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As the activist and their judges in the 9thCircuit Court wrestle with President Donald J. Trump over immigration and executive orders, one of the most dangerous mistakesconsistently being repeated by politicians and academics is still being overlooked. Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) with real, recent operational experience are not consulted and detailed solutions are rarely considered.

Perhaps this is best exposedwhen considering the immigration screening issue. Call them immigrants, refugees or asylum seekers. it really doesnt matter because there is a breakdown of epic proportions when it comes to fingerprinting immigration applicants and collecting data of any type in their country of origin and uploading and running that data through the Department of Defense (DOD) secured data basis that contains information on an unknown number of dangerous people that have been caught and released in a war zone, or people that may be associated with them.

Currently in the United States there arehundreds ofongoing investigations of individuals that have come to the US (some as long as 10 years ago) that were originally caught by the DOD in the Middle East making bombs, planting IEDs etc. The DOD fingerprinted these individualsbut that information was neverput in databases that are shared with State Department or Border patrol. Because remote locationswhere immigrants are submitting their applications for admission into the US oftendo not offer the technologyto scan fingerprints or upload data, individuals are not fingerprinted in places like Djibouti whereindividuals from Somalia get screened when they seek to immigrate to the US.

Even in the places where immigrantsare fingerprinted, those prints are not uploaded to databases fora total and complete scanof their history. Even phone numbers are not beingrun properly through DODdatabases during this process they go unknown as well. Yet many immigrants are still put on a plane by our State Department and sent to the US.

When these immigrantsdoarrive in the USit is ensured that they are fingerprinted, but in most cases thoseprintsand other important dataare still not ranthrough the classified DOD databases.Yet the process continues and they are processed and cleared to enter into the US from whatever holding facility in which they arrive.

Interestingly, the one time when the DOD systems can be accessed isntuntil years laterwhen immigrants approach ICE to get benefits. That is apparently when information is finallyranthrough the DOD system.

Now, hundreds of cases are being investigated involving immigrants that have been residing inside the US for long periods of time (in some cases over 10 years) that areconnected to bombings and other crimes from war zones the Middle East. Their information had been collected by DOD operators in the field, and uploaded to DOD databases with no plan to share with other agencies.

There are more details to this story butit is problematic in that no one really knows exactly what is screened and at what point and it is a problem that has largely been overlooked, even by the current administration.If President Trumps administration concentrated on these types of details that subject matter experts working on the ground understand, these gaps could be closed and our immigration security could take a huge leap forward.

As a former FBI special agent, my investigative mind tells me these issues will continue to plague immigration screening because so much attention is being placed on executive orders and hiring more Customs Officers and not on these types of simple solutions.

The Devil is always in the details, thats why simple issues always cause such massive problems. Dont believe me? Just ask someone that is working at the ground level, like the policy makers should be doing!

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Breakdown In Immigration Screening: The Devil Is In The Details - Daily Caller