Category: Migration, Refugees, and Asylum

The U.S. has arrested a “Louisiana man” for purportedly participating in the Gazans’ October 7, 2023 attack on Israeli civilians. New York Times:

This was an unavoidable situation, apparently, because he supposedly lied to Biden administration immigration officials about his level of effort in globalizing the intifada, achieving river-to-the-sea liberation, etc. Let’s ignore for the moment the question of why Americans believe that government bureaucrats who don’t speak Arabic would be able to separate truth from fiction. The question for this post is what was our theory for how Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi’s presence in the U.S. was going to make the U.S. a better place for existing Americans.

(I personally think that Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi may well have told the truth. The U.S. has an honor system in which a prospective immigrant is asked “Have you participated in terrorism?” and, by the standards of a significant percentage of Americans (especially the young/progressive and, certainly, almost every resident of Dearborn, Michigan), what the Gazans did on October 7, 2023 was a legitimate military action by oppressed indigenous Arabs, not “terrorism”. The October 7 attack was organized by a democratically elected and popularly supported government (Hamas), certainly, and, even after the Israelis counterattacked, was supported in opinion polls by the majority of Gazans.)

From The Guardian:

In June 2024, al-Muhtadi submitted an electronic US visa application in Cairo. In the application, he denied serving in any paramilitary organization or having ever engaged in terrorist activities. His application said he intended to live in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and work in “car repairs or food services”. He entered the US in September 2024.

Let’s leave aside the question of why a “Louisiana man” (NYT) such as Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi would intend to live in Oklahoma. Why was opening the border to someone who was going to work in “food services” going to make the U.S. a better place to live? Oklahoma was already critically short of health care workers (2024 KFOR) so bringing in one more person who would be a customer for health care rather than a provider would make it tougher for existing Oklahomans to access medical care. Maybe one individual restaurant owner would benefit from the cheap labor that Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi could potentially provide, but we’re told that advancements in robotics will soon render low-skill humans obsolete. That would leave U.S. taxpayers on the hook for multiple generations of welfare in the event that Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi either ceased working or never earned enough to get over the threshold for public housing, Medicaid, SNAP/EBT, Obamaphone, etc.

What is our rationale, in other words, for operating an immigration system under which Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi was eligible for permanent U.S. residency and eventual citizenship?

If the majority of American voters can agree that Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi moving from Egypt to Oklahoma wouldn’t have made the U.S. better off, even if Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi hadn’t been part of the October 7 attacks, why doesn’t Congress change U.S. immigration rules so as to prevent a future Biden/Harris-style administration from admitting more “Louisiana men” like Mahmoud Amin Ya’qub al-Muhtadi?

Related:

• How was the immigration of Mohamed Sabry Soliman supposed to benefit Americans?
• How was the immigration of Akayed Ullah supposed to benefit native-born Americans?
• How was the immigration of José Antonio Ibarra supposed to make the average American better off?
• How was the immigration of Sayfullo Habibullaevic Saipov supposed to benefit native-born Americans?

Taxpayer-funded NPR:

Pope Leo XIV weighed in on U.S. politics, saying that Catholic politicians must be judged on the full range of their policy positions and suggesting that the country’s treatment of immigrants is “inhuman.”

“Someone who says I’m against abortion but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” Pope Leo said. “And someone who says I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”

Immigrants suffer “inhuman treatment” in the United States, according to this expert. Also, millions of humans voluntarily show up every year seeking this inhuman treatment. Center for Immigration Studies:

The government’s January 2025 Current Population Survey (CPS) shows the foreign-born or immigrant population (legal and illegal together) hit 53.3 million and 15.8 percent of the total U.S. population in January 2025 — both new record highs.

(Note that the size of the “illegal population” is difficult to estimate and see also Is U.S. immigration policy a form of animal hoarding?)

Fans of logical conundrums may also appreciate this communication from someone on a selfie yacht who communicated that the Israeli Navy disabled his communications:

Loosely related, “Foreign Ministry: Flotilla to Gaza had no humanitarian supplies” (Jerusalem Post). In other words, the selfie yachts were literally carrying nothing more than selfie subjects.

Finally, nobody can accused JetBlue of treating immigrants inhumanely. From a recent flight, in which they invite customers to watch movies specifically related to Hispanic Heritage Month:

“Motel beheading suspect’s criminal history reveals escalating path of violent crime” (NBC Dallas):

Yordanis Cobos-Martinez was previously arrested on charges of indecency with a child, carjacking, false imprisonment and grand theft of a motor vehicle. … Four months later, in June 2017, in South Lake Tahoe, California, a police report details a carjacking in which Cobos-Martinez, while naked, tried to force himself into a woman’s car while pulling her hair and clothes and sitting on her lap. … ICE says he was released on an order of supervision under the Biden administration and because Cuba would not accept him based on his criminal history.

