One of the toughest situations for our Customs and Border Patrol officers is when they are forced to deal with two categories of illegal aliens: unaccompanied minors and what immigration officials refer to as Family Units (FUs). The Family Unit designation applies to multiple, related illegal aliens including minor children. Contrary to the monstrous picture of our immigration enforcement officials painted by Democrats, nobody wants to see innocent children displaced or split up from their families. Unfortunately, in order to comply with our own laws and ensure the safety of minors, that’s what winds up happening all too often on the Mexican border.

But who is really to blame for that? The law enforcement officials who are following the rules or the parents who choose to knowingly break the law by bringing or sending their children across the border illegally? When Attorney General Jeff Sessions had the question put to him recently he delivered a stiff dose of harsh reality. (LA Times, emphasis added)

All immigrants who cross the border illegally will be charged with a crime under a new “zero tolerance” border enforcement policy, Atty. Gen. Jeff Sessions said Monday, launching a crackdown that could overwhelm already-clogged detention facilities and immigration courts with hundreds of thousands of new cases.

Sessions also said that families who illegally cross the border may be separated after their arrest, with children sent to juvenile shelters while their parents are sent to adult detention facilities. Until now, border agents tried to keep parents and their children at the same detention site…

“If you are smuggling a child, then we will prosecute you and that child will be separated from you as required by law,” Sessions said earlier Monday in Scottsdale, Ariz. “If you don’t like that, then don’t smuggle children over our border.”

As the kids like to say these days… Boom!

I’ll confess that I’ve been waiting a while to hear some common sense like this coming from the executive branch of our government. Crossing the border illegally is a crime. When people commit other crimes such as robbery, assault or murder, the perpetrators who are sent to prison sometimes have families, including children. You don’t hear anyone demanding they get a pass so they won’t be separated from their kids. To borrow a line from the Baretta theme song, don’t do the crime if you can’t do the time. (Some of you younger readers may have to go Google that one.)

Sessions went on to remind any potential visitors that our border is not open and if you desire entry, “Make your claim. Wait your turn.” He finished up with another bit of cold, hard truth, telling the audience that we cannot take everyone on this planet who is in a difficult situation.

I continue to hear media talking heads suggesting that Sessions is on the way out or moaning about why President Trump hasn’t fired his Attorney General yet. There’s your reason in a nutshell. That’s precisely the language Trump was using on the campaign trail and Sessions is turning those words into actions. The President clearly likes results and good headlines, and Sessions continues to deliver both.