theatlantic--2020-02-13--John Kelly Finally Lets Loose on Trump

John Kelly Finally Lets Loose on Trump

“ He did exactly what we teach them to do from cradle to grave , ” Kelly told the audience at the Mayo Performing Arts Center .
“ He went and told his boss what he just heard.
” Although Trump has long insisted that his call to Zelensky was “ perfect , ” Kelly made clear that Trump indeed conditioned military aid on Zelensky ’ s help digging up dirt on Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden .
That amounted to a momentous change in U.S. policy toward Ukraine—one that Vindman was right to flag , because other federal agencies @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kelly said .
“ Through the Obama administration up until that phone call , the policy of the U.S. was militarily to support Ukraine in their defensive fight against … the Russians , ” Kelly said .
“ And so , when the president said that continued support would be based on X , that essentially changed .
And that ’ s what that guy [ Vindman ] was most interested in.
” When Vindman heard the president tell Zelensky he wanted to see the Biden family investigated , that was tantamount to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Kelly said .
“ We teach them , ‘ Don ’ t follow an illegal order .
And if you ’ re ever given one , you ’ ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order , and then tell your boss.
’ ” Throughout the appearance , Kelly laid out his doubts about Trump ’ s policies .
Trump has held two formal summits with North Korea ’ s leader , Kim Jong Un , hoping to scuttle the country ’ s nuclear program through @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was futile .
“ He will never give his nuclear weapons up , ” Kelly said .
“ Again , President Trump tried—that ’ s one way to put it .
But it didn ’ t work .
I ’ m an optimist most of the time , but I ’ m also a realist , and I never did think Kim would do anything other than play us for a while , and he did that fairly effectively.
” Kelly didn ’ t know Trump when , after the 2016 election , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ secretary of homeland security .
Watching the contest between Trump and the Democratic presidential nominee , Hillary Clinton , Kelly said he had been “ fascinated—not necessarily in a good way—but fascinated as to what that election meant to our country.
” He said his wife urged him to accept the position , telling him , “ I frankly think he needs you and people like you.
” Kelly ran the Department of Homeland Security until the summer of 2017 , when Trump tapped him to replace outgoing Chief of Staff Reince Priebus @ @ @ @ @ @ @ last year .
At times Wednesday , Kelly sounded like the anti-Trump .
He said he did not believe the press is “ the enemy of the people , ” for example .
And he sharply criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin , whom Trump has steadfastly courted .
Kelly described Putin as someone who is “ not necessarily a rational actor.
” Putin sits atop “ a society in collapse , ” yet is intent on restoring “ the glory days of the Soviet Union , ” he said .

The former chief of staff explained, in the clearest terms yet, his misgivings about Trump’s behavior regarding North Korea, immigration, and Ukraine.
MORRISTOWN, N.J.—Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, the former National Security Council aide and impeachment witness President Donald Trump fired Friday, was just doing his job, former White House Chief of Staff John Kelly told students and guests at a Drew University event here Wednesday night.
Read: Why is John Kelly speaking out now?
Over a 75-minute speech and Q&A session, Kelly laid out, in the clearest terms yet, his misgivings about Trump’s words and actions regarding North Korea, illegal immigration, military discipline, Ukraine, and the news media.
Kelly, a retired Marine Corps general, said that Vindman is blameless and was simply following the training he’d received as a soldier; migrants are “overwhelmingly good people” and “not all rapists”; and Trump’s decision to condition military aid to Ukraine on an investigation into his political rival Joe Biden upended long-standing U.S. policy.
Vindman was rightly disturbed by Trump’s phone call to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in July, Kelly suggested: Having seen something “questionable,” Vindman properly notified his superiors, Kelly said. Vindman, who specialized in Ukraine policy at the National Security Council at the time, was among multiple U.S. officials who listened in on the call. When subpoenaed by Congress in the House impeachment hearings, Vindman complied and told the truth, Kelly said.
David A. Graham: This is what an unleashed Trump looks like
“He did exactly what we teach them to do from cradle to grave,” Kelly told the audience at the Mayo Performing Arts Center. “He went and told his boss what he just heard.”
Although Trump has long insisted that his call to Zelensky was “perfect,” Kelly made clear that Trump indeed conditioned military aid on Zelensky’s help digging up dirt on the Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
That amounted to a momentous change in U.S. policy toward Ukraine—one that Vindman was right to flag, because other federal agencies needed to know about the shift, Kelly said.
“Through the Obama administration up until that phone call, the policy of the U.S. was militarily to support Ukraine in their defensive fight against … the Russians,” Kelly said. “And so, when the president said that continued support would be based on X, that essentially changed. And that’s what that guy [Vindman] was most interested in.”
When Vindman heard the president tell Zelensky he wanted to see the Biden family investigated, that was tantamount to hearing “an illegal order,” Kelly said. “We teach them, ‘Don’t follow an illegal order. And if you’re ever given one, you’ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order, and then tell your boss.’”
Throughout the appearance, Kelly laid out his doubts about Trump’s policies. Trump has held two formal summits with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, hoping to scuttle the country’s nuclear program through personal diplomacy. Kelly said the effort was futile.
“He will never give his nuclear weapons up,” Kelly said. “Again, President Trump tried—that’s one way to put it. But it didn’t work. I’m an optimist most of the time, but I’m also a realist, and I never did think Kim would do anything other than play us for a while, and he did that fairly effectively.”
Kelly didn’t know Trump when, after the 2016 election, he was first offered the job of secretary of homeland security. Watching the contest between Trump and the Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton, Kelly said he had been “fascinated—not necessarily in a good way—but fascinated as to what that election meant to our country.”
James Fallows: Serving Trump revealed who John Kelly always was
He said his wife urged him to accept the position, telling him, “I frankly think he needs you and people like you.” Kelly ran the Department of Homeland Security until the summer of 2017, when Trump tapped him to replace outgoing Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. Kelly left the White House early last year.
At times Wednesday, Kelly sounded like the anti-Trump. He said he did not believe the press is “the enemy of the people,” for example. And he sharply criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom Trump has steadfastly courted. Kelly described Putin as someone who is “not necessarily a rational actor.” Putin sits atop “a society in collapse,” yet is intent on restoring “the glory days of the Soviet Union,” he said.
At DHS, Kelly was responsible for advancing two of Trump’s top priorities: stopping the flow of illegal immigration, and building a border wall to make unauthorized crossings more difficult. In the speech, he said he disagreed with Trump about the scope of the problem. Trump’s border wall doesn’t need to extend “from sea to shining sea,” Kelly said. He also disapproved of the president’s language about migrants, he said. When Trump announced his candidacy in 2015, he famously described some migrants coming into the U.S. from Mexico as “rapists” and criminals.
Kelly said most migrants are merely looking for jobs. “In fact, they’re overwhelmingly good people … They’re not all rapists and they’re not all murderers. And it’s wrong to characterize them that way. I disagreed with the president a number of times.”
Read: John Kelly couldn’t fix the Trump presidency
Responding to questions from the audience, Kelly faulted Trump for intervening in the case of Eddie Gallagher, a Navy SEAL who was convicted last year of posing with the corpse of an Islamic State fighter. Trump reversed a Navy decision to oust Gallagher, in a chain of events that led to the resignation of Navy Secretary Richard Spencer.
“The idea that the commander in chief intervened there, in my opinion, was exactly the wrong thing to do,” Kelly said. “Had I been there, I think I could have prevented it.”
The audience applauded.
When a woman in the crowd said that Trump had “elevated” Gallagher, Kelly looked out at the crowd.
“Yep,” he said.


theatlantic--2020-02-13--Why Is John Kelly Speaking Out Now?

Why Is John Kelly Speaking Out Now?

Kelly ’ s experience shows why many officials decide to keep quiet .
Trump ’ s critics aren ’ t eager to absolve officials who were part of an administration whose policies they abhor .
And Team Trump , meanwhile , won ’ t tolerate a whiff of dissent .
So most of the Trump diaspora has simply decided to stay silent .
We ’ ve heard little from former Defense Secretary James Mattis since he resigned in 2018 over Trump ’ s decision to pull troops out of Syria , though he did speak to the Atlantic ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ about his tenure last year .
In that interview , he said he owed the Trump administration a period of silence , though he added that it wouldn ’ t last forever .
Former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson , who once reportedly called Trump a “ moron , ” hasn ’ t said all that much about the president ’ s go-it-alone approach to foreign policy .
Gary Cohn , the White House ’ s former top economic adviser , clashed with Trump over tariff policy and the president ’ s remarks @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Virginia .
Since his departure the following year , though , Cohn has been circumspect .
Indeed , what we know about the White House ’ s inner workings has largely come from the press .
( Last night , Kelly , a retired four-star Marine Corps general , praised Barbara Starr , the longtime defense reporter for the very same cable network Trump loves to hate : CNN . )
Unlike others—including some of his fellow retired generals who once staffed the administration—Kelly has decided that he will speak out , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his departure from the White House in January 2019 , he ’ s given public speeches and occasional press interviews .
As time passes and he gets more distance , his comments have become more revealing .
Last month , during a tense period in the Senate impeachment trial , Kelly told a reporter that lawmakers needed to hear from witnesses—a position at odds with that of Trump ’ s legal team , which had pressed for a quick , no-fuss acquittal .
It may be that Kelly wants to be the author @ @ @ @ @ @ @ from the most polarizing presidency in decades .
He made a point last night of mentioning that his wife urged him to join the Trump administration as a form of civic duty .
Before he was chief of staff , Kelly ran the Department of Homeland Security .
When he got a question about the travel ban , which was enacted in the first days of the Trump administration , Kelly said that DHS officials “ were not consulted.
” “ It just happened , ” he continued .
“ And it fell @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I led at DHS , because there was this immediate confusion : How do you implement this ban ?
” He added : “ Ethically , I did not agree with what this ban was written to do.
” Six months later , he joined the White House as Trump ’ s chief of staff .

