Four members of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang — three of whom were released into the country under Biden administration border policies — have pleaded guilty to a double murder in the Bronx. Two Americans are dead because our government decided catching and releasing violent foreign nationals was somehow good policy.
But hey, at least nobody called them "illegal." That would've been the real crime.
According to Breitbart News, Keiber Jaen Martinez, Samuel Gonzalez Castro, Eferson Gabriel Morillo-Gomez, and Keineyer Ibarra-Mujica all entered guilty pleas last week for a 2024 shooting in the Bronx that killed 44-year-old Claretha Daniels and 36-year-old Justin Lawless. A third person survived the attempted murder.
The details are infuriating at every level. Martinez crossed the U.S.-Mexico border through Texas in 2023 and was issued a final deportation order on September 5, 2024 — which clearly did wonders. Castro received a final deportation order in November 2024. Ibarra-Mujica got his in June 2024. Three deportation orders. Zero deportations. Two dead Americans.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin laid the blame exactly where it belongs.
"All four of these Tren de Aragua gang members entered our country under the Biden Administration," Mullin said.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche added: "Thanks to the hard work of our law enforcement partners and prosecutors, these four Tren de Aragua gang members" will face justice for what they did.
Let's connect the dots here because the system worked exactly as designed — just not for Claretha Daniels or Justin Lawless. Step one: Biden's border policies let Venezuelan gang members waltz into the country. Step two: they ended up in New York City, a proud sanctuary jurisdiction that treats immigration enforcement like a hate crime. Step three: they murdered two people.
Every single link in that chain was preventable. A secure border stops them from entering. Actual deportation enforcement removes them when they're caught. And a city that cooperates with ICE instead of shielding criminals from federal agents keeps them off the streets.
But none of that happened. Instead, three of these four TdA gang members were caught, processed, given deportation orders, and released right back into the population. The system had them — multiple times — and let them go every single time.
This is what "compassionate" immigration policy looks like in practice. Not in theory. Not in a think-tank white paper. In the Bronx, where a 44-year-old woman and a 36-year-old man are dead because our government couldn't be bothered to enforce its own laws.
Guilty pleas are nice. But Claretha Daniels and Justin Lawless deserved a government that never let their killers into the country in the first place.