This week, President Trump vowed to eradicate the El-Salvadoran MS-13 gang. The gang is one of the most frightening and violent foreign gangs in America.
President Trump vowed to eradicate the notorious MS-13 gang “very soon” during a ceremony at the U.S. Capitol on Monday to honor fallen police officers.
“MS-13 is going to be gone from our streets very soon, believe me,” Trump said to loud applause.
The president has railed against MS-13 in recent weeks, telling National Rifle Association members at a conference last month that he hopes to get the gang “the hell of out here.”
Treasury Department officials labeled MS-13 a “transnational criminal organization” in 2012, noting that its members have been involved in drug trafficking, kidnapping, human smuggling, murder and sex trafficking in the U.S. and several other countries.
A series of raids in at least one sanctuary city hit the gang hard.
It is 4:00 a.m., and a dozen ATF agents have poured out of an armored vehicle, preparing to break open the front and back doors of an inconspicuous store just outside downtown Los Angeles.
One by one, they come out in handcuffs. Some are suspected gang members; some may be victims of human trafficking, authorities say.
A storefront might seem like an odd place to find them. But MS-13 members have been known to live in storefronts and have been suspected of using them as a cover for drug activity, prostitution and human trafficking.
The 50 pre-dawn raids, aimed at catching suspects asleep or off guard, also focused on nabbing members of MS-13's core leadership, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) said.
"Today we disrupted this gang's command and control," said Eric Harden, special agent in charge of the ATF's Los Angeles field division.
Los Angeles is the US base for MS-13, which has tens of thousands of members worldwide. Authorities count the gang among the largest criminal organizations in the US.
As a sanctuary city for illegal alien crime, Los Angeles is a perfect base for the gang. And the judges fighting attempts to crack down on sanctuary cities are MS-13's best friends. And their victims worst enemies.