Michelle Maklin has an exclusive:
EXCLUSIVE: DHS AWARDS GREEN CARD TO DEAD SEPTEMBER 11 VICTIM
By Michelle Malkin · January 26, 2005 07:16 AM
My latest column, which is also a special news feature in today’s New York Post, is dedicated to the memory of the man pictured above. The story exposes how our behemoth, $34 billion Department of Homeland Security sent a green card approval notice on Jan. 15, 2005 to Mr. Eugueni Kniazev (pronounced Yev-GEN-nee Kuh-NEH-zev), who was murdered at the World Trade Center on that unforgettable day the towers collapsed.
That’s right. The feds sent a green card approval notice less than two weeks ago to a known, deceased Sept. 11 victim:
It doesn’t bother me that much that they sent the green card to a dead guy per se… If the guy dies, it is not like he’s going to call DHS and tell them he won’t be needing that green card after all. Since we are not [thankfully] tracked by the Federal government, they have no way of knowing… Fair enough.
But it is indisputable that the man has not been in contact with DHS for over 3 years! In the post 9/11 era no less. To my way of thinking, if they are waiting to approve him they can at least talk to the guy every few months and make sure he is employed or in school.
Being an advocate of smaller, less intrusive government, I can’t get too worked up over this… but I would have thought that starting September 12, 2001 we would have been tracking this far, far more aggressively. I assumed that all immigration policy was placed on some sort of “hold” until we could get a better handle on things. Clearly that was not the case.
God, if there was ever a need for smaller governemtn, then it is NOW.
That is just pathetic! Nice to know WHILE OUR BOYS ARE FIGHTING AND DYING IN IRAQ and elsewhere these lazy bloated govt workers are sat on their asses somewhere not doing their job.
Lets just let ALL the terrorists in already. Fucking hell. ( Though sadly it was a tragic victim of them, it could have been anyone! )
We need to fire 50% of all govt workers IMMEDIATELY and slash the other halfs wages. Spend some of the savings on newer tech and make the damn parasites work efficiently for once.
It’s them or us now.
The irritating thing here — and probably, as my best guess here as to motivating factor for this article for the author — is that even though this guy is long since deceased (and by such terrible circumstances, I agree), that means that he’s been assumed to be alive…and…present…in…the….country…for…over…3…years…without…a green card.
That means that, he’s noticably illegal as to citizenship all that time because (I could be wrong here, just because I am not at all familiar with the perameters of Working Visas) whatever means that found him in New York and “working” WITHOUT citizenship would surely be now past all these years later.
That and the congested nature of Immigration documentation, I suppose. I can’t see any constructive outrage about this issue, however, since like Paul, I also don’t see how the this one guy’s residence situation would be not easily mishandled under the circumstances, or under most normal circumstances, either.
Meaning, the sheer numbers of immigrants in the country, much less those here by illegal means, defies the human manpower capacity by nearly all bureaus to handle individual accountability by any high percentage of thoroughness, such that mistakes seem to be more expected than unusual.
A tangent: what IS concerning to me is hearing Vicente Fox recently, as with Alberto Gonzalez, describe how illegal immigrants are not “illegals.” I mean, they just must not understand the concepts involved to make such preposterously strange, nonsensical statements. As in, if someone crosses into the U.S. without a visa, without citizenship, without an application process even begun to be generous here, they are in the country without blessing of our laws, and therefore, are illegally present in the country and therefore are illegal immigrants.
The push to disinfect those terms is what most offends many of us. It’s not immigration that is offensive, but illegal immigration. I can’t understand Fox and Gonzales and others who try to rationalize as they do about those they should be, rather, leading but, obviously, aren’t. I admire Gonzales but on this issue, he loses my confidence.
Back from the tangent: that the guy now deceased on 09/11 finally received his green card, however, just goes to show that he at least was working the right steps, however past due and far too late a response his survivors received in his absence. I don’t find it too shocking, however, as to the DHS.
But, what’s the point of Malkin providing the pronunciation information for his name? I mean, what IS the point there? Certainly not to assist pronunciation, I am thinking.
