broken brake lights and illegal window tint. When a driver turned out to be here illegally, they handed him to ICE.

That’s the whole story. The law, enforced.

Now look at how they wrote it.

The headline: “The Small-Town Cop Who Helped ICE Deport His Neighbors.” Not people in the country illegally. Neighbors.

The opening: a baptism party. Pozole verde. Horchata. A pregnant mother. A 3-month-old baby. You’re in that kitchen and you love these people before you learn one fact about why the cop is there.

The cop: before you hear his side, you get a 185-page affair investigation and the line “embarrassment to the profession.” Then his overtime pay. Then a Facebook comment they chose to describe: a GIF of dollar bills stacking up. They put him on trial first so you won’t listen when he talks.

The word: “undocumented,” start to finish. The only time “illegally” shows up is when the cop says it.

THE QUESTION THEY NEVER ANSWERED

The pregnant woman at that party is Joanna Martinez. She’s the heart of the story. Her husband, Ulices Macias, the father of her newborn, was stopped, cuffed and handed to ICE when the baby was two weeks old. ProPublica tells you he was here illegally.

They tell you Maria, the other pregnant woman in the story, is “undocumented.”

They tell you Norma Luján is a “Texas-born U.S. citizen.”

Joanna? Nothing.

They interviewed her for four months. Her status was one question away. They either never asked or never printed the answer.

Why does that matter? On June 30, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in Trump v. Barbara that a child born here to parents in the country illegally is a citizen at birth. I think they got it wrong, and so did three justices. Thomas, Alito and Gorsuch dissented. Alito called it a “mistake” that “preserves a powerful incentive to enter or remain in this country illegally.” Thomas said it “devalues” citizenship.

Millions of Americans, me included, still believe a child born to parents here illegally should not be handed citizenship. If one parent is a citizen, or even here legally, that’s a different story, and an honest one. If both are here illegally, that’s the birthright fight right there in that kitchen.

We don’t know which it is. The story doesn’t say. Here’s my read: if Joanna were here illegally and pregnant, they’d have put it in the headline. That’s the most emotional card the birthright crowd has, and they don’t leave it on the table. Their silence tells me she’s legal, and that the honest version of this story didn’t fit the one they wanted to tell. That’s my assumption, not a fact. But they had the answer within reach and kept it from you.

Sometimes what’s omitted says a lot without outright saying it.

THE ONE TRUE SENTENCE

Buried halfway down, the officer said it plainly:

“My actions did not. His actions did. I made a traffic stop. He was here illegally. That’s not my fault.”

They printed it and moved on.

It gets worse. A woman walks up to the officer, grabs his hand and tells him the man’s pregnant wife is in the hospital. She admits it was a lie. The story tells it as a moment of grace. Lying to a police officer to get a man released, written up as a prayer.

And the victims, according to the story? The contractors who lost their crews. The cabin owner who lost his workers. A cleaning business that dropped from 30 people to fewer than 10. They’re admitting the town ran on illegal labor and calling the loss of it a tragedy.

What you won’t find in 5,000 words: one citizen who wanted the law enforced. One question about whether these people should have been there at all.

This is how it works. Nobody says “ignore the law.” They make you cry at the baptism party, smear the cop, call it “undocumented,” leave out the fact that would change the picture, and bury the one honest sentence where you’ll skim past it. Enforce the law and you’re the monster. Break it and you’re the neighbor.

It’s not all of them, but it’s always one. Now it’s a lot of them.

I call balls and strikes. Be fair, and be compassionate. Enforcing the law IS compassion, because it deals with both sides: the citizen and the one who broke it. Mercy comes in the sentencing, not in pretending the law isn’t there.

There are millions of us who think this way. The writers paint us as bloodthirsty racists and xenophobes. We’re not. We just want the law to mean something.

The Ungrateful here is the newsroom. They know exactly what they’re doing with words, and they use them to make you feel guilty for wanting your own laws enforced. That’s coddling, and coddling is just as pernicious as laziness.

My verdict? Grateful for an officer who said it plainly: “He was here illegally. That’s not my fault.” Ungrateful for the editors who buried it, and who kept from you the one fact about Joanna that every reader deserved.

Now you weigh in. Read it yourself and tell me I’m wrong.

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸
— A Grateful Immigrant

Sources:
ProPublica / The New York Times Magazine, “The Small-Town Cop Who Helped ICE Deport His Neighbors,” Oct. 25, 2026: www.propublica.org/article
Trump v. Barbara, No. 25-365, decided June 30, 2026: www.supremecourt.gov/opinions
CNN on the dissents, June 30, 2026: www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/supreme-court-cases-news

I Chose America. They Burned It.Their Words. Your Verdict.

Folks, two clips. Two kinds of people. Watch both, then you decide.

THE GRATEFUL ONES

Anya came from Russia. Legally. Hard, expensive, stressful, and she did it anyway.

“I didn’t get America by accident, I chose it.”
“I respect the system, not just the benefits.”
“I earned my seat at the table. So when I defend America, it’s not because I was born here. It’s because I fought to be here.”

The second came from Brazil over 25 years ago. Proud American citizen now. She held up a dictionary and showed us the word “assimilate.”

“I came here to be one of you. If I thought Brazil was so much better, I would have stayed there.”
“If you’re not coming over here to assimilate like me… stay right where you are. Period. Full stop.”

Nobody handed it to them. They earned it.

The Grateful Ones Short

NOW THE UNGRATEFUL

Los Angeles. June 8, 2025. A crowd circles a burning American flag. Somebody sprays something into the fire. A second flag goes on the fire. A man with a bullhorn tells them what it’s for:

“We need to bring down this empire once and for all.”

