The nation has been keenly observing the anti-ICE “protests” featured on television, and I’m struck by the numerous ironies involved.  

There was a time, not too distant, when immigration enforcement actions at worksites in places like Los Angeles and beyond were so routine that they barely registered a reaction.  

Today, these enforcement actions are sparking riots and attacks on federal officers and property, and state and local governments are delaying law enforcement responses, despite the fundamental need to ensure the safety of those officers.  

It is as if these levels of government have a detached notion of “federalism” that runs only one way: they can levy demands on the federal government, usually involving massive amounts of money and other assistance, while recognizing no obligations in return.

What we are seeing, although it has become all too pervasive in progressive hot spots, is not normal. 

It is the confluence of permissive policies toward crime and violence in blue-run cities and states, with the flooding of the border that took place over the entire length of the Biden administration.  

During those four years, anywhere from 10 to 14 million aliens entered the country either illegally or under transparently bogus programs designed to facilitate their entry, and all of them apparently believe they have a right to be here — even as they wave foreign flags while tossing Molotov cocktails or setting cars on fire.

I have heard a number of politicians and journalists decry the wearing of masks by federal officers (who very reasonably fear being doxxed, putting their families at risk), but I have yet to hear one of them ask why the rioters who shut down traffic, vandalize property and fling bottles, bicycles and other objects at the officers, are also masked.

It goes unremarked because the reason is clear: they do not want to be identified and held responsible for their mayhem. 

The difference in reasoning and motivation between the officers and the protesters could not be any more stark.

But as we watch lawless rioters go unchecked while federal efforts are stymied by the courts at every turn, some of us may be wondering whether the Constitution has in fact morphed into a suicide pact, given the imbalance that has become apparent in the three branches of government.  

The judiciary, once described as the “weakest” branch, has come to wield entirely too much power when a select few district court judges can throw so much sludge into the wheels of government that they grind to a halt.  

The conclusion that I, and I suspect most Americans, draw from what we are seeing and hearing is that this administration is not only on the right track where immigration enforcement is concerned, but that time is indeed of the essence, and the stakes are incredibly high, if we are to heal from the deliberate rending of the social fabric that has taken place.  

Dan Cadman is a Center for Immigration Studies fellow and a retired INS/ICE official with 30 years of government experience.