Check the update:
“The letters on your site suggest that the next step for Knaziev would have been to bring his passport and photos down with him to the INS office. Presumably, then, anyone with a physical resemblance to Knaziev who had obtained his passport could have shown up at INS headquarters and been granted a green card–and eventually citizenship–under Knaziev’s name.
“So whenever an immigrant with an outstanding INS application dies, someone–e.g., a terrorist, criminal, or spy– with access to his passport could apparently assume his identity without further DHS scrutiny. All they have to do is show up at INS for one more meeting, and the card is mailed out six months later.”
In California there is beginning to be some outrage thrown around about this illegal immigration problem that no one seems to have a handle on. I swear I would have voted for Bush if his immigration policies included taking charge of finding the people who are here illegally and sending them back to where they came from. I even stopped voting for Duncan Hunter when he backed down from the illegal immigration policies that were present in the bill that was rammed through congress before Christmas. For all of those of you who are republican I want to know why there is no outrage about this administration’s expansion of government and Bush’s policy ideas on guest workers. I also don’t understand why we can’t use our law of 1986 to go after businesses that hire illegals, if they need to know where to look in San Diego I can point them in twenty directions at once, of course my home owner’s association would be unhappy about my whistle blowing.
I’m sure that since we now have Republicans in complete control of the federal government, it will start getting smaller any day now.
Oh come on you guys, lighten up a bit. Its actually pretty funny that he was sent a green card just recently. Shows our government is working as well as it always has been. 🙂
A lot of DHS/USCIS resources were diverted after 9/11 to other tasks – you all remember the “special registration”, right? That meant increasing backlogs for applications. There are millions of applications pending for various immigration benefits, and a limited number of staffers to handle these. Security checks are tighter now.
Angie:
“Oh come on you guys, lighten up a bit. Its actually pretty funny that he was sent a green card just recently. Shows our government is working as well as it always has been. :)”
Yes, and I hope it’s funny having an incompetent immigration system when a terrorist or criminal THEY LET IN THROUGH LAZINESS melts all the skin away from your bones with a dirty bomb or something. Jesus Christ.
Give me a break, you must be some kind of moonbat to find humour in this.
Patrick:
Damn staight man, we need to stop ALL these illegals…if it’s illegal, then it’s ILLEGAL…it’s against the goddamn law!
All they do is take away jobs from Americans and push the murder rates up.
I didn’t fight or this country to be swamped by people willing to work for pennies and making my children homeless!!
A posthumous green card, maybe somebody did it on purpose? Wouldn’t be too much to give the poor guy citizenship, I’d think.
Th bigger question is why does it take three years to get a green card in this day and age (computers, express mail, etc.). Want to solve the illegal alien ‘problem’? How about issuing green cards in a reasonable time frame. Just a thought…
About California…it was a pretty shocking experience (welllll, not really, just a poor one) when arriving here again from Hawaii and going to a nearby DMV for to apply for a CA D.L. to replace the one from HI, AND, lines that trailed around the building and all down the street one full hour before opening and nearly everyone was obviously not local, as in, near arrivals, as in, all speaking Spanish, mostly all Mexican immigrants. Hundreds upon hundreds, an average one day at one of many nearby DMVs, and that’s just one county here.
I have nothing against anyone from Mexico, it’s just that here in CA almost all the immigrants are either from there or from China (a lot of Middle Eastern folks, too), but mostly from Mexico, and almost all by illegal means.
CA passed by voter majority a while ago a law to disallow any public funds to illegal immigrants but it was struck down by some maneuvering by various groups, rendering the legislation moot.
But, the illegal nature of so much immigration is so offensive to so many citizens, and yet the elected officials continue to denigrate those concerns…I think the sympathies lie by default with those who employ them, because illegal immigrants are a source of cheap labor. On the other hand, it’s not cheap, since they then cost everyone else for all the other services they use, including taking jobs from others who would ohterwise be doing those jobs, and were doing those jobs prior to illegal immigrants arriving.
Times are terrible in Mexico, yes, but the problem where Mexico is concerned, and Central America, is very bad as to this problem, as also with China.
The guest worker program that Bush is promoting seems to be an attempt to at least make note of who is here and why, although given how the illegal immigration problem already is, I know that the Bush plan would only result in even more illegal immigration (they’d assume it was even now more of an alright practice and come in increasing numbers), despite best intentions.