The crowd answers: “Burn it down.”

And while our flag burns on the street, the Mexican flag goes up in the air.

Two days later in Seattle, they pulled the flag down at the federal building and set it on fire too.

I don’t know their papers, and I won’t guess. I know what they did.

It’s not all of them, but it’s always one. Now it’s a lot of them! Love whatever flag you want. The one you set on fire is the one that protects your right to stand in that street.

Now The Ungrateful Short

THE THREE A’S

Accountability. Anya followed the law when it was hard. The crowd chanted “F*** the system.” Grateful pass. Ungrateful fail.

Assimilation. “I came here to be one of you.” versus another country’s flag raised over ours in the fire. Grateful pass. Ungrateful fail.

Allegiance. “When I defend America… it’s because I fought to be here.” versus “Bring down this empire.” Grateful pass. Ungrateful fail.

Gratitude isn’t on its knees. It’s spine. These two women didn’t ask to be coddled. They asked to belong, and they did the work. Making excuses for the flag burners is coddling, and coddling is as pernicious as laziness.

My verdict? Grateful for Anya and the woman from Brazil. Ungrateful for the ones who burned the flag that protects them.

Grateful or Ungrateful? Cast your verdict, then send it to someone who needs to see this.

Pick a side. Promote or Defend.
Grateful vs. Ungrateful tee 👉 agratefulimmigrant.com/products/grateful-vs-ungrateful-tee

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸
— A Grateful Immigrant

Sources and credits:

@comrade_mom on TikTok. Public repost: @TONYxTWO on X, Feb 7, 2026: x.com/TONYxTWO/status
@vivaresistance on TikTok. Public repost: @TONYxTWO on X, Feb 17, 2026: x.com/TONYxTWO/status
Video: FreedomNewsTV / Oliya Scootercaster, via Fox News, Jun 9, 2025: www.foxnews.com/anti-ice-protesters-los-angeles-spit-burn-american-flag
New York Post, Jun 9, 2025: nypost.com/us-news/la-anti-ice-rioters-burn-spit-on-american-flag-while-chanting-f-k-trump
Video: Katie Daviscourt / The Post Millennial, Seattle, Jun 10, 2025: x.com/KatieDaviscourt/status Clips used for commentary and news reporting. Creators credited; we’ll take any clip down on request.

TRAPPED FOR LIFE They Broke the Market. Now They Blame It.

Folks, your health insurance went up again. It’s going up more. Here’s why.

In a real market, price is the signal. Too expensive? You walk. The seller cuts the price or loses you. Somebody new comes in and does it cheaper. That’s how everything you buy gets better and cheaper.

Health care doesn’t work that way. You don’t pay the bill, an insurer or the government does. You don’t see the price until after the care. Medicare sets the rates and everyone negotiates off them. A hospital that charges more doesn’t lose a single patient. No signal. No pushback. Prices only go one way.

Then came 2010. Obamacare. Shoved down our throats as the cure. “If you like your plan, you can keep it.” “$2,500 in savings for the average family.” Remember?

Here’s what it actually did.

It forced you to buy insurance, so demand was set by law, not price.

It told you what your plan must cover, so you couldn’t buy only what you need. Cheap, simple plans? Outlawed.

It tied subsidies to premiums. Premiums go up, the subsidy goes up, taxpayers eat it. Why would an insurer ever hold the line?

It capped insurer overhead at a percentage of spending. Want to make more? Spend more. Higher costs pay.

It pushed hospitals and doctors into giant systems. Less competition. Higher prices.

Individual-market premiums roughly doubled from 2013 to 2017. Now the COVID-era subsidies are gone, and you’re seeing the real price they were hiding.

Look at the parts of medicine where you pay cash, like LASIK and cosmetic surgery. Prices held or dropped. Quality went up. That’s what a market does when you let it.

And now the same people who caused this want to promise you rainbows and roses again. More control. More “coverage.” More programs.

What they’re really saying is: We’ve got you trapped for life. Without our control, you don’t get to participate. You don’t get REAL CHOICES.

They destroyed the market. Then they blame the market, when it hasn’t existed in any real way since 2010.

That’s not a cure. That’s a cage.

ACCOUNTABILITY. They promised savings and delivered doubled premiums. Nobody owned it. Fail.

ASSIMILATION. America runs on choice and earning your way. They replaced it with mandates and dependence. Fail.

ALLEGIANCE. Defending the country means defending the freedom that built her. Trapping Americans in a system they can’t leave is the opposite. Fail.

Agency built America. Not altruism. Give people back the price, the choice and the decision, and watch what happens.

My verdict? Grateful for every American who still pays cash and asks “what does it cost?” Ungrateful for the people who broke the market and want credit for fixing it.

Now you weigh in…

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸
— A Grateful Immigrant

JUDGE GASLIGHTS! A Biden Judge Just Told DHS to Stand Down

Folks, Homeland Security is doing its job.

We have illegal aliens in this country. From what I see, a lot of them are getting IDs and some kind of government handout, when they aren’t supposed to be here at all. This administration was elected largely to clean that up. DHS is doing exactly that.

On Monday, 28 green-card holders in California were charged with voting or registering to vote illegally. They aren’t citizens, and they voted anyway.

Then came the push back. On Wednesday night, Judge Araceli Martínez-Olguín, a Biden appointee in Oakland, ordered DHS to stop its field operations hunting noncitizen voters in nine states. That’s two weeks before an election.

