DHS Secretary Noem announced that two suspected leakers had been identified and were being referred for prosecution. Government service comes with duties and a price for betrayal.
“Loose lips sink ships.”
During WWII, my grandmother saw this phrase on posters in the London Underground during her daily commute. Americans at the time saw it too, on subways, buses and in other public places.
The message: Everyone, not just Americans with government jobs and security clearances, has a responsibility to safeguard national security information.
And not just during a conventional war. It applies to things like stopping mass illegal immigration and vigorously enforcing our immigration laws. A big reason President Donald Trump was elected again was his promise to do just that. This means deporting those here illegally.
Trump appointed former policeman and career Border Patrol officer Tom Homan to do this tough, unenviable job. Homan and his federal agents are doing their best to enforce our laws.
Like many Americans, I agree with those laws, but even those who don’t can’t simply flout them. Federal, state and local laws aren’t a menu from which you can choose which ones to comply with. You can vote to change them, but you can’t ignore or subvert them.
Under President Joe Biden, the men and women of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s office of Enforcement and Removal Operations were held back from doing their jobs by onerous red tape and limitations. Under Trump, they’ve been asked to ramp up interior enforcement operations. This means arresting illegal aliens, who are often congregated in big cities that overwhelmingly elect Democratic mayors and councils who oppose ICE’s federal mission.
In February, an ICE/ERO operation in Los Angeles was reportedly leaked by either Department of Homeland Security or FBI staff. Earlier that month, a raid that would have netted members of the Venezuelan prison gang Tren de Aragua (TdA) was also undermined by a leak.
TdA members include violent robbers, murderers and sex-traffickers. Whoever leaked the information that made them harder to catch was doing no favors to the communities in which TdA lives and feeds.
Blowing an operation doesn’t make anyone safer. ICE isn’t going to give up, they’ll just have to try harder and work longer. The risk of agents, illegal aliens and bystanders getting hurt goes up.
Take Abraham Gonzalez. In March 2024, the suspected TdA gang member was arrested on suspicion of murder in Denver. ICE put a detainer on him, which means asking police to hand him over for immigration enforcement once he was done with any local charges.
Because of Denver’s pro-illegal immigrant “Public Safety Enforcement Priorities,” they didn’t hand Gonzalez over inside the jail, but cut him loose in a parking lot. It took six agents to arrest him, at least one of whom was injured.
If you have a security clearance, you may read things you would prefer not to know. Being a superpower and reluctant cop on the international block is not always a clean business. Tough calls are made. Second-guessing them is the responsibility of our elected representatives, not those who carry out orders or are privy to the secrets necessary to make them possible.
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Halfway through my career, I was disgusted when Bradley (now Chelsea) Manning leaked classified cables from U.S. embassies to Washington. Thousands of messages (allegedly) written by colleagues of mine were suddenly in the public domain. Neither was I impressed by former CIA contractor Edward Snowden’s leaks of classified NSA files in 2013.
I realize these two saw evidence of what they thought was illegal activity by their own government. Maybe they were right. But betraying their sworn oath to keep their country’s secrets, and jeopardizing national security by leaking information, was unacceptable.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is asking some employees to undergo polygraph (“lie detector”) sessions. These are commonly required of government personnel whose jobs require regular use of highly classified information.
On March 7, Noem announced that two suspected leakers had been identified and were being referred for prosecution. They’ll have due process, but should they be found guilty, they’ll lose their clearances and jobs. Government service has a lot of benefits, but those come with duties and a price for betrayal.
If any government employees feel morally outraged by any of our laws, they should get other jobs and work through the political system to change them. What they may not do is substitute their feelings for their duty and thereby put more innocent lives at risk.