The former chief of staff is making the case that he spoke truth to power inside the White House. The trouble for him is how many Americans won’t be convinced.
MORRISTOWN, N.J.—John Kelly had just finished his speech and opened up the floor to questions when a woman in the audience walked up to a microphone. She asked him how he plans “to atone for the blood of those immigrant children that are dying in detention centers” and while crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.
The accusation summed up the substantial skepticism and hostility that Kelly, the former White House chief of staff, faced here last night. Throughout his 75-minute appearance at the Mayo Performing Arts Center, hecklers in the crowd stood and shouted at him about the Trump administration’s family-separation practice and Muslim travel ban, two of the most controversial policies the White House enacted during Kelly’s tenure. Kelly also got smacked by the right. This morning, after I reported on his comments questioning Donald Trump’s North Korea policy and defending the actions of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman, his former boss scolded him on Twitter for speaking out. Kelly “just can’t keep his mouth shut,” the president tweeted.
Not many people who’ve worked closely with Trump have left the administration and unburdened themselves about what they saw. Yet seldom has it been more important to hear the unsparing evaluations of people who watched Trump in action. When a president routinely presents a warped picture of his own actions, it’s essential for the people who were in the room to verify what took place.
Kelly’s experience shows why many officials decide to keep quiet. Trump’s critics aren’t eager to absolve officials who were part of an administration whose policies they abhor. And Team Trump, meanwhile, won’t tolerate a whiff of dissent.
So most of the Trump diaspora has simply decided to stay silent. We’ve heard little from former Defense Secretary James Mattis since he resigned in 2018 over Trump’s decision to pull troops out of Syria, though he did speak to the Atlantic’s editor in chief, Jeffrey Goldberg, about his tenure last year. In that interview, he said he owed the Trump administration a period of silence, though he added that it wouldn’t last forever.
Read: John Kelly finally lets loose on Trump
Former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who once reportedly called Trump a “moron,” hasn’t said all that much about the president’s go-it-alone approach to foreign policy. Gary Cohn, the White House’s former top economic adviser, clashed with Trump over tariff policy and the president’s remarks about the 2017 white-nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. Since his departure the following year, though, Cohn has been circumspect. Indeed, what we know about the White House’s inner workings has largely come from the press. (Last night, Kelly, a retired four-star Marine Corps general, praised Barbara Starr, the longtime defense reporter for the very same cable network Trump loves to hate: CNN.)
Unlike others—including some of his fellow retired generals who once staffed the administration—Kelly has decided that he will speak out, albeit on his own terms. Since his departure from the White House in January 2019, he’s given public speeches and occasional press interviews. As time passes and he gets more distance, his comments have become more revealing. Last month, during a tense period in the Senate impeachment trial, Kelly told a reporter that lawmakers needed to hear from witnesses—a position at odds with that of Trump’s legal team, which had pressed for a quick, no-fuss acquittal.
It may be that Kelly wants to be the author of his own story and inch away from the most polarizing presidency in decades. He made a point last night of mentioning that his wife urged him to join the Trump administration as a form of civic duty. Before he was chief of staff, Kelly ran the Department of Homeland Security. When he got a question about the travel ban, which was enacted in the first days of the Trump administration, Kelly said that DHS officials “were not consulted.”
“It just happened,” he continued. “And it fell on my shoulders, and the people I led at DHS, because there was this immediate confusion: How do you implement this ban?” He added: “Ethically, I did not agree with what this ban was written to do.” Six months later, he joined the White House as Trump’s chief of staff.
At one point in his speech, Kelly talked about Vindman and how young soldiers are trained. “We teach them to always tell the truth, to tell truth to power,” he said.
Kelly is making the case that he himself spoke truth to power inside the Trump administration. The trouble is, many Americans won’t be convinced. They’d likely ask why someone who held so much power couldn’t quash the policies he is criticizing.
When he told the audience about “illegal adults coming across the border,” the woman who suggested that he had blood on his hands broke in.
“No human being is illegal,” she said.
“Stay with me—they are under the law,” Kelly replied.
The woman clearly wasn’t with him.


theatlantic--2020-02-13--The Atlantic Politics Daily: John Kelly Has Something to Say

It ’ s Thursday , February 13 .
In today ’ s newsletter : John Kelly speaks his mind about Trump .
Plus : Which U.S. presidents were the best writers ?
The retired four-star general , former White House chief of staff , and former secretary of homeland security let loose about his old boss during a speech at Drew University in New Jersey .
Kelly called out the president ’ s retaliation against Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman , criticizing Trump ’ s strategy on North Korea , questioning the president ’ s language about migrant families , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Nicholas , our White House reporter , was in the room for the remarkable comments : When Vindman heard the president tell Zelensky he wanted to see the Biden family investigated , that was tantamount to hearing “ an illegal order , ” Kelly said .
“ We teach them , ‘ Don ’ t follow an illegal order .
And if you ’ re ever given one , you ’ ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order , and then tell your boss.
’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ out his doubts about Trump ’ s policies .
Trump has held two formal summits with North Korea ’ s leader , Kim Jong Un , hoping to scuttle the country ’ s nuclear program through personal diplomacy .
Kelly said the effort was futile .
Kelly kept quiet for much of his tenure in the Trump administration , speaking more freely after he put some distance between him and the White House .
But the criticism may be too little , too late , Peter writes , this latest unburdening convincing no @ @ @ @ @

The former chief of staff wants to make the case that he spoke truth to power while inside the White House. Plus: Which U.S. presidents were the best writers?
The Atlantic Politics Daily: John Kelly Has Something to Say
It’s Thursday, February 13. In today’s newsletter: John Kelly speaks his mind about Trump. Plus: Which U.S. presidents were the best writers?
*
« TODAY IN POLITICS »
(EVAN VUCCI / AP )
The retired four-star general, former White House chief of staff, and former secretary of homeland security let loose about his old boss during a speech at Drew University in New Jersey. Kelly called out the president’s retaliation against Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, criticized Trump’s strategy on North Korea, questioned the president’s language about migrant families, and defended the press.
My colleague Peter Nicholas, our White House reporter, was in the room for the remarkable comments:
When Vindman heard the president tell Zelensky he wanted to see the Biden family investigated, that was tantamount to hearing “an illegal order,” Kelly said. “We teach them, ‘Don’t follow an illegal order. And if you’re ever given one, you’ll raise it to whoever gives it to you that this is an illegal order, and then tell your boss.’” Throughout the appearance, Kelly laid out his doubts about Trump’s policies. Trump has held two formal summits with North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, hoping to scuttle the country’s nuclear program through personal diplomacy. Kelly said the effort was futile.
Kelly kept quiet for much of his tenure in the Trump administration, speaking more freely after he put some distance between him and the White House. But the criticism may be too little, too late, Peter writes, this latest unburdening convincing no Americans of anything new.
Kelly’s indictment of the president is also striking, given that many others in the military community have chosen to keep mum. (Military officials must weigh calling out what they see as unprecedented, destructive behavior, against preserving the apolitical nature of the military. Retired officers face the same calculus, as my colleagues Kathy Gilsinan and Leah Feiger reported in their piece on this slow-boil revolt.)
Call it the James Mattis rule: “There is a period in which I owe my silence. It’s not eternal. It’s not going to be forever,” the former secretary of defense told Jeff Goldberg last year.
Read the rest of Peter’s dispatch on the former chief of staff’s speech here.
—Christian Paz
*
« OTHER CANDIDATES »
(SCOTT EISEN / GETTY)
When They Go Joe
Trump’s impeachment trial ended in acquittal and Joe Biden flopped in both Iowa and New Hampshire. Was there a point to Trump’s pushing for investigations into the Bidens?
“The president got himself impeached and wasted valuable time in the frantic pursuit of an also-ran,” David Graham argues. If Biden is knocked out of the primary, that will ultimately prove to be a hollow victory for Trump, who bears the stain of impeachment.
*
« EVENING READ »
(THE ATLANTIC)
Which presidents were the best writers?
After leaving office, presidents write books, memoirs. Most of them were … mediocre. James Parker writes:
Books by presidents ... it’s a vexed and miscellaneous genre. The heavy buttocks of history sit upon it. Literature rarely has anything to do with it. So credit to Craig Fehrman for the compendiousness, readability, and general exuberance of his Author in Chief: The Untold Story of Our Presidents and the Books They Wrote.
There were arguably only three notable writers among them. The first is John Quincy Adams.
*


theatlantic--2020-02-14--<em>The Ticket: </em>A Historic Vote on Equal Rights, and Hopes for Gun Control

For the first time yesterday , Jennifer Wexton got to use the gavel .
The freshman Democratic congresswoman from Virginia presided over a floor debate on a bill to advance the Equal Rights Amendment .
“ This wins the prize for the coolest thing I ’ ve gotten to do as a member of Congress , ” she told Edward-Isaac Dovere on the latest episode of The Ticket : Politics From The Atlantic .
Listen to the full episode here : Subscribe to The Ticket : Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher ( How to Listen ) Four years ago @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Virginia , she saw her resolution to ratify the decades-old amendment die under Republican leadership .
But the ERA got new life in November after Democrats swept local elections .
Soon after , Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the ERA , thereby crossing the three-quarters threshold of states needed to amend the Constitution .
That was step one of contemporary ERA advocates ’ two-step strategy .
Step two moved ahead this week when the House of Representatives passed a resolution removing a deadline Congress had set for ratification by the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on the measure , she sat down with Dovere in her office .
• Wexton describes her experience of being a woman in politics—from mansplaining in Congress to what her first opponent said in his concession call .
• Two years after the Parkland , Florida , shooting , the gun-violence conversation has not led to the enactment of national legislation .
Wexton talks about how the issue motivated her to get into politics .
• Also on the show : an exclusive exchange with Andrew Yang , recorded in New Hampshire as @ @ @ @ @ @ @