Her reasons? The data is “flawed.” And the arrests “lead to an objectively reasonable fear of law enforcement entanglements that intimidates citizens from urging or aiding others in exercising their right to vote.”

Intimidate who? It’s 2026, not the 1800s. Why would anyone be intimidated just because they look “foreign”? I’m foreign. I look foreign. I’m not white. I vote, and I’m not scared, because I’m a citizen. She never said who’s being intimidated or how. If you’re on the rolls legally, you have nothing to fear. The only person who should be nervous is the one who isn’t supposed to be there.

And what did she have? Allegations. A union says some of its members “no longer wanted” to vote in person. A whistleblower alleges the target list is bad. That’s it. No named victim. No documented case.

She’s a judge. She knows the difference between evidence and an allegation. She took the allegations anyway and halted federal law enforcement in nine states. That’s not a mistake. That’s a choice. Call enforcement “intimidation,” call a claim a fact, and dare you to question it. That’s the gaslight.

Well, I feel violated. My rights as a citizen were violated by non-citizens voting. There! And mine isn’t a feeling on paper. Those 28 charges are real. Every illegal ballot cancels a citizen’s. So whose fear counts?

Weigh it. On one side: allegations. On the other: 28 people charged in one week. Millions of illegal aliens are working in this country illegally. Nobody disputes that. They broke the law to get here and break it to work here. And we’re supposed to believe the ballot box is the one line they won’t cross?

They’ll tell you audits find almost nothing. Of course they do. You can’t audit what you rigged on the front end. None found doesn’t mean no fraud. It means nobody could find it.

Look at Minnesota. In 2023, Gov. Walz signed “Driver’s Licenses for All,” handing licenses to people here illegally. His own office counted 81,000 of them. He said he was “proud to finally sign it into law.” The card can’t show your status. Republicans asked for a mark on it. Democrats said no. Minnesota doesn’t require ID to vote. A license helps prove residency when you register. And a registered voter can vouch for someone else’s address at the polls.

Now picture the job. You’re auditing the rolls. Thousands of names, maybe hundreds of thousands. It’s a temp job paying $18 to $30 an hour. You check signatures and addresses. Every name comes with an ID and a registration, just like the 28 had. Nobody in that chain checks citizenship. If the paperwork’s clean, the vote’s clean. That’s the game.

Then the one agency built to dig past the paperwork goes knocking on doors. And a judge shuts it down.

Don’t listen to what they say. Watch what they do. Walz says “safer roads,” and hands out licenses that hide status in a state with no voter ID. The judge says “protect citizens,” and rules on allegations to stop the only check that looks past the paperwork. Different words, same result: fewer checks, more cover.

Look at where she chose to lean. In 2026, with 28 charged, licenses handed out to people here illegally, and a whole system that checks paperwork and not citizenship, she looked at all of it and decided the danger was DHS. Not the illegal ballots. The people trying to find them. Fix the list, don’t kill the probe. She killed the probe.

The Biden camp, through a Biden judge, wants no enforcement.

ACCOUNTABILITY. 28 were charged in one week. She didn’t clear them. She stopped the search for the next ones. Fail.

ASSIMILATION. Becoming American means following our laws, and the vote belongs to citizens. Protecting people who skip that step isn’t compassion. It’s coddling. Fail.

ALLEGIANCE. Guarding the count is defending the country from within. Shutting that down two weeks before an election is the opposite. Fail.

After all that, this, my fellow Americans, is how you destroy a country: from within. This is what I mean when I say they’re using our system to destroy our system. And once they get what they want, they’ll pivot so fast it’ll give you whiplash.

How do I know? History. Show me one country, just one, that bought the utopia rhetoric of “equality and justice for all” and stayed free. Free the way we used to be. Free the way America grew to greatness. Through agency, not altruism.

My verdict? Grateful for DHS doing its job. Ungrateful for the judge who’d rather tie its hands.

Now you weigh in…

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸
— A Grateful Immigrant

Grateful vs. Ungrateful: Their Words. Your Verdict.

Folks, no commentary needed. Just watch.

The Grateful Ones

She came from Mexico. In her words: “I came from Mexico. I came legally… I have never asked for a penny to the government.”

Then she watched rioters in Los Angeles wave another country’s flag. Her answer: “You are waving the flag of another country that you love? Go. You don’t need to be here. You don’t deserve to be here.”

He came from Korea in 1976. Paperboy. Dry cleaner owner for 20 years. Retired in his early 40s. On America’s 249th birthday: “This is a land of opportunity for all the immigrants… Thank you America. Thank you Americans. I love you all.”

youtube.com/shorts

Now the Ungrateful

Dearborn, Michigan. April 5, 2024. Al-Quds Day rally. The speaker tells the crowd to pour their chants “upon the head of America.” The crowd chants, in Arabic, “Death to America.” Then: “It’s the entire system that has to go.”

September 2025. Same city. A resident objects to a street sign and reminds the council that Hezbollah bombed our embassy in Beirut. The mayor: “You are an Islamophobe. And although you live here, I want you to know as mayor, you are not welcome here. And the day you move out of the city will be the day that I launch a parade…”

youtube.com/shorts

Their words. Not mine. Easy to decide.

My verdict? Grateful on the first two. Ungrateful on the second.

Now you weigh in. Grateful, or Ungrateful? Cast your verdict in the comments, then send it to someone who needs to see this.

Pick a side. Promote or Defend.

