Alice in Wonderland "Justice:" Biden Makes Good On His "Sentence First, Verdict Later" Pledge and Punishes Border Patrol Agents, Despite an Investigation Clearing Them Of Having "Whipped" Illegal Aliens

John Sexton at Hot Air covered this last Friday. I missed it.

After more than 9 months of investigation, Customs and Border Patrol has finally released a 500 page report on the incident in which migrants in Del Rio, Texas were allegedly "whipped" by agents on horseback. The report concludes that no whipping took place, none at all. That's contrary to what everyone from the president on down was saying at the time.

Biden condemned the agents last year amid public outcry at the scene of horses charging at families and small children running out of the way.

"It's horrible, what you saw. To see people like they did, with horses, running them over, people being strapped, it's outrageous," Biden said at the time. "Those people will pay," he said, referring to the agents. "There is an investigation underway right now, and there will be consequences."

Vice President Harris echoed those comments in an appearance on ABC's "The View," saying the scenes "evoked images of some of the worst moments of our history, where that kind of behavior has been used against the indigenous people of our country, has been used against African Americans during times of slavery."...

CBP Commissioner Chris Magnus told reporters that the statements from Biden and Harris did not prejudice the outcome of the investigation. "I don't believe there's been any issues with outside influence," said Magnus, who said he told investigators to disregard "anything they heard outside of their own work."

Sure, I guess the fact that the president and vice president had already prejudged the case and demanded punishment had no impact at all. That's why you have this report which concludes nothing really happened but that people need to be disciplined anyway.

The "investigation" finds that Border Patrol is guilty of conveniently vague "crimes."

The investigative findings show that the agency failed to appropriately task, supervise, and exercise command and control over the Horse Patrol Units in Del Rio on September 19, 2021. Several Border Patrol Agents used force or the threat of force to attempt to drive migrants back into the Rio Grande River towards the U.S.-Mexico border, though there is no evidence that any migrants were forced to return to Mexico or denied entry to the United States. Additionally, the Office of Professional Responsibility found multiple instances in which Agents acted inappropriately during the incident, including one Border Patrol Agent who was found to have used denigrating and inappropriate language and to have maneuvered his horse unsafely near a child...

Yes well when you bring your children on dangerous border-crossing jaunts, who is to blame for them being exposed to some danger?

Jonathan Turley likens this all to the Red Queen in Alice in Wonderland, who pronounced the sentence first, the trial to follow.

"Those people will pay." With that promise, President Biden vowed to punish Customs and Border Protection agents accused of whipping undocumented immigrants on the southern border. Despite the announcement of an investigation into the allegation just the day before, Biden did not stop for the pretense of process in declaring the agents guilty.

This "sentence first -- verdict afterwards" approach may amuse the Red Queen of Alice in Wonderland, but it should be anathema to an American president. Not only did Biden shatter his own administration's investigation but he joined other leading Democratic figures in defaming the agents.

Biden told the American people that these easily identifiable officers would be punished after they allegedly "strapped" the Haitian migrants. Other Democratic politicians like Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) declared that the whipping was "worse than what we witnessed in slavery" and described "the cowboys who were running down Haitians and using their reins to whip them." Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) called it simply "white supremacist behavior." Many in the media went into high gear, too, denouncing what one outlet described as the "Whipping (of) Haitian Asylum Seekers."

However, Biden's behavior was the worst, due to his position as head of the Executive Branch: "It was horrible what -- to see, as you saw -- to see people treated like they did: horses nearly running them over and people being strapped. It's outrageous. I promise you, those people will pay."

By announcing that the agents were guilty and needed to be punished, Biden destroyed the credibility of the Department of Homeland Security's ongoing investigation. It is akin to what is called "command influence" in the military, when comments or actions of a superior officer influence an investigation or prosecution. Investigators and department officials could well be worried about their own careers if they do not find a basis to punish one or more of the border agents. The failure to do so would be an embarrassment to the president and risk the wrath of powerful figures in Washington. Conversely, any action taken against these agents can now be challenged due to Biden's preemptive declaration.

The biggest problem is that the whipping story was entirely untrue.

Indeed, it was obviously untrue from the start. We were all watching the same video, and the officer was clearly using his strap to control his skittish horse. Even the photographer expressed astonishment at the coverage and said he did not see a single person strapped or whipped by agents.

The profile of this scandal is familiar. The media repeatedly has worked people into a frenzy over stories that eventually were proven false, but with little later coverage when the truth contradicted earlier accounts....

He notes that all of these claims were defamatory.

Those in the media might limit their legal liability with corrections posted or published within a few days of the initial reports -- but they can still be sued. It could be argued that some apparently did not care if the border agents did or did not whip migrants because "it was a fact too good to check." Moreover, the use of the still photos was uniformly misleading and could be used as the basis for "false light" charges, in which pictures are used to present a false or misleading image.

Alas, the man most responsible for defamation here -- the deranged pervert Joe Biden -- is almost entirely insulated from defamation lawsuits, thanks to old rulings by the Supreme Court, which make almost every stupid claim he makes part of his "official acts." See Turley's article for that.

Remember, NeverTrump promised you that Joe Biden was an honest and honorable man who would use the powers of the presidency responsibly and would certainly never defame law-abiding and decent border patrol agents just because his leftwing partisans hate border patrol, and would never effectively order his government to find innocent men guilty to appease the left!

NeverTrump tells a lot of lies. A lot of lies. And they cover up all of those lies by telling still more lies.

But NeverTrump are honorable men, are they not? The noble NeverTrumpers have told you that Trump was a liar and would justify using the power of government to squelch their enemies. And so he was not honorable.

And yet, did not NeverTrump also lie and justify using the power of government to squelch their enemies?

And yet they are honorable men.

Aren't they?

Not a single NeverTrumper -- not one! -- has called for a special prosecutor for the Hunter Biden matter or for any of Joe Biden's many legal imbroglios, which his conflicted wingman Merrick Garland cannot fairly investigate, but they continue telling us about how they're "Country Above Party" and "Honor Above Partisanship" and all the rest of it.

And David French would surely never pay a drifter he found on Craigslist to, and I quote, "use my wife like a bus-station toilet," would he?

Such honorable men, one and all!

posted by Ace at 02:42 PM

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