In Israel, O'Malley Talks Jobs, Foreign Policy and, of Course, 2016

JERUSALEM – Gov. Martin O’Malley of Maryland said Wednesday that he would spend the second half of this year mulling whether to run for president in 2016. He seems already to have a campaign theme: jobs and innovation.

At least that’s what he insisted was the sole focus of his eight-day trip to Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian territories, and pretty much all he wanted to talk about with a handful of reporters he had summoned to the King David Hotel for coffee. “I’m sure all of you will ask me foreign policy questions,” he said as he opened the floor. “I respect your right to ask them, and I hope you’ll respect my right to shy away from answering them.”

And so, on the news of the day — apparent differences between the Obama administration and the Israeli military on whether chemical weapons had been deployed by the Syrian military — Mr. O’Malley, a Democrat, deferred to the president’s judgment. “It’s certainly one of the great challenges,” he allowed.

Asked whether the American people, weary from a decade of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, would be ready to engage in another military operation to stop Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, Mr. O’Malley avoided specifics. “I believe that the president will make that call,” he said, “and the president will have the primary responsibility of making that case to the American people and also to Congress.”

How about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict? “All of us hope for peace in the Middle East.”

Governor O’Malley, 50, said it was his third visit to Israel, and that he had brought with him about 50 high-tech executives, Jewish leaders, and Maryland officials for what is essentially a trade mission. After a side trip to Jordan in which he met with Prince Faisal – “What we spoke about was the huge challenge that the ongoing conflict in Syria has for the entire region” – much of his itinerary here is filled with companies that have offices in his home state, including one that makes radar for the vaunted Iron Dome missile defense system.

Mr. O’Malley was also set to meet with President Shimon Peres of Israel; two rising stars in Israeli politics, Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid, both of whom head economic ministries; and Salaam Fayyad, who resigned earlier this month as prime minister of the Palestinian Authority. (Scheduling with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel was still being worked out.)

“I’m hoping in discussions with him to learn,” Mr. O’Malley said of Mr. Fayyad. “That’s part of the obligation that goes along with travel.”

The visit comes two months after Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, a Republican similarly put forth as a potential 2016 candidate, made headlines during his own trip here by referring to Jerusalem as its capital, a point of contention with the Palestinians. Might he face off against Governor O’Malley?

“I plan for the latter half of this year to dedicate some more thought time, reflection time, to the question of whether or not I would run,” he said Tuesday. “The key question in running for any office is having a clear and refined understanding of the shared reality we face and the better set of choices we need to make as a people to meet those challenges and to create a better future for our kids.”

For the latter half of this week, Mr. O’Malley plans to tour the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum, the Western Wall and the Old City, and attend Mass at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem with his 15-year-old son, one of four O’Malley children who attend Catholic schools, as their father did.

A reporter pointed out that on his way into Bethlehem, he would see the controversial separation barrier Israel has erected in the West Bank. Mr. O’Malley said he had seen something similar in Northern Ireland. “They call it the peace wall,” he noted.

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Immigration Policy at Issue in Primary for Sheriff in Travis County, Texas

Sheriff Greg Hamilton, first elected in 2004, is coming under increasing fire from his Democratic primary challenger, John Sisson, a retired Austin Police Department lieutenant, for his use of Secure Communities. The program, administered by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and in place statewide, compares the fingerprints of arrested individuals to a federal database to determine whether those individuals are eligible for deportation. If a person is found to be in violation, ICE requests that a detainer be placed on the individual for 48 hours, excluding weekends and holidays.

The federal government says the program is needed to ferret out violent immigrants or repeat immigration violators for deportation. But critics say that the system focuses on lower-level offenders rather than the more violent criminals. Mr. Sisson said Sheriff Hamilton grants detainers on every immigrant who is booked.

“I was appalled to see what it was doing to the Hispanic community and the immigrant community here,” Mr. Sisson said. “I felt like it was very inhumane to be lazy and not do the research and say, ‘We’ll just hold everybody for deportation and not even mess with the particulars.’ ”

Sheriff Hamilton said that he is merely following the law.

“The only one that can deport and put an immigration detainer on an individual is an ICE agent, not us,” he said. “At the Travis County Jail, we follow the law, and the law says that when an ICE detainer is put on, the law enforcement agency shall maintain that individual for 48 hours.”

From June 2009 to September 2011, Travis County submitted 80,731 fingerprint sets and removed 2,269 immigrants, including those who left voluntarily.