Get the Grateful vs. Ungrateful tee

Spine, not knees.
LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸
— A Grateful Immigrant

Sources

@malugarza85 on TikTok, Jun 8, 2025 (original now private); public repost
Korean immigrant July 4 video, earliest upload found via @BasedBandita; original creator unknown, so contact us for credit or removal
MEMRI TV, Al-Quds Day rally in Dearborn (chant translation)
Fox 2 Detroit, Dearborn City Council meeting

The Difference

In my last post I wrote about our self-appointed saviors. Omar. Piker. People who cast themselves as the rescuer and America as the villain.

Somebody’s going to say, “What about Trump?”

Fair question. Let’s be honest. Trump plays the savior too. At the 2016 convention he said it out loud: “Nobody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it.”

Both sides pitch savior qualities to their own people. So the question isn’t who claims to save. It’s whose side you’re saving, and whether you treat your people as capable or as victims.

That’s the difference.

Trump’s stance is that people, especially Americans, are very capable and are not victims. They’re also very benevolent.

The data back that up. Americans give more of their own money, voluntarily, through private charity than the “moralistic” Europeans do. Individual giving in the U.S. came to 1.44% of GDP. Britain, Europe’s best, gave 0.54%. Germany gave 0.17%. France gave 0.11%. A 2025 survey found the same order on share of income: Americans 0.97%, Britain 0.75%, France 0.45%, Germany 0.39%.

His approach is to uplift American values, not put them down. He promotes our traditions instead of silencing them. “We’re saying ‘Merry Christmas’ again,” he said in 2017. He celebrates the Judeo-Christian Western traditions without apology. He is not shy about being proud of it. In Warsaw he put the question plainly: “The fundamental question of our time is whether the West has the will to survive. Do we have the confidence in our values to defend them at any cost?”

He is not bashful in saying we are more successful than others because of our people and how we practice our culture. He is not in favor of celebrating other cultures while tamping down ours!

He doesn’t believe more successful people should be made, through government power, to carry the burden for the rest. He believes agency built this nation, not altruism. The latter is made possible by the former.

When we do make mistakes, he believes it’s a misplacement of the latter. Or, if not, a misreading of the situation, but one made in the best interest of Americans first.

Were there true mistakes? I’m sure there were, and many. But we are a self-criticizing culture, and we course correct.

Now hold the other side up next to it. Omar tells a Somali crowd she’ll guard Somalia’s seas. Piker rides to Havana against his own country’s sanctions. One saves America. The others save someone else, from America.

I say he, but HE is US.

My verdict? Grateful.

Now you weigh in. Grateful, or Ungrateful? Cast your verdict in the comments, then send it to someone who needs to see this.

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸

— A Grateful Immigrant

“Our Self-Appointed SAVIORS”

Folks, what type of mentality or personality do people like Omar, Piker and his ilk have?

In my opinion, it’s one of complete arrogance. Whether they realize it or not, even if it’s not braggadocio, it is the opposite of humility. The opposite of Gratitude. The personality is void of circumspection. False humility and the soft bigotry of low expectation married to a savior complex. And underneath all of it, hypocrisy.

Let’s take them at their own words.

No mirror.

In 2019, Hasan Piker said on his stream: “America deserved 9/11, dude. F— it, I’m saying it.” When the heat came, he called it “inappropriate.” In the same breath he sharpened it: “I didn’t say Americans deserved 9/11 — I said America deserves 9/11.” Then he offered, “maybe you can chalk it up to English being my second language.” He was born in New Jersey.

Last month on Axios he was asked if America is worse than al-Qaeda. “Pound-for-pound as far as the number of deaths, yes.”

Then there’s the landlord clip: “Murder those motherf—ers in the street.” His defense on Australian TV? “Hyperbolic.” “LARPing.” Never “I was wrong.”

Omar, the day agents searched her home on a judge’s warrant: “I’m ok. Make no mistake: this is an attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement.” The problem is never her. It’s always someone else.

False humility.

Piker calls landlording “inherently parasitic” and sells his audience on the evils of wealth. Then he bought a $2.74 million house in West Hollywood. His answer to the critics: “tax the f— out of people like me.” Sorry, pal. Nobody’s stopping you from writing a bigger check.

When the Treasury came asking about his Cuba trip, he played the martyr: “they’re after your boy,” an “intimidation operation.”

Omar’s office, after her disclosure dropped from as much as $30 million to under $100,000: “The congresswoman is not a millionaire.” Same amended filing: up to $1,005,000 in 2024 income from her husband’s companies.

The soft bigotry of low expectations.

Omar did say Feeding Our Future’s crooks “must be held accountable.” Then, on national TV, she turned the story around: “This also has an impact on Somalis, because we are also taxpayers… We also could have benefited from the program and the money that was stolen.” Fifty-seven convictions, and her line was, “we don’t feel the weight of what those individuals have done.”

That’s not defense. That’s coddling. And coddling does as much damage as laziness. It tells people the rules bend for them.

Thomas Sowell got two D’s and two F’s his first term at Harvard. He was told to shape up or ship out. “I didn’t have anywhere to ship out to.” So he got to work and graduated with honors. Nobody coddled him. That’s why he made it.

The savior.

Omar, in Somali, to a Somali crowd in Minneapolis, January 2024: “For as long as I am in Congress, no one will take over the seas belonging to the nation of Somalia… So feel comfortable Somali Minnesotans that the woman you sent to Congress is aware of this issue.”

Piker rode a convoy to Havana to stand with Cuba against his own country’s sanctions.

Both cast themselves as the rescuer. America is the villain.

Hypocrisy.

In 2018, Omar said: “I am not a Somali representative… I am a representative who happens to have all of these marginalized identities.” Six years later she stood before her own group and promised it the seas of Somalia.