What did this noble migrant do? “ICE calls for removal of man accused of beheading another man with machete at Dallas motel” (CNN):

Police say Cobos-Martinez was cleaning a room with an unnamed witness as the incident unfolded. The witness told police Cobos-Martinez became upset when the victim, Chandra Nagamallaiah, used the unidentified witness to translate his request to not use a broken washing machine instead of speaking to him directly, according to the affidavit.

Surveillance video shows Cobos-Martinez leaving the motel room, pulling out a machete and attacking Nagamallaiah. After the victim ran, the attack continued outside – in front of the victim’s wife and son – both of whom attempted to intervene, according to the affidavit. After beheading Nagamallaiah, Cobos-Martinez allegedly placed the victim’s head in a dumpster.

Should we give the Cuban government credit for being smarter than the U.S. government? Cuban officials protected their own citizens/residents by wisely giving Americans what Americans voted for (i.e., to collect a miscellaneous assortment of humans from all of the world’s most violent and dysfunctional societies with particular emphasis on collecting those directly embroiled in violence).

Separately, this latest beheading seems to be another example of Migrant A killing Migrant B on U.S. soil, similar to Indian enricher Harjinger Singh killing three Haitians in Florida (NY Post).

Related:

• How immigration and socialism have played out in Cuba
• How was the immigration of Mohamed Sabry Soliman supposed to benefit Americans?
• How was the immigration of Akayed Ullah supposed to benefit native-born Americans?
• How was the immigration of José Antonio Ibarra supposed to make the average American better off?
• How was the immigration of Sayfullo Habibullaevic Saipov supposed to benefit native-born Americans?

“Man Who’d Served His Time in U.S. Is Deported to an African Prison” (New York Times, September 1, 2025):

Mr. Etoria came to the United States [from Jamaica] on a green card in 1976 at age 12. He joined his mother, who had been sponsored by a family she worked for as a nanny, said Ms. McKen, his aunt. He had tough times early in life, she said. He saw his mother flee from his abusive father. In the United States, he struggled to adjust and was bullied in school, she said.

Mr. Etoria has a history of drug abuse, which he has blamed in part on head injuries he suffered as a child. He was also diagnosed with schizophrenia. Doctors noted that he has exhibited violent outbursts, hallucinations and paranoia, according to court records.

He was arrested in 1981 on charges of attempted murder, robbery and kidnapping. During a psychiatric evaluation, he said he could not remember exactly what happened, according to court records. He pleaded guilty and served three years in prison.

More than a decade later, Mr. Etoria walked into a leather goods shop and shot the victim three times in the head, according to Brooklyn court records. The motive was never determined, and there was no indication that he knew the victim or that the crime was gang-related.

I’m trying to figure out what our rationale has been for wanting to keep an immigrant after he “served three years in prison” for “attempted murder, robbery and kidnapping.” Why didn’t we deport him back to Jamaica in the 1980s, before he had a chance to commit murder? The U.S. government had the right to deport him, I think, but a bureaucrat somewhere concluded that American citizens would somehow be better off keeping Mr. Etoria as a neighbor?

Here’s a good window into how the female humans of America are implementing Charles Darwin’s sexual selection:

Since leaving prison in 2021, Mr. Etoria, a father of three adult children, has spoken regularly with his aunt, she said.

I.e., the schizophrenic convicted criminal has enjoyed far greater reproductive success than the typical American male who works 50 hours per week, pays taxes, and has never been arrested. Maybe that actually was the rationale for keeping him around? American women want to breed with convicted criminals and there aren’t enough native-born criminals to meet the demand for genetic material?

Note that the subject of the above-referenced article is not about what happened in the 1980s, but rather about the cruel Trump administration that has deported Orville Etoria to Eswatini, formerly Swaziland.

What amazes me almost as much as the idea that Americans in the 1980s couldn’t live without being enriched by a convicted criminal’s continued residence is the ability of the U.S. economy to survive Mr. Etoria and millions of similarly situated enrichers. Taxpayers have been funding shelter, food, security, etc. for Mr. Etoria almost every year since at least 1981 when he was first arrested. Taxpayers are continuing to fund shelter, food, and security for Mr. Etoria now that he lives in Eswatini. U.S. taxpayers are also funding migrant-to-migrant interactions, e.g., “Three victims of Florida 18-wheeler U-turn crash ID’d as Haitian immigrants” (New York Post):

The three victims of the Indian immigrant truck driver who made an illegal U-turn across a Florida highway earlier this month have been identified as Haitian immigrants, according to officials.

The driver Herby Dufresne, 30, and passengers Faniola Joseph, 27, and Rodrigue Dor, 53, all Haitian immigrants, were in their minivan when it plowed into the side of an 18-wheeler driven by Harjinder Singh, an immigrant from India, on Aug. 12, the Miami Herald reported.

(I’m not sure what the argument for keeping the enricher Harjinder Singh here in the U.S. was. India is home to 1.45 billion humans, a number that grows every year, and also India is too dangerous for any human to occupy?)