More than 900 were Level 3 offenders, convicted of misdemeanors that include traffic violations and drunken driving. There were 420 Level 1 offenders and 437 Level 2. Level 1 are aggravated felonies, including murder, rape, sexual abuse of a minor and drug trafficking. Level 2 offenders are convicted of any lesser felony or three misdemeanors.

Travis County’s number of removals surpasses that of Bexar County, where about 105,600 submissions were processed, resulting in the removal of 1,479 immigrants. Bexar County, which includes San Antonio, has a population of about 1,715,000, compared with Travis County’s population of 1,024,000.

But Sheriff Hamilton said deputies release immigrants if ICE agents do not take them and they are otherwise releasable on bond.

“Secure Communities identifies the individuals that are in our community that have run afoul of law enforcement,” he said. “And I think it’s very important that somebody knows who is in the community.”

But Sheriff Hamilton also cited his sensitivity toward the immigrant community, legal or otherwise, most of whom he said are in search of a better life. His wife is a naturalized citizen from Honduras, he said, and his department delivers aid to Austin’s Casa Marianella immigrant shelter.

“I have never asked a question, are they here legally or illegally,” he said. “I just want to help out.”

The winner of the May 29 Democratic primary will face Raymond Frank, a former sheriff and admitted underdog Republican candidate who identifies himself as an independent in the mold of Representative Ron Paul, Republican of Lake Jackson.

Mr. Frank has vowed to do away with the program if he is elected because it separates families. “A lot of Republicans are pretty outspoken about immigration,” he said. “And I don’t share their views at all.”

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Top Dems oppose detention policy in defense bill (AP)

WASHINGTON – Top Democrats on the Senate Judiciary and Intelligence committees are opposing provisions in a sweeping defense bill that would require military custody of terrorist suspects and limit the government's authority to transfer detainees.

In a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., the lawmakers — Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy and Intelligence Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein — said the provisions would undercut U.S. counterterrorism efforts and urged him to remove the sections from the bill. The Obama administration also opposes the provisions.

"Professionals in the intelligence community and law enforcement need the flexibility to use all tools to effectively interrogate, incarcerate and bring terrorists to justice," Leahy and Feinstein wrote Oct. 21 along with 11 other Democratic senators.

The issue has exposed divisions within the Senate and the Democratic Party.

The Senate Armed Services Committee approved the $683 billion defense bill in June that would authorize spending on military personnel, weapons systems and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1. The panel, led by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., approved the provision on military custody on a 25-1 vote.

But the administration's opposition and Reid's concerns have delayed Senate consideration of the legislation with about 10 weeks remaining in the session.

The provision in the bill would require military custody of a suspect determined to be a member of al-Qaida or its affiliate and involved in the planning or an attack on the United States. The administration argues that such a step would hamper efforts by the FBI or other law enforcement to elicit intelligence from terror suspects, and Reid has said "limitations on that flexibility, or on the availability of critical counterterrorism tools, would significantly threaten our national security."

Levin has argued that the provision included a national security waiver that the administration could exercise to bypass the requirement.

This isn't the first time Congress has tried to limit the administration on the detainee issue. Last year's defense bill barred the transfer of detainees at the naval prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to the United States. The omnibus spending bill that President Barack Obama and Congress approved in April also prevented the transfer of detainees from Guantanamo to the U.S., prohibited the construction or modification of facilities in the United States to house detainees and required the defense secretary to notify Congress before transferring a terror suspect to a foreign country.

Congressional Republicans and some Democrats want to keep the facility at Guantanamo open despite Obama's efforts, which have proven unsuccessful, to close the prison. Lawmakers also favor trying suspects in military commissions instead of federal courts.

Separately, Rep. Howard "Buck" McKeon, R-Calif., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, sent a letter to Obama expressing frustration with the administration's unwillingness to discuss the House-passed defense bill's provisions on terror suspects. The House bill, approved this past summer, includes different provisions limiting the administration's authority on handling detainees that the White House opposes.

"The administration has shown a willingness to undertake nothing short of extraordinary action regarding targeting terrorists overseas," McKeon wrote in an Oct. 20 letter. "Yet is has shown none of this resolve when it comes to detaining our enemies instead."

McKeon argued that the administration has "foreclosed options that are critical to our national security."

The House and Senate versions of the defense bills need to be reconciled and cleared by Congress for the president. In doubt is Congress' four-decade record of completing defense bills and sending them to the president.

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