She says Congress must be “beholden to the people and not special interests.” She calls her critics’ attacks “rooted in xenophobia and Islamophobia.” Then she sorts Americans by tribe herself.

Piker preaches against the rich. He lives like them.

The other way.

Gratitude is spine, not knees. It isn’t groveling. It’s standing up straight and owning your life.

The three As are the antidote. Accountability: you own your words, no “hyperbolic,” no “LARPing.” Assimilation: you join the country that took you in, or in Piker’s case, raised you. Allegiance: one flag, not the seas of another nation.

Arrogance can’t do any of the three. It has no mirror.

My verdict? Ungrateful.

Now you weigh in. Grateful, or Ungrateful? Cast your verdict in the comments, then send it to someone who needs to see this.

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸

— A Grateful Immigrant

Sources

TheWrap, on Piker’s 2019 “deserved 9/11” stream, plus his TYT interview
Wikipedia, Hasan Piker, born in New Brunswick, N.J.
Axios, Sept. 17, 2026
news.com.au, on Piker’s interview with ABC 7.30
BBC, on the Oct. 12 search
YourTango, 2021
The Daily Beast, Aug. 20, 2021
Fox News, May 2026
Just The News, on “intimidation operation” and the Cuba convoy
Yahoo Finance, on the amended disclosure
Fox News, on Omar’s Face the Nation interview
CBS Minnesota, on Omar at the TPS rally
Thomas Sowell’s 1990 column and 2004 column
Minnesota Reformer, translation of the Jan. 27, 2024 speech
The World (PRX), Oct. 30, 2018
The Nation, 2019
Star Tribune, Feb. 2024

Simple.

If Ilhan Omar lied her way into this country, she pays for it. If she didn’t, she sues the people who came after her.

So what happened? On October 12, Homeland Security agents searched her house in Washington. A judge signed off on it. They took her phone. Prosecutors have sent out more than a dozen grand-jury subpoenas, some to her own relatives. From what’s being reported, it’s about her immigration papers. Her age, too.

No charges yet.

The Homeland Security Secretary, Markwayne Mullin, calls it “a strong case.” Omar calls it “an attempt to target political enemies and weaponize federal law enforcement.”

Vindictive? Folks, I don’t care. If she handed them the ammo, that’s on her.

And if she’s innocent and somebody abused their power? Then sue. Make them pay, financially and criminally.

Now, my opinion. I don’t like Ilhan Omar. I think she uses our system to destroy our system.

Her story is she came here in 1995, at 12, a refugee from Somalia, and became a citizen in 2000. Well, that story is exactly what’s being investigated. I’m not taking it on faith, same as I wouldn’t take a charge on faith.

What’s not in question is what she said. Her own words.

June 2025, on Democracy Now!: “I grew up in a dictatorship, and I don’t even remember ever witnessing anything like that… to now be turned into one of the… worst countries.”

Grew up in a dictatorship. And this is the country turning into one of the worst?

Then January 2024. She’s in Minneapolis, speaking Somali to a Somali crowd: “We are people who know that they are Somali and Muslim… the U.S. government will do what we tell the U.S. government to do. That is the confidence we need to have as Somalis… For as long as I am in Congress, no one will take over the seas belonging to the nation of Somalia… Our land will not be divided. God willing we will seek to return our missing territory.”

Our land. Our missing territory. What we tell the U.S. government.

It’s in the words we choose to say. Maybe even instinctively. That’s the tell.

Folks, read it or listen to it, it doesn’t matter. You’ll instantly understand what was intended. Just like Hasan Piker in my last post, saying “say America!” Then he obfuscates.

Really, no difference here with Ilhan Omar. Different subject, same message. We’re NOT for America, even if we say we are.

It’s in the words and actions that are unguarded, or purposely articulated only to be obfuscated. That’s the game!

Matter of fact, that has always been the game. Remember “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘is’ is”?

If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it’s a duck.

She represents Minnesota’s 5th District. Somalis are about 3 percent of it. Three percent. She swore an oath to this country, not to Somalia’s coastline. That’s a failure of Allegiance.

So knowing what she said in Minneapolis, is it any wonder people are cynical about her ties to the Somali fraud?

You’ve heard of Feeding Our Future. They stole from a federal child-meal program. In 2020 she sponsored a bill, the MEALS Act, that loosened the rules on that program. One of the places charged, Safari Restaurant, took in more than $16 million, according to prosecutors. She posted a video promoting its meals. She took $7,400 from three people who were later charged. Gave it to food charities once the FBI probe went public. A man who worked with her campaign, Guhaad Hashi Said, was convicted. Prosecutors even listed emails between the ringleader and her office as trial exhibits. One’s titled “Help with USDA Food Program.” She hasn’t been charged with anything.

Then there’s the money. Her disclosure in May 2025 put her husband’s two companies, a winery and a venture capital firm, at $6 million to $30 million. The year before? $51,000, tops. In February 2026 House Oversight asked how. In March she amended it. Now the companies are worth nothing, and the whole household is worth $18,004 to $95,000. Her office called it an “accounting error.” Said, “The congresswoman is not a millionaire.”

I don’t know of anyone, and I mean anyone, who sees a number like that on a statement with their name on it and doesn’t say: WAIT! This is entirely incorrect! I don’t have that kind of money! No way!

She filed it in May 2025. She fixed it in March 2026. After Congress came asking.

Honest people catch it. People who aren’t forthright behave the way she has.

And here’s the kicker. She calls other people racists for dividing Americans by group. Then she stands in front of her own group and promises them a congresswoman.