Representative Jennifer Wexton ( center ), flanked by Representative Brenda Lawrence and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, applauds in recognition of the recent vote by the Virginia Senate and House of Delegates to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment.
Representative Jennifer Wexton discusses the Equal Rights Amendment and gun control, joining Edward-Isaac Dovere minutes after presiding over House debate on the historic ERA bill.
For the first time yesterday, Jennifer Wexton got to use the gavel. The freshman Democratic congresswoman from Virginia presided over a floor debate on a bill to advance the Equal Rights Amendment.
“This wins the prize for the coolest thing I’ve gotten to do as a member of Congress,” she told Edward-Isaac Dovere on the latest episode of The Ticket: Politics From The Atlantic. Listen to the full episode here:
Subscribe to The Ticket: Apple Podcasts | Spotify | Stitcher (How to Listen)
Four years ago, when Wexton was a state senator in Virginia, she saw her resolution to ratify the decades-old amendment die under Republican leadership. But the ERA got new life in November after Democrats swept local elections. Soon after, Virginia became the 38th state to ratify the ERA, thereby crossing the three-quarters threshold of states needed to amend the Constitution.
That was step one of contemporary ERA advocates’ two-step strategy.
Step two moved ahead this week when the House of Representatives passed a resolution removing a deadline Congress had set for ratification by the states. Shortly after Wexton oversaw debate on the measure, she sat down with Dovere in her office.
In the episode:
Wexton describes her experience of being a woman in politics—from mansplaining in Congress to what her first opponent said in his concession call.
Two years after the Parkland, Florida, shooting, the gun-violence conversation has not led to the enactment of national legislation. Wexton talks about how the issue motivated her to get into politics.
Also on the show: an exclusive exchange with Andrew Yang, recorded in New Hampshire as he prepared to end his candidacy.
Voices:


The Undocumented Agent

One afternoon in April 2018 , Raul Rodriguez was working on his computer at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection office in Los Indios , Texas , when two managers entered the building .
Somebody must be in trouble , he thought .
The managers usually arrived in pairs when they needed a witness .
For nearly two decades , Rodriguez had searched for people and drugs hidden in cargo waiting to get into the United States .
He was proud of his work as a Customs and Border Protection officer ; it gave him stability and a sense of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 2018 , when public scrutiny of CBP began to intensify—the agency had officially started separating children from their parents—Rodriguez remained committed to his job .
Though he wasn ’ t separating any families at the border , he ’ d canceled the visas and initiated the deportations of thousands of people in his years of service .
“ Hey , Raulito , ” one of the managers said , calling him over .
Rodriguez walked past agents who were trying to look busy on their computers .
Just two years from being eligible @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an unblemished record .
He couldn ’ t imagine what the managers wanted .
Rodriguez had been crossing bridges at the border since his parents , who were Mexican , had sent him to live with relatives in Texas when he was 5 years old .
He ’ d wanted to stay in Mexico , but his mother insisted that he go : He was a United States citizen .
She ’ d given birth to him just across the border in hopes that he would have a better life , and it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ opportunity .
He started first grade at a public school in Mission , Texas .
From then on , he saw his parents only on school breaks .
As a child , he ’ d admired immigration agents ’ crisp uniforms and air of authority .
When he grew into a teenager , though , agents began to question him more aggressively , doubting his citizenship despite his Texas-issued birth certificate .
He chalked it up to simple prejudice , no different from the white students at Sharyland High who provoked him to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ He decided he ’ d defy their stereotypes by one day becoming an agent himself .
He would enforce the law , but without demeaning people as he did it .
Rodriguez joined the Navy in 1992 .
As a recruit , he cleaned floors and toilets , cooked , and drove a bus .
Visiting his parents in Mexico , he wore his uniform .
They didn ’ t say they were proud , but the looks on their faces made him feel as though growing up in Texas really had been @ @ @ @ @ @ @ across the border in uniform , he approached the agents on the bridge and thought : Now they 're going to have to accept me as an American .
His father , Margarito , had tutored Rodriguez in a strict vision of right and wrong .
A farmer who wore a sweat-stained cowboy hat and a polyester shirt , Margarito kept big bags of cash at home earmarked for his agricultural co-op members ’ hospital bills and funeral costs .
He made sure Rodriguez understood that he never skimmed off the communal funds @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with it .
While other members bought new cars with stolen money , Margarito walked around town on foot asking for rides .
“ Always do the right thing , no matter what , ” he told Rodriguez .
Now Margarito advised him that , as an immigration agent , he must enforce the law no matter what—no exceptions , not even for family .
“ You ’ re migra now , ” one of Rodriguez ’ s cousins said during the barbecue .
Immigration .
As boys , he and Rodriguez had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the brush , gossiping like brothers about goings-on at the ranch .
But the cousin had begun trafficking drugs and carrying a gun .
“ We ’ re on opposite ends , ” Rodriguez recalled telling him .
He cut ties with the cousin , and with close relatives who were living in the United States illegally .
Rodriguez began putting in long hours and overnight shifts , exacerbating tensions in his already rocky marriage .
He and his wife eventually separated .
His son , Raul Jr. , who was 10 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ me his father became an intermittent presence in his life as Rodriguez threw himself into his work .
By then , Rodriguez had already met his current wife , Anita , at the training academy they attended in Glynco , Georgia .
During training , they ’ d found that they had a lot in common .
Anita had grown up in Southern California , where immigration enforcement was a part of everyday life .
As a kid , she would prank her undocumented cousins by yelling “ La migra !
” just @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when Anita was 17 , she became homeless and lived for a time in a car outside Yuma , Arizona , with an older sister and her sister ’ s five kids .
Unauthorized immigrants making their way into the States ran over a footbridge near where they slept .
Border Patrol officers noticed the homeless family and began bringing them food , water , and even Christmas presents .
“ Nobody was taking care of us except those Border Patrol agents , ” Anita told me .
“ I wanted to be @ @ @ @ @ @ @ moved to the United States from Mexico , and she wanted to help facilitate immigration .
“ The name of your company is Immigration and Naturalization Service , ” she remembered an instructor at the academy saying .
“ I took that to heart.
” She moved from Arizona to South Texas , where Rodriguez was already stationed .
After he separated from his wife , he and Anita married and had two kids of their own .
He was assigned to work one of the same bridges he ’ d crossed as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ had given him a hard time back then became his colleague .
His co-workers told him he looked like an undocumented immigrant , and they nicknamed him “ la nutria , ” after an invasive aquatic rodent that swims the Rio Grande—but now he was in on the joke .
After long shifts , Rodriguez and his buddies would hang out together , drinking beer late into the night in the bridge parking lot .
Sometimes , he recognized employees of a Texas furniture factory , where he ’ d been a security @ @ @ @ @ @ @ States .
One guy was so proud of Rodriguez for becoming an agent that he sought out his inspection lane just to see him in uniform .
Rodriguez knew the man worked at the factory , in violation of the tourist visa he held .
“ Why did you have to come through my lane ?
” Rodriguez asked , before canceling his visa .
He revoked about 10 workers ’ papers this way .
Several years into his tenure with CBP , Rodriguez was buying cigarettes at a gas station near the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ if he would help her smuggle a child through his inspection lane .
She wrote her phone number on a scrap of paper and pressed it into his hand .
The proposition was brazen , but not uncommon—corruption was rampant within CBP .
In the years after 9/11 , officials had lowered hiring standards so that they could quickly bring in thousands of agents .
Drug traffickers tried to infiltrate their ranks , Department of Homeland Security officials have said , and rogue agents seemed to flout the rules almost as often as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ dollars in bribes to allow drugs and undocumented immigrants to move into the U.S. undetected .
( CBP did not respond to requests for comment .
A spokesperson confirmed to the Los Angeles Times that Rodriguez had been employed by the agency but declined any further comment . )
Anita told me that when people of Mexican heritage become agents , their family members tend to be ambivalent .
“ On one hand they ’ re very proud of us , because to work for the government—that ’ s a lofty thing in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ But then on the other hand , traicionero—you 're a traitor , because you 're deporting your own people.
” Rodriguez says he never let that stop him : Too much empathy could lead an agent to bend the rules .
But some cases did haunt him .
In his early years as an officer , an English-speaking teenager walked up to him on the bridge from the Mexican side .
Quiet and alert , the kid was not unlike Rodriguez had been at that age , except for his lack of papers @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been living illegally in the U.S. most of his life ; he needed to return to continue high school .
Rodriguez asked why he had risked a trip to Mexico if he knew he wouldn ’ t be allowed back into the U.S .
The boy explained that his grandmother had died and he ’ d gone to pay his respects before she was buried .
“ I wanted to see her one last time , ” he said .
Rodriguez told him his best hope for returning was to one day marry @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Rodriguez had little doubt about the rules .
He sent the teen back to Mexico .
That night , the boy attempted to swim across the Rio Grande .
Agents found his body floating beneath the bridge the next morning .
In the twilight of the Obama administration , Central American children and families began arriving at the border in droves , seeking protection from poverty and gang violence , and reunion with family in the U.S. Rodriguez , by then a veteran CBP officer , believed that many asylum seekers had @ @ @ @ @ @ @ stories so that they would be released into the United States to await their day in court .
The then–presidential candidate Donald Trump promised to lock these people up .
Rodriguez voted for Trump .
The Rio Grande Valley soon became the epicenter of CBP ’ s effort to deter migrant families by removing thousands of children from their parents .
Any parent could see the separations were inhumane , Rodriguez told me .
Someone in Washington had taken the crackdown too far .
But what could he do , as a nobody @ @ @ @ @ @ @ officers , “ Leave your heart at home.
” He focused on his sense of duty and followed orders .
Rodriguez was incredulous .
He wrote in a handwritten statement that morning , “ I have always believed I was a United States Citizen and still believe I ’ m a United States Citizen.
” His mother had died in 2013 , so his father was the one living witness who could clear things up .
Rodriguez offered to arrange for investigators to meet with Margarito later that day .
He called a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ father from Mexico to the meeting spot—a Starbucks near the border—even if he had to drag him there .
A few hours later , Margarito arrived to speak with Rodriguez and the investigators .
Margarito was evasive when officials first showed him the acta .
“ I need to know the truth , ” Rodriguez told him .
“ Tell me the truth.
” Margarito looked down at the table .
Rodriguez had been born at the adobe house outside Matamoros .
He explained that about two months later , one of his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ register a false birth certificate .
The fraudulent document had come to light because Rodriguez had petitioned for one of his brothers in Mexico to get a green card .
An officer with U.S .
Citizenship and Immigration Services , the agency that issues green cards , flagged the petition because Rodriguez ’ s Texas-issued birth certificate had been registered by a midwife who was later convicted of fraud .
( According to The Washington Post , government officials have said that cases against midwives during the 1990s uncovered roughly 15,000 falsely registered @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now had no legal status in the country , and was fired from Customs and Border Protection for failing to meet a basic condition of employment : U.S. citizenship .
Margarito stressed to investigators that he ’ d always hidden the truth from his son .
( When Homeland Security finished its investigation into Rodriguez , a prosecutor from the U.S. attorney ’ s office in McAllen declined to charge him with any crimes . )
A few hours later , still stunned by his father ’ s confession , Rodriguez placed an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his first marriage , Raul Rodriguez Jr. Raul Jr. was inspecting a home for insect and rodent infestations when he received his father ’ s call .
At 27 , he was working at a pest-control company in hopes of moving his three young kids out of an apartment in Los Fresnos , Texas , and had just landed an interview for a job with U.S. Customs and Border Protection .
He went to his father ’ s house , where he found his father and his stepmother , Anita , looking ashen @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for him .
He thought his father might have a serious illness .
Rodriguez began to tell Raul Jr. about the midwife , the acta , and Margarito ’ s confession .
Raul Jr. ’ s disbelief gave way to panic when his father explained that he , too , would likely lose his citizenship .
In 1990 , Rodriguez ’ s first wife , who was a Mexican citizen , gave birth to Raul Jr. in Matamoros .
Though he was born in Mexico , he was American by birth because of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Jr. later obtained a certificate to prove his “ acquired citizenship.
” But those papers were based on a fraud .
“ I do n't even know how to describe myself , ” Raul Jr. told me .
“ I don ’ t know if I 'm an illegal or not.
” In order to avoid making a false claim to U.S. citizenship—which could have barred him from the country—Raul Jr. returned his certificate of citizenship to the government .
He put his application to CBP , and a new house , on @ @ @ @ @ @ @ green card through his wife .
Along with more than 100,000 undocumented immigrants in the Rio Grande Valley , Rodriguez and his son are geographically hemmed in .
To the south is the U.S.-Mexico border , a deep-green river surveilled by thousands of federal agents and by blimps repurposed from Iraqi and Afghan battlefields .
To the east is the Gulf of Mexico , where boaters are subject to immigration checks by the Coast Guard .
Border Patrol checkpoints dot the major roads heading north out of the valley .
Every driver must @ @ @ @ @ @ @ you a U.S. citizen ?
An agent from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement , which handles deportations , set up a meeting with Rodriguez a few months after the fraudulent birth certificate was discovered .
The agent said he wanted to help him by going over the details of his case .
But Rodriguez , who knew the agent from work , sensed that this was a ploy to get more information out of him .
He took it as a warning from ICE : We ’ re watching .
More than 50,000 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the country , according to the nonprofit American Immigration Council .
They ’ re easy to spot at Rodriguez ’ s kids ’ high school .
Former colleagues who noticed Rodriguez ’ s absence but were not privy to the details of his case figured that he ’ d been fired for corruption .
He ’ s always been “ chueco , ” a retired agent named John Garcia told me he overheard someone say at work .
Crooked .
Just as Rodriguez had once cut ties with his undocumented family members @ @ @ @ @ @ @ when they saw him in public , at restaurants or the grocery store .
“ They treat him like he 's a pariah , ” Anita told me .
Rodriguez ’ s integrity award sits above the TV where he watches the local news every morning from the treadmill .
He spends the rest of the day tending to his sheep , cows , and chickens , rarely leaving his property , because a traffic stop could ultimately lead to deportation .
“ I don ’ t have any legal status in the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ I ’ m deportable.
” Rodriguez and Anita have refinanced their house and raided the kids ’ college fund to supplement Anita ’ s income from her job at the Department of Homeland Security .
Fired just shy of retirement , Rodriguez lost his eligibility to receive a $ 4,400-a-month pension along with his citizenship .
Rodriguez feared that the stress of his new reality could lead to divorce .
Last fall , as the evening cooled to 90 degrees , he drove to his teenage son ’ s football game , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
At the game , the band played the national anthem before kickoff , and an announcer asked veterans to rise and be recognized .
Rodriguez remained seated .
Anita , adamant that his service still counted for something , nudged him in the ribs .
“ Stand up.
” He applied to become a lawful permanent resident as the spouse of a U.S. citizen , and was forthright in his interview .
Yes , he told the official , he had made a false claim to U.S. citizenship , but only because @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Yes , he had voted in a federal election as an undocumented immigrant .
He expected no special treatment , just the pension , health benefits , and safety from deportation he felt he ’ d earned through his nearly two decades at CBP .
With some patience , he was confident that he could get his status sorted out .
By last fall , he had been waiting for a response for almost a year and a half .
Rodriguez says he can now see the impacts of immigration enforcement that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ I can relate to people who I turned back , people that I deported , ” he said .
“ They call it karma.
” Still , he doesn ’ t regret his service , and distinguishes himself from other unauthorized immigrants .
“ There are a lot of people trying to do it the easier way , ” he told me .
“ I just found out , and I ’ m trying to do it correctly.
” If deported , he would live on family property in Tamaulipas .
The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ travel ” warning to U.S. citizens says of the area : “ Murder , armed robbery , carjacking , kidnapping , extortion , and sexual assault [ are ] common along the northern border.
” As an agent , Rodriguez had put traffickers in jail , and his face is widely recognizable from his years on the bridge .
“ I don ’ t know how long I can survive , ” he told me .
Read : An astonishing government report on conditions at the border Despite those risks , Rodriguez dismissed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ asylum—a legal pathway to U.S. residence that the Trump administration has sought to eradicate , claiming it is rife with fraud .
“ I 'm not going to do it that way .
I 'd rather get deported , ” Rodriguez said .
“ I 'm going to practice what I preach.
” Once passionate about her work , Anita told me she has “ lost faith in the system.
” But without a college education , she sees no other option .
Her job in immigration , she said , “ is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Rodriguez “ lives by the rules … and even now he says that if the government chooses to deport him , he 's going to go , ” Anita said , her voice catching .
He would turn himself in before he would hide from ICE .
“ I ca n't let that happen .
What am I going to do ?
What are my kids going to do ?
What is he going to do over there ?
He 's a federal officer.
” Anita researches Rodriguez ’ s case most nights @ @ @ @ @ @ @ military veterans in the news facing deportation .
In October , Rodriguez received a letter from Citizenship and Immigration Services .
His green-card application had been denied because he had falsely claimed to be an American citizen and illegally voted .
The letter argued that Rodriguez did not qualify for leniency , even if he did not know about his status at the time .
( USCIS declined to comment on specific cases . )
In our interviews , Rodriguez said he understood that the government had to apply the rules to him @ @ @ @ @ @ @ undocumented relatives , his former co-workers , and the boy who drowned under the bridge .
But he drew a distinction between how he ’ d carried out his duties and how officials were handling his case .
“ I wasn ’ t being strict ; I was just abiding by what the law says , ” he told me .
“ And these people are not doing what the law says.
” He believed that he still qualified for an exemption provided by the law for those who make a false claim @ @ @ @ @ @ @ its denial letter , USCIS said it could not make an exception for Rodriguez even if he was unaware of his status at the time , citing recent precedent .
Still , Rodriguez held out hope that he could convince the agency to reverse its decision .
Immigration lawyers told me , however , that federal officials are granting fewer exceptions across the board .
“ Apply the right laws , and apply the right rules , ” Rodriguez told me .
He believed the agency was singling him out unfairly .
“ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ I want.
” His problem might be that it already is .

