Well OF COURSE We're Deporting A Wounded Combat Veteran With PTSD. Why Wouldn't We?

Miguel Perez Jr. when he was in the Army and America pretended he mattered

Another turn of the New Cruelty screw: Miguel Perez, Jr., 39, a green card holder who has been in the USA since he was eight years old, is facing deportation because he's one of those criminal aliens we're all supposed to be terrified of. Perez joined the Army in 2001 and served two tours of duty in Afghanistan, and he mistakenly thought taking his oath to defend the nation made him a citizen, but it didn't. He could have applied for expedited citizenship, but didn't since he didn't look into the details. He also says his superiors in the military never offered him any help with becoming a citizen.

After three judges from the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals turned down his request to stay in the US last week, he announced Wednesday that he would begin a hunger strike. He believes that if he were sent back to Mexico, he'd be targeted by drug cartels, who seek out combat veterans to join them. If he were to refuse, he believes he'd be killed. That argument didn't convince the three-judge appeals panel, which decided he needs to be deported.

"If it comes down to me being deported, I would rather leave this world in the country I gave my heart for,” Perez said in an interview from the detention center where he has been in custody for the last year.

After returning from Afghanistan, Perez was diagnosed with PTSD and was supposed to get tested to determine whether he'd suffered a traumatic brain injury, but before that testing got started, he was arrested in 2008 for a drug charge when he was caught trying to sell cocaine to an undercover cop. He accepted a plea deal and pleaded guilty to delivering less than 100 grams of cocaine. He had also received a general discharge from the Army (one step down from an honorable discharge), after an infraction for drugs. If he'd been naturalized, those offenses would have meant a 15-year sentence and difficulty getting a job. But since Perez only has a green card, that makes him a bad hombre and exactly the kind of dangerous scum we must sweep from our nation. Please add your file footage of Donald Trump pumping up his rally crowds and calling for blood now.

Perez only discovered that he really wasn't a citizen when he was finished with half his sentence and eligible for release in 2016. ICE took him straight from prison to a detention facility in Wisconsin, and he learned he'd been ordered to be deported to Mexico. He's not entirely out of options just yet, and may ask for an en banc hearing of the full appeals court. Perez'si attorney, Chris Bergin, is also trying to get his deportation stayed after a medical evaluation found he needs immediate treatment for his PTSD and likely brain injury. Bergin is also seeking a grant of citizenship retroactive to 2001, when Perez enlisted.

For all the good it may do -- and it may be very little -- Perez's supporters are petitioning Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner to pardon Perez on the drug charge, although ICE would probably see the arrest alone as sufficient to justify deporting him. Everyone's a criminal if you look at them hard enough.

Now, mind you, if you talk about this disgusting perversion of what we used to call the American Dream on Twitter, you'll find any number of folks who'll helpfully point out that the deportation order goes back to Obama's presidency, so you're not allowed to say anything about Donald Trump's drive to deport as many dirty foreigns as humanly possible. You see, somehow, since you're a liberal and you looove Obama, you wouldn't have thought twice about this if Obama deported a veteran, and you don't really like the troops either, and you're only mad because Trump is president and YOU LOST. No, don't try to say this would be inhuman even if Obama were still president, because you're only able to think in partisan terms, you America hater.

And that's how Trump Saved America from the evil killer illegal aliens and their liberal apologists, Amen.

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[ Chicago Tribune ]