Guilty? She faces the consequences.
Innocent? She sues, and somebody pays.

Either way, I know where she stands. She told us.

My verdict? Ungrateful.

Now you weigh in. Grateful, or Ungrateful? Cast your verdict in the comments, then send it to someone who needs to see this.

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL 🇺🇸

— A Grateful Immigrant

Sources

Minnesota Reformer, translation of Omar’s Jan. 27, 2024 Minneapolis speech, checked by two translators.
Star Tribune, fact-check of the same speech.
Democracy Now!, June 13, 2025.
House Oversight letter to Timothy Mynett, Feb. 5, 2026.
CBS Minnesota, on the disclosure amendment and the “accounting error.”
Yahoo Finance, on “not a millionaire.”
Sahan Journal, on Feeding Our Future donations to Omar.
KARE 11, on who received donations from Feeding Our Future defendants.
American Experiment, on Omar and Safari Restaurant, quoting the indictment.
Neilsberg, Somali share of Minnesota’s 5th District (about 3.4 percent).
BBC, on the Oct. 12 search, the warrant, the focus on her age, and Omar’s statement.
Reuters via Yahoo News, Oct. 15, 2026, on the phone seizure and the subpoenas.
Washington Post, Oct. 13, 2026, on the birth date and citizenship papers.
CBS News, Oct. 16, 2026, on Mullin’s “a strong case,” the subpoenas, and that she has not been charged.

Two Children of Immigrants. One Grateful. One Ungrateful.

Our leaders have told us we are a nation of immigrants.

Reagan, 1984, at Fudan University: “We call ourselves a nation of immigrants, and that’s truly what we are.”

Bush, 2006: “We’re a nation of laws, and we must enforce our laws. We’re also a nation of immigrants.”

Obama, 2014: “My fellow Americans, we are and always will be a nation of immigrants.”

Hillary Clinton, 2016: “I think we are both a nation of immigrants and we are a nation of laws.”

Fine. I’m one of those immigrants.

So here’s what I watch for. Not where you came from. What you do once you’re here.

And on Thursday, October 8, 2026, two children of immigrants stood on two debate stages, in two states, on the same night.

Here’s what I see.

Michigan: “A ridiculous question.”

Abdul El-Sayed, Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, debated Republican Mike Rogers at WOOD TV8 in Grand Rapids. [1][2]

El-Sayed was born in Rochester Hills, Michigan, and raised by his father, an Egyptian immigrant. University of Michigan. Rhodes Scholar at Oxford. Medical degree from Columbia. [15][16]

Moderator Rick Albin asked him which country is the greater threat to the United States, Israel or Iran. [3]

El-Sayed: “I’m just going to say that that’s a ridiculous hypothetical.” [3]

Albin: “I’ll ask one last time. Israel or Iran?” [4]

El-Sayed: “That’s, again, a ridiculous question. I think both of them have proven dangerous in their own way.” [3][4]

He also said Israel “has pushed us to go to war in Iran.” [3]

Iran held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days. [5] The Pentagon says Iran-backed militants killed at least 603 U.S. personnel in Iraq. [6]

He called the question ridiculous.

New York: plain answers.

Same night. NY1 and Spectrum News. Republican Saritha Komatireddy, running for New York Attorney General, debated incumbent Letitia James. [7][8]

Komatireddy was born in Brooklyn. In her own words: “My parents actually came to New York in the 1980s and settled down in Coney Island. It’s where they did their medical training at Coney Island Hospital.” Her family moved around the country; she grew up in Missouri and came back to New York to be a federal prosecutor. [9][10] Her parents are doctors who immigrated from Telangana, India. [11]

Harvard Law. Federal prosecutor in Brooklyn for more than a decade. Chief of staff at the DEA under President Biden. [12][10]

On antisemitism, she didn’t hedge. Of James: “This is the problem. She just stands there. She doesn’t do anything.” [7]

On Jewish students: James “has used it for other students but not for Jewish students who have been barricaded in libraries because of their race got no help from Tish James.” [7]

And when James was asked whether she supports a standard definition of antisemitism? “We are looking at the definition of antisemitism.” [8][13]

Looking.

Komatireddy’s campaign promise, in writing: “On Day One of my administration, I will declare a state of emergency over antisemitism.” [14]

On law and order: “I’m running for New York attorney general to make sure that New York is safe to prosecute crime, prosecute fraud, and take the homeless off the streets.” [12]

Now, honesty. Komatireddy was not asked Israel or Iran. Published coverage shows no Middle East question in that debate. [8] So I won’t put words in her mouth.

What I can judge is what each one did with the question in front of them.

One answered. One called it ridiculous.

It’s not about ancestry.

Both are children of immigrants. Both were born here. Both are accomplished: Oxford and Columbia medicine on one side, Harvard Law on the other.

So this isn’t about blood. We judge conduct.

One looked at America’s enemies and America’s friends and wouldn’t pick.

The other looked at Jewish New Yorkers being attacked and said: I will prosecute.

That’s the difference between gratitude and grievance.

If anyone has evidence that I’ve got either of them wrong, show me. I’ll look at it.

Coddling is as pernicious as laziness.

We’ve spent years telling newcomers and their kids they don’t have to choose. Keep the old grudges. Keep the old enemies. America will make room.

That’s coddling. And coddling rots a people the same way laziness does.

Gratitude is the opposite.

Gratitude is spine. It’s agency. America makes its own decisions; nobody “pushes” us. And a grateful citizen stands up and says so, out loud, even when it costs votes.

The Three A’s.

Accountability. Answer the question you were asked. El-Sayed didn’t. Komatireddy did.