After spending nearly two decades facilitating deportations as a Customs and Border Protection officer, Raul Rodriguez discovered that he was not a U.S. citizen. Now he’s at risk of deportation himself.
One afternoon in April 2018, Raul Rodriguez was working on his computer at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection office in Los Indios, Texas, when two managers entered the building. Somebody must be in trouble, he thought. The managers usually arrived in pairs when they needed a witness.
For nearly two decades, Rodriguez had searched for people and drugs hidden in cargo waiting to get into the United States. He was proud of his work as a Customs and Border Protection officer; it gave him stability and a sense of purpose. Even in the spring of 2018, when public scrutiny of CBP began to intensify—the agency had officially started separating children from their parents—Rodriguez remained committed to his job. Though he wasn’t separating any families at the border, he’d canceled the visas and initiated the deportations of thousands of people in his years of service.
“Hey, Raulito,” one of the managers said, calling him over. Rodriguez walked past agents who were trying to look busy on their computers. Just two years from being eligible to retire, Rodriguez says he had an unblemished record. He couldn’t imagine what the managers wanted.
Rodriguez had been crossing bridges at the border since his parents, who were Mexican, had sent him to live with relatives in Texas when he was 5 years old. He’d wanted to stay in Mexico, but his mother insisted that he go: He was a United States citizen. She’d given birth to him just across the border in hopes that he would have a better life, and it was time for him to seize that opportunity. He started first grade at a public school in Mission, Texas. From then on, he saw his parents only on school breaks.
Read: Trump ends Obama-era protection for undocumented immigrants
As a child, he’d admired immigration agents’ crisp uniforms and air of authority. When he grew into a teenager, though, agents began to question him more aggressively, doubting his citizenship despite his Texas-issued birth certificate. He chalked it up to simple prejudice, no different from the white students at Sharyland High who provoked him to fistfights by calling him “wetback.” He decided he’d defy their stereotypes by one day becoming an agent himself. He would enforce the law, but without demeaning people as he did it.
Rodriguez joined the Navy in 1992. As a recruit, he cleaned floors and toilets, cooked, and drove a bus. Visiting his parents in Mexico, he wore his uniform. They didn’t say they were proud, but the looks on their faces made him feel as though growing up in Texas really had been worthwhile. And whenever he headed back across the border in uniform, he approached the agents on the bridge and thought: Now they're going to have to accept me as an American.
But on that day in Los Indios in 2018, one of Rodriguez’s managers slid an envelope across the desk. Rodriguez remembers reading: “You are no longer a law-enforcement officer, pending further investigation.” His gun and badge were confiscated without explanation. He left the building in a stupor.
Days later, he sat down with investigators at a federal building in nearby McAllen, Texas. They told him his career in immigration and his military service before that—his identity as a veteran, an agent, and an American—were based on a lie. His United States citizenship was fraudulent. He was an undocumented immigrant himself.
Left: One of the bridges that Rodriguez monitored as a Customs and Border Protection officer. Right: Rodriguez in his CBP uniform.
Rodriguez joined the Immigration and Naturalization Service, a CBP predecessor agency, in 2000, after five years in the Navy. Soon after he graduated from training, Rodriguez’s parents hosted a cookout at their home, in the rural outskirts of Matamoros, Mexico. His wife chatted with his mom and sisters, while their two young children, Daira and Raul Jr., played with their cousins. Corridos played on the stereo and fajitas sizzled on the barbecue in front of the adobe house. Hurricanes had flattened similar structures nearby, but his family’s home still stood, because Rodriguez had refinished the walls with mud and grass every other year during school breaks.
His father, Margarito, had tutored Rodriguez in a strict vision of right and wrong. A farmer who wore a sweat-stained cowboy hat and a polyester shirt, Margarito kept big bags of cash at home earmarked for his agricultural co-op members’ hospital bills and funeral costs. He made sure Rodriguez understood that he never skimmed off the communal funds, though he could have gotten away with it. While other members bought new cars with stolen money, Margarito walked around town on foot asking for rides. “Always do the right thing, no matter what,” he told Rodriguez. Now Margarito advised him that, as an immigration agent, he must enforce the law no matter what—no exceptions, not even for family.
“You’re migra now,” one of Rodriguez’s cousins said during the barbecue. Immigration. As boys, he and Rodriguez had spent countless hours hunting rabbits and quail in the brush, gossiping like brothers about goings-on at the ranch. But the cousin had begun trafficking drugs and carrying a gun. “We’re on opposite ends,” Rodriguez recalled telling him. He cut ties with the cousin, and with close relatives who were living in the United States illegally.
Rodriguez began putting in long hours and overnight shifts, exacerbating tensions in his already rocky marriage. He and his wife eventually separated. His son, Raul Jr., who was 10 or 11 at the time, told me his father became an intermittent presence in his life as Rodriguez threw himself into his work.
Awards and honors from Rodriguez’s career with CBP.
By then, Rodriguez had already met his current wife, Anita, at the training academy they attended in Glynco, Georgia. During training, they’d found that they had a lot in common. Anita had grown up in Southern California, where immigration enforcement was a part of everyday life. As a kid, she would prank her undocumented cousins by yelling “La migra!” just to watch them run. Later, when Anita was 17, she became homeless and lived for a time in a car outside Yuma, Arizona, with an older sister and her sister’s five kids. Unauthorized immigrants making their way into the States ran over a footbridge near where they slept. Border Patrol officers noticed the homeless family and began bringing them food, water, and even Christmas presents. “Nobody was taking care of us except those Border Patrol agents,” Anita told me. “I wanted to be like them.” Her own father had moved to the United States from Mexico, and she wanted to help facilitate immigration. “The name of your company is Immigration and Naturalization Service,” she remembered an instructor at the academy saying. “I took that to heart.”
She moved from Arizona to South Texas, where Rodriguez was already stationed. After he separated from his wife, he and Anita married and had two kids of their own.
He was assigned to work one of the same bridges he’d crossed as a teen, and an agent who had given him a hard time back then became his colleague. His co-workers told him he looked like an undocumented immigrant, and they nicknamed him “la nutria,” after an invasive aquatic rodent that swims the Rio Grande—but now he was in on the joke. After long shifts, Rodriguez and his buddies would hang out together, drinking beer late into the night in the bridge parking lot.
Sometimes, he recognized employees of a Texas furniture factory, where he’d been a security guard, as they reentered the United States. One guy was so proud of Rodriguez for becoming an agent that he sought out his inspection lane just to see him in uniform. Rodriguez knew the man worked at the factory, in violation of the tourist visa he held. “Why did you have to come through my lane?” Rodriguez asked, before canceling his visa. He revoked about 10 workers’ papers this way.
Several years into his tenure with CBP, Rodriguez was buying cigarettes at a gas station near the bridge when a woman approached to ask if he would help her smuggle a child through his inspection lane. She wrote her phone number on a scrap of paper and pressed it into his hand. The proposition was brazen, but not uncommon—corruption was rampant within CBP. In the years after 9/11, officials had lowered hiring standards so that they could quickly bring in thousands of agents. Drug traffickers tried to infiltrate their ranks, Department of Homeland Security officials have said, and rogue agents seemed to flout the rules almost as often as they enforced them, accepting millions of dollars in bribes to allow drugs and undocumented immigrants to move into the U.S. undetected. (CBP did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson confirmed to the Los Angeles Times that Rodriguez had been employed by the agency but declined any further comment.)
Read: The Border Patrol’s corruption problem
Rodriguez called the woman’s phone number and set up a meeting. He agreed to accept a bribe of $300. The woman and child entered the United States through his inspection lane and were arrested immediately—Rodriguez had worn a wire and taped the encounter.
For his role in the operation, CBP flew Rodriguez to Washington in 2007 to accept the agency’s national award for integrity. “Nothing is more critical to CBP’s mission,” then-Commissioner W. Ralph Basham said at the ceremony. In a flat-brimmed hat and white gloves, Rodriguez walked across the stage to shake Basham’s hand.
Anita told me that when people of Mexican heritage become agents, their family members tend to be ambivalent. “On one hand they’re very proud of us, because to work for the government—that’s a lofty thing in Mexico,” Anita said. “But then on the other hand, traicionero—you're a traitor, because you're deporting your own people.” Rodriguez says he never let that stop him: Too much empathy could lead an agent to bend the rules. But some cases did haunt him.
In his early years as an officer, an English-speaking teenager walked up to him on the bridge from the Mexican side. Quiet and alert, the kid was not unlike Rodriguez had been at that age, except for his lack of papers. He admitted that he’d been living illegally in the U.S. most of his life; he needed to return to continue high school. Rodriguez asked why he had risked a trip to Mexico if he knew he wouldn’t be allowed back into the U.S. The boy explained that his grandmother had died and he’d gone to pay his respects before she was buried. “I wanted to see her one last time,” he said. Rodriguez told him his best hope for returning was to one day marry a U.S. citizen. But for now, Rodriguez had little doubt about the rules. He sent the teen back to Mexico.
That night, the boy attempted to swim across the Rio Grande. Agents found his body floating beneath the bridge the next morning.
Read: The Border Patrol–to–emergency room pipeline
In the twilight of the Obama administration, Central American children and families began arriving at the border in droves, seeking protection from poverty and gang violence, and reunion with family in the U.S. Rodriguez, by then a veteran CBP officer, believed that many asylum seekers had been coached to tell the same sad stories so that they would be released into the United States to await their day in court. The then–presidential candidate Donald Trump promised to lock these people up. Rodriguez voted for Trump. The Rio Grande Valley soon became the epicenter of CBP’s effort to deter migrant families by removing thousands of children from their parents.
