Malloy, The Sanctuary Governor

“We are continuing to work with and await guidance from the appropriate federal agencies on screening measures that will be taken. With that said, if refugees – many who are children fleeing a horrific war-torn country—seek and are granted asylum after a rigorous security process, we should and will welcome them in Connecticut,” so said a spokesperson for Governor Dannel Malloy,  according to a piece in the Hartford Courant.

There are some obvious difficulties with this passage. Syria is administered by an odious dictator, perhaps even more ruthless than the father who preceded him, and rigorous screening measures such as those mentioned by Malloy are not always possible in horrific, war-torn countries.

Of course, a screening examination of even the most cursory kind is never possible in the case of illegal aliens from wretched countries such as Honduras and Guatemala who, crossing through Mexico, bum-rush the US border and thereafter become nearly invisible tucked within a welter of humanity – unless they call attention to themselves by violating a law other than the immigration laws winked at in sanctuary cities. Such difficulties have not stopped Malloy from opening the doors of Connecticut to unverified illegal immigrants, some of whom may be found in Connecticut’s sanctuary cities such as New Haven.

 Malloy was repaid for his strenuous efforts on behalf of Syrians when the Kennedy Center Library bestowed upon him its prestigious “John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage Award “in 2016.  Presenting the award, Kennedy’s grandson Jack Schlossberg noted, “As half of U.S. governors, leading presidential candidates and countless others across the country voice support for a ban on Syrian refugees from entering the United States, Governor Dannel Malloy took a stand against the hateful, xenophobic rhetoric. In doing so, he put principles above politics and upheld my grandfather’s vision of America that ‘has always served as a lantern in the dark for those who love freedom but are persecuted, in misery, or in need.’”

Right.  According to the Courant story, Alaa Hassan Qalb Allouz, a Syrian refugee who made his way with his wife to New Haven’s sanctuary in 2016, was charged by FBI counter terrorism investigators, two years after touchdown “when his ex-wife took their 13 month old child to Yale New Haven Hospital with apparent signs of abuse.” Allouz was arrested and released by New Haven police for assault and ordered not to contact his wife. He was arrested again in 2017 for violating the order. Allouz had contacted his wife at the domestic violence shelter in which the state had placed her. A year later “while housed in Corrigan-Radgowski Correctional Institute, (forgive the caps) ALLOUZ WAS ARRESTED BY US IMMIGRATION AND CUSTOMS ENFORCEMENT AGENTS PUSHING FOR HIS DEPORTATION.” Allouz was arrested by (ICE) two years after his wife had fled from him to a protective shelter in New Haven’s sanctuary city. Transferred to a federal immigration facility, “Allouz was ordered to be removed from the United States. But there is a “but.” – “BUT HIS DEPORTATION CAME TO A HALT WHEN STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIALS TOLD ICE THEY WERE NOT SENDING ANYONE BACK TO SYRIA.”

Here is a question not addressed or answered in the Courant story: To what extent are Dan Malloy’s sanctuary city protocols responsible for the terrorization of a woman who received from her refugee husband, years after he had first been detained – and released -- by sanctuary city police, the following email: “I want you to understand that I’ll make you cry blood, and you know that. If and when I go back to Syria, it will be really bad for you, it won’t make a difference to me anymore, and you know that.”

FBI agents intercepted a recording between Allouz and a doctor at a Connecticut prison in 2017 in which Allouz said, “If I don’t slaughter her here, I will slaughter her in Syria. I will not do anything here. But in Syria, I can do anything I want.” The American feminization movement has yet to reach war-torn Syria.

A sanctuary city is one in which those seeking refuge – in the case of Syria, some refugees whose background will not be revealed by a “rigorous security process” – are given sanctuary and insulated from the impertinent intervention of the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), an agency charged by the US Congress with deporting refugees who are in the country illegally or others who should be detained until they have passed rigorous “screening measures.” Had police officials in New Haven’s sanctuary city immediately contacted ICE when Allouz first terrorized his wife, ICE might have arrested him earlier. And Malloy, as well as other members of Connecticut’s all-Democrat US Congressional Delegation, might have interceded with US State Department officials to get this domestic terrorist out of Connecticut – away from the woman he was terrorizing.

None of this happened because sanctuary cities force a breech between municipal law enforcement officials and ICE through a process of nullification in which governors who receive profile in courage awards are able to decide precisely which laws passed by the US Congress they will or will not obey, sometimes with murderous results.