Assimilation. Take on this country’s values. Equal protection means Jewish students get it too.

Allegiance. When someone asks who threatens America, you answer for America. First time.

That’s stewardship. We didn’t build this house. We inherited it. Our job is to guard it, for the ones who come after.

Same night. Two children of immigrants. Two answers.

You decide.

Grateful, or Ungrateful?

Spine, not knees.

LIVE GRATEFUL.

P.S. Update on our first Ungrateful: another American-born son of Turkish parents.

Hasan Piker was born in New Brunswick, New Jersey, to Turkish parents. [18]

He streamed the Michigan debate live. Thursday night, October 8. [17]

That same night, Jon Ossoff debated Mike Collins for a Senate seat in Georgia. [20] Komatireddy debated Letitia James in New York. [8]

Of all the debates that night, Piker chose that one to livestream.

Piker doesn’t live in Michigan. He lives in Los Angeles. He bought a $2.74 million house there in 2021. He can’t vote in that race. [21]

My read: he wanted to showcase the most obvious ungrateful child of immigrants, and shove it in our faces, to keep the narrative going.

When El-Sayed called the Israel-or-Iran question “ridiculous” for the second time, here’s what Piker said at his screen:

“Say America, say Michigan. Say America, say Michigan.” [17]

El-Sayed didn’t.

A few moments later he added: “No, just say, just say, I don’t care about either of these countries. I care about America. I’m an American.” Then: “No, not America, the biggest threat. Just like, turn it back to like, I don’t care about either of those countries, I’m American. America number one.” [17]

Hasan Piker. The man who said America deserved 9/11. [19]

Here’s my read, and it’s mine.

He led with “Say America.” The question on the table was who the bigger threat is, and the first word out of his mouth is America. That’s what his audience hears: America is the threat.

Then he covered it. “No, not America, the biggest threat.” “America number one.” Fake patriotism, laid on after the message landed.

That’s the pattern with Piker. He knows what he wants his audience to hear. Then he obfuscates.

Don’t take my word for it. The clip is linked below. Watch it and judge for yourself.

And here’s the thing. It would have been an easy one.

“Iran is the bigger threat.”

That’s an answer. And it still leaves Israel as a threat, if that’s what he believes. People can parse it all day long.

If a follow-up came, his qualifiers about Israel’s actions would land with his voters. And his opponents would get it. They’d disagree, but they’d get it.

He couldn’t even do that.

That’s the whole question of stewardship in one night. Whose side are you on? If you can’t say Iran is the threat, then you’ve picked a side, and it’s not America.

If anyone has evidence I’ve read it wrong, show me.

Sources

WOOD TV8, full debate video, Oct. 8, 2026. https://www.woodtv.com/video/michigan-u-s-senate-candidates-abdul-el-sayed-and-mike-rogers-debate-at-wood-tv8/12250853/
Detroit Free Press, Oct. 8, 2026. https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/elections/2026/10/08/abdul-el-sayed-mike-rogers-us-senate-debate/92162055007/
The Jerusalem Post, “El-Sayed says Israel, Iran have both proven ‘dangerous’ to US.” https://www.jpost.com/international/article-911134
JNS, “In Michigan Senate debate, El-Sayed won’t say Iran worse than Israel…” https://www.jns.org/news/u-s-news/in-michigan-senate-debate-el-sayed-declines-to-say-iran-worse-than-israel
National Archives, “444 Days: Selected Records Concerning the Iran Hostage Crisis 1979-1981.” https://www.archives.gov/research/foreign-policy/iran-hostage-crisis
Military Times, “Iran killed more US troops in Iraq than previously known, Pentagon says,” April 4, 2019. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2019/04/04/iran-killed-more-us-troops-in-iraq-than-previously-known-pentagon-says/
New York Post, Oct. 9, 2026. https://nypost.com/2026/10/09/us-news/letitia-jamess-gop-opponent-for-attorney-general-saritha-komatireddy-trounces-in-fiery-ny-ag-debate/
VINnews, Oct. 9, 2026. https://vinnews.com/2026/10/09/komatireddy-challenges-letitia-james-on-crime-antisemitism-and-fraud-in-heated-debate/
Saritha Komatireddy, podcast interview, June 30, 2026 (transcript). https://exa.ai/library/podcast/bv66dz9l8z5/episode/x1s0ndr80sr
Hindustan Times, “Who is Saritha Komatireddy?” https://www.hindustantimes.com/world-news/us-news/who-is-saritha-komatireddy-all-about-her-family-net-worth-as-president-donald-trump-endorses-letitia-james-opponent-101786849190133.html
The Vetting Room, May 4, 2020. https://vettingroom.org/2020/05/04/saritha-komatireddy/
Spectrum News NY1, Aug. 5, 2026. https://ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2026/08/05/republican-saritha-komatireddy-lays-out-record-in-challenge-to-ag-letitia-james
Matzav.com, debate coverage, Oct. 2026. https://matzav.com/fiery-showdown-letitia-james-grilled-by-gop-challenger-over-antisemitism-crime-medicaid-fraud-and-trump-prosecutions/
Komatireddy campaign release, “Komatireddy pledges ‘state of emergency’ on antisemitism.” https://sarithafornewyork.com/komatireddy-pledges-state-of-emergency-on-antisemitism-vows-ag-takeover-of-prosecutions-where-district-attorneys-fail-to-protect-new-yorkers/
Bridge Michigan, “Who is Abdul El-Sayed?” https://bridgemi.com/michigan-government/who-is-abdul-el-sayed-what-to-know-about-michigan-democrats-us-senate-winner/
El-Sayed campaign, About. https://abdulforsenate.com/about/
Hasan Piker’s livestream coverage of the Oct. 8 Michigan Senate debate, posted on X by @socialistadri, Oct. 8, 2026 (Israel-or-Iran segment at about 29:49–32:00; quotes at about 31:30–32:12). https://x.com/socialistadri/status/2108358316821024941
Wikipedia, “Hasan Piker” (born July 25, 1991, New Brunswick, N.J., to Turkish parents). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasan_Piker ; IBTimes UK. https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/who-hasan-piker-quick-facts-handsome-64-twitch-streamer-whos-been-accused-animal-cruelty-1747107
Washington Examiner, on Piker’s 2019 “America deserved 9/11” remark, which he has since walked back. https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/entertainment/4756365/hasan-piker-says-far-less-damaging-9-11-comment-trump-iran-take-out-california/
Atlanta News First, “Sen. Jon Ossoff, Rep. Mike Collins meet in first Georgia Senate debate,” Oct. 8, 2026. https://www.atlantanewsfirst.com/2026/10/08/live-tonight-sen-jon-ossoff-faces-rep-mike-collins-first-statewide-senate-debate/
Business Insider, “Hasan Piker faces criticism for buying a nearly $3 million home in Los Angeles County,” Aug. 23, 2021. https://www.businessinsider.com/hasan-piker-house-twitch-streamer-criticized-los-angeles-2021-8