Any parent could see the separations were inhumane, Rodriguez told me. Someone in Washington had taken the crackdown too far. But what could he do, as a nobody on the bridge? He told trainee officers, “Leave your heart at home.” He focused on his sense of duty and followed orders.
A CBP vehicle along the border.
As the uproar over family separations engulfed the Trump administration, Rodriguez sat before a pair of investigators in a dim room with a one-way mirror, facing a crisis of his own. They showed him a document filled out in longhand with his and his parents’ names. The header read acta de nacimiento—a certificate of birth, issued in the Mexican state of Tamaulipas. It was evidence, they said, that Rodriguez had been born in Mexico, not the United States. “Do you recognize this?”
Rodriguez was incredulous. He wrote in a handwritten statement that morning, “I have always believed I was a United States Citizen and still believe I’m a United States Citizen.” His mother had died in 2013, so his father was the one living witness who could clear things up. Rodriguez offered to arrange for investigators to meet with Margarito later that day. He called a nephew and told him to get his father from Mexico to the meeting spot—a Starbucks near the border—even if he had to drag him there. A few hours later, Margarito arrived to speak with Rodriguez and the investigators.
Margarito was evasive when officials first showed him the acta. “I need to know the truth,” Rodriguez told him. “Tell me the truth.” Margarito looked down at the table. Rodriguez had been born at the adobe house outside Matamoros. He explained that about two months later, one of his sisters had arranged for a midwife to register a false birth certificate.
The fraudulent document had come to light because Rodriguez had petitioned for one of his brothers in Mexico to get a green card. An officer with U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the agency that issues green cards, flagged the petition because Rodriguez’s Texas-issued birth certificate had been registered by a midwife who was later convicted of fraud. (According to The Washington Post, government officials have said that cases against midwives during the 1990s uncovered roughly 15,000 falsely registered babies born in Mexico.) Rodriguez now had no legal status in the country, and was fired from Customs and Border Protection for failing to meet a basic condition of employment: U.S. citizenship.
Margarito stressed to investigators that he’d always hidden the truth from his son. (When Homeland Security finished its investigation into Rodriguez, a prosecutor from the U.S. attorney’s office in McAllen declined to charge him with any crimes.) A few hours later, still stunned by his father’s confession, Rodriguez placed an urgent call to his own son from his first marriage, Raul Rodriguez Jr.
Raul Jr. was inspecting a home for insect and rodent infestations when he received his father’s call. At 27, he was working at a pest-control company in hopes of moving his three young kids out of an apartment in Los Fresnos, Texas, and had just landed an interview for a job with U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
He went to his father’s house, where he found his father and his stepmother, Anita, looking ashen. They had set out a chair for him. He thought his father might have a serious illness. Rodriguez began to tell Raul Jr. about the midwife, the acta, and Margarito’s confession. Raul Jr.’s disbelief gave way to panic when his father explained that he, too, would likely lose his citizenship.
In 1990, Rodriguez’s first wife, who was a Mexican citizen, gave birth to Raul Jr. in Matamoros. Though he was born in Mexico, he was American by birth because of his father’s nationality. Raul Jr. later obtained a certificate to prove his “acquired citizenship.” But those papers were based on a fraud. “I don't even know how to describe myself,” Raul Jr. told me. “I don’t know if I'm an illegal or not.” In order to avoid making a false claim to U.S. citizenship—which could have barred him from the country—Raul Jr. returned his certificate of citizenship to the government. He put his application to CBP, and a new house, on hold indefinitely. He applied for a green card through his wife.
While he waits, he, like his father, is at risk of deportation.
Rodriguez gets water for his horse, near graffiti by one of his sons.
Along with more than 100,000 undocumented immigrants in the Rio Grande Valley, Rodriguez and his son are geographically hemmed in. To the south is the U.S.-Mexico border, a deep-green river surveilled by thousands of federal agents and by blimps repurposed from Iraqi and Afghan battlefields. To the east is the Gulf of Mexico, where boaters are subject to immigration checks by the Coast Guard. Border Patrol checkpoints dot the major roads heading north out of the valley. Every driver must stop and answer the question: Are you a U.S. citizen?
An agent from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which handles deportations, set up a meeting with Rodriguez a few months after the fraudulent birth certificate was discovered. The agent said he wanted to help him by going over the details of his case. But Rodriguez, who knew the agent from work, sensed that this was a ploy to get more information out of him. He took it as a warning from ICE: We’re watching.
More than 50,000 officers patrol the border and the interior of the country, according to the nonprofit American Immigration Council. They’re easy to spot at Rodriguez’s kids’ high school. Former colleagues who noticed Rodriguez’s absence but were not privy to the details of his case figured that he’d been fired for corruption. He’s always been “chueco,” a retired agent named John Garcia told me he overheard someone say at work. Crooked. Just as Rodriguez had once cut ties with his undocumented family members, agents began to avoid eye contact when they saw him in public, at restaurants or the grocery store. “They treat him like he's a pariah,” Anita told me.
Rodriguez’s integrity award sits above the TV where he watches the local news every morning from the treadmill. He spends the rest of the day tending to his sheep, cows, and chickens, rarely leaving his property, because a traffic stop could ultimately lead to deportation. “I don’t have any legal status in the U.S.,” he told me. “I’m deportable.”
Rodriguez and Anita have refinanced their house and raided the kids’ college fund to supplement Anita’s income from her job at the Department of Homeland Security. Fired just shy of retirement, Rodriguez lost his eligibility to receive a $4,400-a-month pension along with his citizenship. Rodriguez feared that the stress of his new reality could lead to divorce.
Last fall, as the evening cooled to 90 degrees, he drove to his teenage son’s football game, careful to use blinkers at every turn. At the game, the band played the national anthem before kickoff, and an announcer asked veterans to rise and be recognized. Rodriguez remained seated. Anita, adamant that his service still counted for something, nudged him in the ribs. “Stand up.”
Left to right: Rodriguez’s one-eyed dog; remnants of a shirt caught on razor wire; Rodriguez’s tattoo, which he got after he was fired, of a CBP badge being split by a Mexican flag.
Soon after he was fired, Rodriguez got a large CBP badge tattooed on his left shoulder. A Mexican flag splits the badge into two halves.
He applied to become a lawful permanent resident as the spouse of a U.S. citizen, and was forthright in his interview. Yes, he told the official, he had made a false claim to U.S. citizenship, but only because he hadn’t known the truth. Yes, he had voted in a federal election as an undocumented immigrant. He expected no special treatment, just the pension, health benefits, and safety from deportation he felt he’d earned through his nearly two decades at CBP. With some patience, he was confident that he could get his status sorted out. By last fall, he had been waiting for a response for almost a year and a half.
Rodriguez says he can now see the impacts of immigration enforcement that he once preferred to leave unexamined. “I can relate to people who I turned back, people that I deported,” he said. “They call it karma.”
Still, he doesn’t regret his service, and distinguishes himself from other unauthorized immigrants. “There are a lot of people trying to do it the easier way,” he told me. “I just found out, and I’m trying to do it correctly.”
If deported, he would live on family property in Tamaulipas. The State Department’s “Do not travel” warning to U.S. citizens says of the area: “Murder, armed robbery, carjacking, kidnapping, extortion, and sexual assault [are] common along the northern border.” As an agent, Rodriguez had put traffickers in jail, and his face is widely recognizable from his years on the bridge. “I don’t know how long I can survive,” he told me.
Read: An astonishing government report on conditions at the border
Despite those risks, Rodriguez dismissed the idea that he should apply for asylum—a legal pathway to U.S. residence that the Trump administration has sought to eradicate, claiming it is rife with fraud. “I'm not going to do it that way. I'd rather get deported,” Rodriguez said. “I'm going to practice what I preach.”
Once passionate about her work, Anita told me she has “lost faith in the system.” But without a college education, she sees no other option. Her job in immigration, she said, “is what’s feeding my family.” Rodriguez “lives by the rules … and even now he says that if the government chooses to deport him, he's going to go,” Anita said, her voice catching. He would turn himself in before he would hide from ICE. “I can't let that happen. What am I going to do? What are my kids going to do? What is he going to do over there? He's a federal officer.” Anita researches Rodriguez’s case most nights and keeps a close watch on other military veterans in the news facing deportation.
In October, Rodriguez received a letter from Citizenship and Immigration Services. His green-card application had been denied because he had falsely claimed to be an American citizen and illegally voted. The letter argued that Rodriguez did not qualify for leniency, even if he did not know about his status at the time. (USCIS declined to comment on specific cases.)
A gap in the border wall separating Texas and Mexico.
In our interviews, Rodriguez said he understood that the government had to apply the rules to him the way it did to everyone else—his undocumented relatives, his former co-workers, and the boy who drowned under the bridge. But he drew a distinction between how he’d carried out his duties and how officials were handling his case. “I wasn’t being strict; I was just abiding by what the law says,” he told me. “And these people are not doing what the law says.” He believed that he still qualified for an exemption provided by the law for those who make a false claim to U.S. citizenship unwittingly. But in its denial letter, USCIS said it could not make an exception for Rodriguez even if he was unaware of his status at the time, citing recent precedent. Still, Rodriguez held out hope that he could convince the agency to reverse its decision. Immigration lawyers told me, however, that federal officials are granting fewer exceptions across the board. “Apply the right laws, and apply the right rules,” Rodriguez told me. He believed the agency was singling him out unfairly. “Treat me the same—that’s all I want.” His problem might be that it already is.