With Vicente Fox leading the way, Mexico’s main industry now is the export of illegal immigrants, and Mexico’s leading sources of income. Fox is obviously intent on not changing that, so, short of building a huge impassible wall across the south, what?
The whole cultural thing on borders has to be addressed, too, what with many border towns (both south and north) trying to encourage a “borderless” culture, with families on both sides. My feeling about that is that the culture has to change, people should be taking the idea of the borders more seriously, despite any “inconvenience” it causes their families.
I am also a big fan (although I can’t find the article) that the 9/11 Hijackers also had their green cards renewed. Immigration should have been halted on 9/12 until we could figure it out.
Paul
I have to agree with you. I just hope that small-government conservatives (I’m on the libertarian side of the fence myself), who perhaps turned too blind of an eye to federal expansion after 9/11, will begin to push back.
We’ve spent decades arguing against the efficiency and effectiveness of the federal nanny-state. I don’t see why we shouldn’t believe that this same federal government is going to be more effective or efficient at national security or fighting a war. Just because the party in power claims to be conservative, it doesn’t mean they are.
Strong immigration policy seems to be the one issue neither party really wants to advocate for, because they are both trying to hard to keep/garner votes.
Somebody needs to make it a priority, because this is one of the biggest holes in our security, and the bad guys know it, and they are smart enough to know how to use it against us.
Yeah, Just Me, many of us agree with you about that. It’s that no one running for any public office will confront the idea, or at least with any dedication. Bush confronting Social Security reform is daring enough, but the immigration issues, I can’t imagine anyone in Congress taking this on, I really can’t. Governor Pete Wilson did in CA and didn’t survive in office because of it, but he did get that legislation passed here, that his Democrat replacement, Grey Davis and pals got the legislation, somehow, “overturned” or thereabouts. I realize Davis also didn’t survive his term(s) in office, so perhaps there’s hope.
Left to voter decision, most states so far have opted for strict immigration controls/preventions for illegal kind but the issue is that voter decisions are often overthrown by certain groups. But I think that may have been only luck to a great degree because once enough voters become sufficiently ardent about this, legislators get the message, but so far, they all appear relatively afraid to take the issue on.
But I really wish Bush would speak with more specifics and detail about what he has in mind with his “Guest Worker Program” idea and why he’s promoting that, because so far, there’s a big grey area about that and I know I am certainly not a fan of the idea.
– Dead voters are still the worse of the two…. Its so easy to get them to vote for liberals….Kniazev was unavailable for comment….
Once again, several people making the apples and oranges comparison of Mexican illegals and terrorists. There were, as I recall, 19 Arab hijackers on 9/11 several of whom entered through Canada and zero, none, zip, nada in the way of Mexican terrorists were involved. Eliminating illegal immigration from Mexico won’t prevent Islamofascists from entering the country through Canada. Using terrorism as an excuse for dealing with a problem that ought to be dealt with by making legal immigration more attractive is just demagoguery.
Tom Hanna…to clarify what I wrote earlier, this thread, it was tangential to the thread issue but still related and that was about illegal immigration, the bulk of which in the U.S. originates in Mexico. Not that terrorists do, literally, but that most illegal immigrants in the U.S. are from Mexico, next comes China, Pakistan and the Middle East, I believe.
Thus, among that great mix of illegal immigrants and even among those who are not here by illegal means, is likely to be and have been some who were terrorists and may still have that in mind.
The two issues of illegal immigration originating in Mexico (that’s a fact, look around if you have any doubts about that) and that terrorism also exists in the U.S. ARE, in fact, related in that to help in the prevention of terrorism, you have to also more closely monitor immigration (d’oh). Unfortunately, a lot of our immigration problems have to do with people who originate in Mexico and then illegally enter the U.S. — meaning, it’s far easier for nearly anyone to enter Mexico from whereever and then to cross into the U.S., just as it is where Canada is concerned, although Mexico even culturally encourages illegal immigration to the U.S. if not relies upon it for economic reasons, and Canada doesn’t in the same proportions as does Mexico.