Dereliction of Duty

Why Doing So Gets Americans Killed

Our leaders have told us we are a nation of immigrants.

Reagan, 1984, at Fudan University: “We call ourselves a nation of immigrants, and that’s truly what we are.”

Bush, 2006: “We’re a nation of laws, and we must enforce our laws. We’re also a nation of immigrants.”

Obama, 2014: “My fellow Americans, we are and always will be a nation of immigrants.”

Hillary Clinton, 2016: “I think we are both a nation of immigrants and we are a nation of laws.”

Well, I’m in that count. Legally.

The illegals I’m going to talk about here started on the wrong foot and deliberately stayed out of step.

The first duty.

A government’s first duty is the security of its citizens.

They were here illegally. They were caught for another crime. And instead of removing them and keeping citizens safe, cities like New York, and people like Zohran Mamdani, chose the criminals’ side over Americans.

The names everyone knows.

Kate Steinle, 32. Shot dead on a San Francisco pier, 2015, by Jose Ines Garcia Zarate, an illegal alien San Francisco had released months earlier. Acquitted of murder. [1][2]

Mollie Tibbetts, 20. Abducted and murdered in Iowa, 2018, by Cristhian Bahena Rivera, an illegal alien. Life without parole. [3]

Kayla Hamilton, 20. Murdered in Aberdeen, Maryland, 2022, by Walter Javier Martinez, an illegal alien and MS-13 member. 70 years. [4][5]

Rachel Morin, 37, mother of five. Raped and murdered on a Maryland trail, 2023, by Victor Martinez-Hernandez, an illegal alien. Life without parole. [6][7]

Laken Riley, 22. Murdered in Athens, Georgia, 2024, by Jose Ibarra, an illegal alien the NYPD had arrested and released. Life without parole. [8][9]

Jocelyn Nungaray, 12. Strangled in Houston, 2024. Two illegal aliens, released at the border months earlier, are charged. [10]

Debrina Kawam, 57. Burned to death on a Brooklyn subway train, 2024. A deported illegal alien who came back is charged. [11][12]

Oscar Belgal. Illegal alien. Arrested by the NYPD in 2023, convicted of grand larceny, arrested again in 2025, and left on the street until ICE came for him in Marble Hill. [13][14]

Caught for another crime and let go, or let in and never removed. It’s a distinction without a difference.

The system had them or let them in. It didn’t remove them. Seven women and girls are dead. The eighth man was still on the street.

March 4, 2025.

President Trump stood before Congress and honored Laken Riley with her mother and sister in the gallery. [15]

I watched that speech. Every Republican stood and applauded. By my count, more than nine out of ten Democrats stayed in their seats. That’s what I saw. If you saw something different, the video is public. Show me.

They choose not to.

The city says cooperation scares people away from reporting crime. A man robbing and dealing isn’t calling 911 anyway.

The city says it needs a judge’s warrant. Its own law already allows a hold with one. [16] And the Supreme Court says Washington can’t force a city to help. It never said a city can’t. [17][18]

They’re allowed to hold them. They choose not to.

14,916 ICE detainers not honored in New York since January 2025. [13]

They know these names.

City Hall knows these names. It still hides behind “lawbreakers won’t report lawbreaking.”

Mamdani: “I am in support of abolishing ICE.” [19] “When it comes to our city, we are proud of our sanctuary city policies.” [20]

Here’s what I see.

They are not on America’s side. Not on Americans’ side. No matter how tightly they wrap themselves in the flag, no matter how they work the Constitution.

At the very least on this, they’re on the intruders’ side.

Intent doesn’t change the damage.

Nobody in City Hall swore an oath to weaken this country. I don’t need them to.

If you knowingly release a man you have in custody on a new crime, the result on the street is the same as if you had sworn that oath.

Same victims. Same funerals.

That’s dereliction of the first duty. Immigration doesn’t shrink that duty. It makes it bigger.

Coddling is as pernicious as laziness.

Releasing a man with a record because enforcing the law is uncomfortable is not compassion. It’s coddling. And coddling rots a city the same way laziness does.

Gratitude is spine. Agency. It says: this country is worth protecting, and I’ll do the hard part.