Enlightened self interest is acceptable if you're elite.

Rich part of Washington, D.C. goes tooth-and-claw to prevent new child-migrant shelter in its neighborhood

By Monica Showalter

Putting on its Victorian gentleman suit (pace Tom Wolfe), the Washington Post's editorial board tut-tuts a rich part of Washington, D.C. and its political patrons, for pulling out all stops to prevent construction of a child-migrant shelter in its fancy environs.

MANY AMERICANS are rightly outraged by the Trump administration’s treatment of migrant children, who have been separated from parents and ill-treated by authorities. Democrats have been understandably eager to distance themselves from such policies — a stance that can result in knee-jerk opposition even to sensible practices in effect during the Obama administration.

That might explain the nearly uniform outcry from Washington-area politicians incensed at federal plans to build new shelters for migrant children in Northern Virginia and the District . The shelters, state-licensed and similar to scores across the county in operation since before President Trump took office, would help move migrant children out of squalid, cramped Border Patrol stations near the U.S.-Mexico border. They would provide a way station for unaccompanied minors while federal officials seek to place them with U.S.-based relatives or foster families.

But local politicians, nearly all Democrats, have balked at cooperating with federal authorities on any immigration matter. They have denounced the proposed new shelters with objections that smack of NIMBYism masquerading as humane concern for children. This month, the administration of D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) enacted emergency rules that blocked a planned federal shelter.

Just some misplaced never-Trumpism, maybe with a whiff of NIMBYism?

Actually, the area has been plagued by some of these child migrants, getting its name in the news more than once for its gruesome murders. Here's one of them, courtesy of, sure enough, the Washington Post:

Edwin Rios, 18, of Southeast Washington has been charged with murder in the killing of Ariana Funes-Diaz, 14, Prince George’s County police announced Friday.

Funes-Diaz was slain April 18 by MS-13 gang members who feared that she would go to police about a kidnapping and robbery that had occurred in the District, prosecutors said.

Funes-Diaz was lured to a tunnel in Riverdale, Md., where she was forced to strip and then was beaten with a baseball bat and cut with a machete in an attack that was recorded on camera, charging documents state.

Her body was abandoned in the woods for a month before police found it in a creek near where she was attacked, police said.

Three others have been charged as adults in the case: Joel Escobar, 17, of Northeast Washington; Cynthia Hernandez-Nucamendi, 14, of Lothian; and Josue Fuentes-Ponce, 16, of Bladensburg.

The case sparked wider national attention after the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency rebuked Maryland officials, saying they had released Escobar and Fuentes-Ponce at the close of an unrelated case without notifying federal immigration authorities.

Those are some child migrants authorities are getting a new shelter pipeline set up for. 

The map here says that Prince George's County in Maryland is about six miles from the Takoma district in Washington, D.C. where the resistance is.

It's indisputable that bringing in more unvetted migrants mean there are going to be more of these killings going on, something that might just affect property values and the quality of life in this tony district.

Here's a local NBC news report on what's going on in that area, keying off that same gruesome MS-13 murder commited by some illegal child migrants. I have transcribed (and boldfaced) some choice snippets:

"to get a better understanding of how MS-13 has evolved and why we're seeing so many gruesome crimes..."

...

'Two of the city's four murders last year -- MS-13."

...

"More than five years ago, we were given a special invitation travel with law enforcement to El Salvador to learn about the MS-13 gang and its ties to our area."

...

"Since the time that we went to El Salvador till now, would you say the gang has a larger presence in our area or a smaller presence?"

"Large."

"What would you attribute that to?"

"Recruitment.

...

"And he says kids are entering the gang at a much younger age. You've seen in our area MS-13 gang members as young as nine years old."

"Starting the process. But you look at them and say 'innocence.' (Inaudible) may not know right from wrong, but the gang knows that. So they'll take that for their benefit."

...

"They feel or they believe that a juvenile can commit the same violence as an adult would such as a stabbing or a decapitation but they think nothing is going to happen to them in the judicial system. So that's why the target is juveniles."

...

So many gruesome crimes? Gangs increasing? Recruitment younger and younger? Child migrants here alone looking for some "family"? Gangs know child decapitators won't get punished? With that sort of thing going on, you can bet the migrant center is going to be a bonanza for gang recruitment and a new wave of gruesome crimes. Funny how these asylum seekers always seem to end up in U.S. areas where those gangs they're supposedly fleeing are right there waiting for them.

The 2001 "missing intern" Chandra Levy murder, even closer to Takoma than Prince George's County, by the way, was also done by one of El Salvador's illegal immigrants.

Now the battle is couched in "concern" for the comfort of illegal child migrants along with opposition to President Trump, even though, as the Post notes, the policy is Obama's. And the crocodile tears are flowing.

The Post rightly notes that if the child migrant center is not built, the kids are going to be waiting in squalid detention camps down at the border and then end up somewhere in maybe the Southwest instead, a place that has long complained about border crime and the problem unvetted migrants bring. In fact, leftist elites have always been sheltered from this kind of thing, happy to let the whole issue of unvetted foreigners getting in without enforcement to be the border's problem, up until Trump at least. The migrant community that rich Washington D.C. has encouraged for its cheap gardeners and maids -- and "can't live without" -- as the Daily Beast says, has always been insulated from the real problems of allowing all unvetted comers into the coontry. Well, now the place for the child migrant shelter is being rightly placed in an affluent part of Washington so they can live with the consequences of their choices, too.

It sounds like President Trump or whoever he's got on the federal side trying to build this shelter is combining proximity to the Salvadoran illegal immigrant community - Washington's largest - with a little taste of the medicine these liberals would like to inflict on the border regions and poorer parts of the country.

I can't think of a better place to put that shelter. Let them live with the result of their own hypocrisy.