theatlantic--2020-02-14--The Inconvenient Truth About ISIS

The Inconvenient Truth About ISIS

Barzani is in a position to know , because he ’ s had a front-row seat to the war against ISIS from the start .
Before he became prime minister in June , Barzani was an influential U.S. partner in the war against ISIS as the top security official in the Iraq ’ s Kurdish region , which is semiautonomous from Iraq ’ s central government in Baghdad .
Kurdish fighters , called peshmerga , defended their territory from the ISIS onslaught in 2014 even as entire divisions of the U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces melted away .
They not only @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s most effective military allies in the country , but their spies fed intelligence to the Americans , their officials helped coordinate U.S. air strikes , and their counterterrorism units worked alongside U.S. special operators .
Thousands of peshmerga have been killed and wounded in the anti-ISIS campaign .
Barzani has watched with concern as Trump zigzagged on the presence of American troops who were supporting Syrian Kurds in their own anti-ISIS fight , then ramped up a confrontation with Iran that has thrown the U.S. mission in Iraq into uncertainty .
After @ @ @ @ @ @ @ general Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in January , Iraqi politicians vowed to eject the the 5,000 U.S. troops stationed in the country for the ISIS campaign .
Their status remains in limbo .
Barzani , whose government relies heavily on U.S. support , did not directly criticize Trump for the Soleimani killing , saying he was “ surprised ” by it and wanted to de-escalate regional tensions .
Meanwhile , more than five years into the U.S.-led war—and after many statements by Trump heralding the Islamic State ’ s defeat—the group still has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Barzani told us .
( A Pentagon report last summer put the number of ISIS fighters between 14,000 and 18,000 .
Estimates by analysts and U.S. officials put the number around 10,000 when it announced its caliphate in the summer of 2014 . )
ISIS is still managing to carry out 60 attacks a month in Iraq alone against security forces and local rivals , Barzani said , as it regroups around a core of hardened fighters .
U.S. military officials and Western and regional politicians have never stopped warning about the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and launch attacks .
When Trump ordered a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria in October , he faced bipartisan resistance from lawmakers who said the job was not yet done .
But what is striking about Barzani ’ s portrayal of the group is the idea that it is not just surviving but thriving .
This cuts against the official line from the White House .
It jibes , however , with recent warnings : from the Pentagon ’ s inspector general , who said in a report last week that Baghdadi @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s command structure or operations ; and from the United Nations , which said in a report last month that ISIS still has at least $ 100 million in its reserves and has begun to reassert itself in Iraq and Syria .

The group is bigger now than when it founded its self-styled caliphate, and America’s conflict with Iran is only making the fight against it more complicated.
The Islamic State has lost all of its territory; tens of thousands of its fighters have been killed or are imprisoned; and its former leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, is dead. But a Kurdish leader who witnessed the militant group’s rise and fall is warning that ISIS is putting itself back together and stressing an uncomfortable fact: that ISIS is bigger now than it was nearly six years ago, when it founded its self-styled caliphate.
Eager to move on, President Donald Trump has declared victory over ISIS. Nevertheless, the conflict is ongoing, and to the extent that the Democratic presidential candidates mention the fight, it’s to express their desire to withdraw troops. The reality, though, suggests that a definitive end to the conflict remains out of reach. Even after America spent billions of dollars during two presidencies to defeat ISIS, deployed troops across Iraq and Syria, and dropped thousands of bombs, ISIS persists. If anything, it stands ready to exploit Trump’s impatience to end America’s “forever wars” and shift the country’s focus to countering Iran.
“ISIS is still very much intact,” Masrour Barzani, the prime minister of Iraqi Kurdistan, told us in an interview. “Yes, they have lost much of their leadership. They have lost many of their capable men. But they’ve also managed to gain more experience and to recruit more people around them. So they should not be taken lightly.”
Graeme Wood: ISIS is gloating
Barzani is in a position to know, because he’s had a front-row seat to the war against ISIS from the start. Before he became prime minister in June, Barzani was an influential U.S. partner in the war against ISIS as the top security official in the Iraq’s Kurdish region, which is semiautonomous from Iraq’s central government in Baghdad. Kurdish fighters, called peshmerga, defended their territory from the ISIS onslaught in 2014 even as entire divisions of the U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces melted away. They not only proved to be some of America’s most effective military allies in the country, but their spies fed intelligence to the Americans, their officials helped coordinate U.S. air strikes, and their counterterrorism units worked alongside U.S. special operators. Thousands of peshmerga have been killed and wounded in the anti-ISIS campaign.
Barzani has watched with concern as Trump zigzagged on the presence of American troops who were supporting Syrian Kurds in their own anti-ISIS fight, then ramped up a confrontation with Iran that has thrown the U.S. mission in Iraq into uncertainty. After Trump ordered the killing of the Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad in January, Iraqi politicians vowed to eject the the 5,000 U.S. troops stationed in the country for the ISIS campaign. Their status remains in limbo. Barzani, whose government relies heavily on U.S. support, did not directly criticize Trump for the Soleimani killing, saying he was “surprised” by it and wanted to de-escalate regional tensions.
Meanwhile, more than five years into the U.S.-led war—and after many statements by Trump heralding the Islamic State’s defeat—the group still has some 20,000 fighters across Iraq and Syria, Barzani told us. (A Pentagon report last summer put the number of ISIS fighters between 14,000 and 18,000. Estimates by analysts and U.S. officials put the number around 10,000 when it announced its caliphate in the summer of 2014.) ISIS is still managing to carry out 60 attacks a month in Iraq alone against security forces and local rivals, Barzani said, as it regroups around a core of hardened fighters.
U.S. military officials and Western and regional politicians have never stopped warning about the Islamic State's ability to recruit fighters and launch attacks. When Trump ordered a withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria in October, he faced bipartisan resistance from lawmakers who said the job was not yet done. But what is striking about Barzani’s portrayal of the group is the idea that it is not just surviving but thriving. This cuts against the official line from the White House. It jibes, however, with recent warnings: from the Pentagon’s inspector general, who said in a report last week that Baghdadi’s death has not disrupted ISIS’s command structure or operations; and from the United Nations, which said in a report last month that ISIS still has at least $100 million in its reserves and has begun to reassert itself in Iraq and Syria.
Read: Iraq is the one war zone Trump doesn’t want to leave
The administration’s focus on punishing the Iranian regime isn’t helping. The Soleimani strike capped months of U.S.-Iran tensions that included Iran-linked attacks on shipping and oil interests in the Persian Gulf and rocket attacks by Iran-backed militias against U.S. troops in Iraq; after Soleimani’s death, Iran sent missiles flying at bases housing U.S. troops in the country. “This confrontation definitely will have a negative effect on the fight against terrorism and ISIS, which should be the priority for all of us,” Barzani said.
But the main reason for the ISIS resurgence, Barzani said, is the persistence of the same conditions that allowed it to rise up in the first place. Syria remains in chaos. In Iraq, U.S. and Iraqi leaders alike have, for almost two decades, failed to solve problems such as corruption, poor governance, sectarianism, and economic malaise. Much of the Sunni-majority areas that were ISIS strongholds still lie in destruction, largely from U.S. air strikes, and some are now under the control of Iran-backed Shiite militias, which have antagonized much of the population with their sectarian tactics.
The U.S. has pushed other countries to contribute funds to help rebuild ravaged areas, but it has not prioritized these efforts, which have been halting and plagued by local mismanagement. Leaders in Baghdad have made little effort at political reconciliation. Many residents remain in displaced-persons camps. “If people are jobless, if people are hopeless, if people have no security, if people have no opportunity, if there is no political stability, it's always easy for terrorist organizations to manipulate local populations,” Barzani told us. “ISIS is a by-product. So as long as these factors are still valid, there will always be either ISIS or something similar to ISIS.”


theatlantic--2020-02-14--The Atlantic Politics Daily: A Front-Row Seat to the Return of ISIS

“ Gaining an anti-endorsement from one of the leading experts on economy-ruining must have delighted the Sanders campaign.
” Bernie Sanders has sparked fear within the country ’ s financial centers .
The likes of Lloyd Blankfein ( the former head of Goldman Sachs ) and Stanley Druckenmiller ( a billionaire hedge fund manager ) have warned that the democratic socialist candidate ’ s economic policies will tank the stock market and hurt business .
But the powers of the presidency are actually quite limited when it comes to the economy , Annie Lowrey argues .
+ Want more ?
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ in America : How in one of the best decades the American economy has ever recorded , families were still being bled dry .
He worked as a Customs and Border Protection officer for nearly two decades , facilitating thousands of deportations in his years of work .
But then came a day when Raul Rodriguez discovered that he himself was not a U.S. citizen .
On that day in Los Indios in 2018 , one of Rodriguez ’ s managers slid an envelope across the desk .
Rodriguez remembers reading : “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , pending further investigation.
” His gun and badge were confiscated without explanation .
He left the building in a stupor .
Days later , he sat down with investigators at a federal building in nearby McAllen , Texas .
They told him his career in immigration and his military service before that—his identity as a veteran , an agent , and an American—were based on a lie .
His United States citizenship was fraudulent .
He was an undocumented immigrant himself .
Read Jeremy Raff ’ s remarkable story of a former @ @ @ @ @ @ @ one at risk of deportation .
Today ’ s newsletter was written by Christian Paz , a Politics fellow , and edited by Shan Wang , who oversees newsletters .
You can reply directly to this newsletter with questions or comments , or send a note to politicsdaily @ theatlantic.com .
Your support makes our journalism possible .
Subscribe here .

The inconvenient truth is that the group is even bigger now, and America’s current conflict with Iran isn’t helping. Plus: Berniebros vs. Berniephobes.
It’s Friday, February 14. In today’s newsletter: An inconvenient truth—about the return of ISIS. Plus: Berniebros vs. Berniephobes.
Members of our politics team are out on the campaign trail this weekend. This newsletter will return on Tuesday, after President’s Day, with the latest on 2020.
*
« TODAY IN POLITICS »
(ALI HASHISHO / REUTERS)
“ISIS is still very much intact.”
The prime minister of Iraqi Kurdistan, who’s had a front-row seat to the war against ISIS, has that warning for America: The militant group may have lost its caliphate, its leader, and many of its fighters, but it’s still managed to gain more experience and recruit new followers, Mike Giglio and Kathy Gilsinan report:
Meanwhile, more than five years into the U.S.-led war—and after many statements by Trump heralding the Islamic State’s defeat—the group still has some 20,000 fighters across Iraq and Syria, Barzani told us. (A Pentagon report last summer put the number of ISIS fighters between 14,000 and 18,000. Estimates by analysts and U.S. officials put the number around 10,000 when it announced its caliphate in the summer of 2014.) ISIS is still managing to carry out 60 attacks a month in Iraq alone against security forces and local rivals, Barzani said, as it regroups around a core of hardened fighters.
The inconvenient truth is that the group is even bigger now, and America’s current conflict with Iran isn’t helping.
Read the full story.
—Christian Paz
*
« ARGUMENT OF THE DAY »
(MIKE SEGAR / REUTERS)
“Gaining an anti-endorsement from one of the leading experts on economy-ruining must have delighted the Sanders campaign.”
Bernie Sanders has sparked fear within the country’s financial centers. The likes of Lloyd Blankfein (the former head of Goldman Sachs) and Stanley Druckenmiller (a billionaire hedge fund manager) have warned that the democratic socialist candidate’s economic policies will tank the stock market and hurt business. But the powers of the presidency are actually quite limited when it comes to the economy, Annie Lowrey argues.
+ Want more? Read Annie on the deepest financial crisis in America: How in one of the best decades the American economy has ever recorded, families were still being bled dry.
*
« WEEKEND READ »
(Matthew Genitempo)
The Undocumented Agent
He worked as a Customs and Border Protection officer for nearly two decades, facilitating thousands of deportations in his years of work.
But then came a day when Raul Rodriguez discovered that he himself was not a U.S. citizen.
On that day in Los Indios in 2018, one of Rodriguez’s managers slid an envelope across the desk. Rodriguez remembers reading: “You are no longer a law-enforcement officer, pending further investigation.” His gun and badge were confiscated without explanation. He left the building in a stupor. Days later, he sat down with investigators at a federal building in nearby McAllen, Texas. They told him his career in immigration and his military service before that—his identity as a veteran, an agent, and an American—were based on a lie. His United States citizenship was fraudulent. He was an undocumented immigrant himself.
Read Jeremy Raff’s remarkable story of a former CBP officer who’s now the one at risk of deportation.
*


theatlantic--2020-02-16--Bernie Sanders Is Already Winning Big With Latino Voters

In New Hampshire , Sanders similarly blew away his opponents with Latino voters .
An exit poll by NBC shows that Sanders won 39 percent of those voters in the state ’ s primary on Tuesday—about 20 percentage points more than any other candidate .
Read : Democrats should be worried about the Latino vote Neither of the two early states have particularly large Latino populations , but in Iowa , which is around 6 percent Latino , the Sanders campaign spent months circulating flyers to Latino voters , partnering with local Latino groups , and recruiting Latino canvassers and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in Nevada , where a recent poll shows him as the clear front-runner .
Sanders ’ s track record in Iowa and New Hampshire bodes well for his chances with Latino voters in the state—but this time around , he faces more competition .
One potential point of weakness for Sanders emerged this week , when the state ’ s powerful Culinary Union , whose members are overwhelmingly Latino , criticized the senator for his Medicare for All plan .
Several candidates—such as Buttigieg and Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts , pounced to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ support .
( On Thursday , the union declined to endorse a candidate . )
As the Democratic contenders descend on Nevada ahead of the caucus , all of them are frantically seeking to woo Latino voters .
But Nevada presents challenges for Sanders ’ s rivals—among Latinos , the senator ’ s campaign is already light-years ahead of them , says Domingo Garcia , the president of the League of United Latin American Citizens , the country ’ s largest Latino civil-rights group .
Warren doesn ’ t have high name recognition @ @ @ @ @ @ @ told me , and the departures of black and Latina staffers in Nevada have elevated concerns that her campaign is not connecting with Latinos there .
Meanwhile , Buttigieg and Klobuchar—who have relatively little nonwhite support nationally—have sought to mobilize support from Latino voters ahead of the caucus , but they still have small outfits in the state .
Both candidates recently sat down with the Spanish-language news network Telemundo in Nevada ; Buttigieg spoke in Spanish .
Sanders ’ s campaign insists that the senator will prevail with Nevada ’ s Latino @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his rivals .
Chuck Rocha , a senior adviser to Sanders , told me that more than 200 staffers , including 76 Latino staffers , are deployed across the state at 11 field offices .
“ There ’ s one thing you can not get back in campaigns , and that is time , ” Rocha said .
“ But like most campaigns have done historically with Latino outreach , with just days left before the caucus , Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg go up [ with ads ] on Spanish TV.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Spanish-language television last month . )

The senator notched decisive victories with Latinos in Iowa and New Hampshire. Can he do it again in Nevada?
Bernie Sanders wasn’t physically at a Las Vegas town hall on Thursday hosted by a Latino civil-rights group, but the enthusiasm for his campaign was still apparent. While three of his rivals—former South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg; Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota; and the businessman Tom Steyer—were there in person and got warm receptions, the largely Latino crowd broke out in chants of “Bernie, Bernie” when the senator from Vermont appeared on a live-stream.
Even though the Democratic primary kicked off with contests in two of the whitest states in the country, Bernie Sanders is already winning big with Latino voters. In both Iowa and New Hampshire, Sanders claimed an overwhelming victory with Latinos—a validation of his playbook of mobilizing Latino voters that will now face its biggest test yet in Nevada, which is nearly 30 percent Latino and holds its caucus on Saturday. Though other candidates could still chip away at his advantage, Sanders’s success so far sends a clear sign to the rest of his field: His focus on Latino voters is paying off, and they have a daunting amount of work to do to catch up.
While overall turnout in the Iowa caucus was similar to that of 2016, Matt Barreto, the co-founder of the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Initiative, told me he estimates that Latino turnout at least doubled from four years ago, and that these voters broke sharply for Sanders. He won 51 percent of votes in the state’s 30 precincts with the most Latino voters, and in the 12 Latino-majority precincts, he won 66 percent of caucus-goers, according to an analysis by LPPI.
In New Hampshire, Sanders similarly blew away his opponents with Latino voters. An exit poll by NBC shows that Sanders won 39 percent of those voters in the state’s primary on Tuesday—about 20 percentage points more than any other candidate.
Read: Democrats should be worried about the Latino vote
Neither of the two early states have particularly large Latino populations, but in Iowa, which is around 6 percent Latino, the Sanders campaign spent months circulating flyers to Latino voters, partnering with local Latino groups, and recruiting Latino canvassers and staff—a strategy that he has also deployed in Nevada, where a recent poll shows him as the clear front-runner. Sanders’s track record in Iowa and New Hampshire bodes well for his chances with Latino voters in the state—but this time around, he faces more competition.
One potential point of weakness for Sanders emerged this week, when the state’s powerful Culinary Union, whose members are overwhelmingly Latino, criticized the senator for his Medicare for All plan. Several candidates—such as Buttigieg and Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, pounced to try to win the group’s support. (On Thursday, the union declined to endorse a candidate.)
As the Democratic contenders descend on Nevada ahead of the caucus, all of them are frantically seeking to woo Latino voters. But Nevada presents challenges for Sanders’s rivals—among Latinos, the senator’s campaign is already light-years ahead of them, says Domingo Garcia, the president of the League of United Latin American Citizens, the country’s largest Latino civil-rights group.
Warren doesn’t have high name recognition with Latino voters, Garcia and others told me, and the departures of black and Latina staffers in Nevada have elevated concerns that her campaign is not connecting with Latinos there. Meanwhile, Buttigieg and Klobuchar—who have relatively little nonwhite support nationally—have sought to mobilize support from Latino voters ahead of the caucus, but they still have small outfits in the state. Both candidates recently sat down with the Spanish-language news network Telemundo in Nevada; Buttigieg spoke in Spanish.
Sanders’s campaign insists that the senator will prevail with Nevada’s Latino voters because his operation dwarfs that of his rivals. Chuck Rocha, a senior adviser to Sanders, told me that more than 200 staffers, including 76 Latino staffers, are deployed across the state at 11 field offices.
Read: Nevada’s coveted Latino voters
“There’s one thing you cannot get back in campaigns, and that is time,” Rocha said. “But like most campaigns have done historically with Latino outreach, with just days left before the caucus, Amy Klobuchar and Pete Buttigieg go up [with ads] on Spanish TV.” (The Sanders campaign started advertising on Spanish-language television last month.)
Any last-minute outreach to Latinos in Nevada could be too little, too late, Clarissa Martínez de Castro, the deputy director of policy and advocacy at the nonpartisan civil-rights group Unidos US, told me.
“You’ve got to build that relationship, right?” Martínez de Castro said. “No waiting for the last minute—I don’t think that’s the strategy that candidates use with voters that they really are trying to win, so they should not use it with Latino voters either.”
Sanders’s advantage with Latino voters means he could be poised for a big caucus night, but how he ultimately performs could have implications beyond Nevada, too: The state’s demographics make it a bellwether for Latino-heavy states like California and Texas, which vote on Super Tuesday, in early March.
Now that the race has moved beyond Iowa and New Hampshire, every candidate is rushing to court Latino voters. But in Nevada, Sanders’s operation will be tough to beat.