MS-13: Exporting Violence To America

Their motto is "kill, rape, control."  Their bodies are branded with animated tattoos from head to toe.  These ruthless murderers terrorize their victims before brutally ending their lives.  These desperadoes are members of the MS-13 gang, a growing menace that has spread its tentacles to 46 states.

The gang with origins in El Salvador is responsible for a a rising tide of violence that worries law enforcement officials.  The FBI, which tabulates crime statistics by virtually every category, has no available data on the MS-13 crime wave.  However, many incidents have received news coverage.

In Houston, two MS-13 members kidnapped three teenage girls, holding them hostage and repeatedly raping them. The killers murdered one girl and left her body on the roadside. Two female high school students were beaten and hacked by gang members brandishing a machete and a bat near New York.

In Virginia last year, MS-13 hoodlums lured a Maryland man to a park on the outskirts of the nation's capitol.  The gang members stabbed the victim 100 times, decapitated him and sliced his heart from his dead body, according to police reports.  Even police were shocked by the excessive brutality.

MS-13 violence is not just aimed at civilians, rival gang members and traitors who attempt to flee their  flock. They brazenly threaten to kill police if they interfere with their activities, which include drug distribution, prostitution, robbery, kidnapping and home invasions, according to the FBI.

Who are these tatted goons terrorizing our country?

MS-13 traces its roots to the mean streets of Central America.  Many are El Salvadoran nationals, but others include immigrants from Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico.  The name MS-13 is a derivative of La Mara Street in San Salvador. Mara Salvatrucha translates to street gang or street smarts.

El Salvadorans with gang ties began sneaking into the U.S. in the 1990's.  Many had honed their criminal skills fighting as guerrilla soldiers in the civil wars in Central America.  They are well trained in weapons and warfare tactics.  These are no ordinary street ruffians.

Many wound up in Los Angeles, which became their operations base for exporting their brand of mayhem. Gang leaders recruited from the immigrant community, reaching into middle and high schools for new members. The gang preys on unaccompanied minors who illegally entered the U.S.

In 1994, the FBI formed a task force to deal with the looming threat posed by the notoriously violent gang. Despite a concerted law offensive, the gang has metastasized like a cancer.  Nationally, estimates peg the MS-13 membership at between 10,000 and 20,000. 

But those are just guesstimates.  The gang's rolls include about 5,000 to 6,000 members just in communities around Washington, D.C.  Once the gang was a primarily West Coast operation, but it now stretches from the heartland to the East Coast.  And they are claiming new territory every day. 

Their influence extends beyond the U.S. into Central America and Mexico.  In Mexico, officials there have called MS-13 a threat to national security.  MS-13 smuggles weapons and drugs across the Mexican border.  The gang also exploits the porous border to engage in human trafficking.

Alarmed by the gang's criminal assault on American soil, the Treasury Department in 2012 designated the outfit a "transnational criminal organization."  It was the first street gang ever accorded this tag, elevating its threat on par with deadly international cartels such as the Mexican Zetas. 

Last year Attorney General Jeff Session escalated the war on MS-13 putting the entire resources of the federal government to crush their criminal rampage.  "They leave misery, devastation and death in their wake," Sessions said.  "They must be and will be stopped."

Despite the obvious MS-13 threat, the liberal media, including The New York Times and Washington Post, recently tried to downplay the emergency.  The Post pointed out last month that MS-13 accounts for less than one percent of the approximately 1.4 million gang members in America.

Current membership numbers are not the chief threat the gang poses.  It is their intensifying violence, their recruiting success and rapid expansion that has made the gang a law enforcement priority.  Nearly every big city now has a local task force solely dedicated to dismantling MS-13.

Undeterred by facts,  the Post complained that designating MS-13 a priority will only "encourage the gang and others like it to flourish."  Placing a giant target on this gang will inflame anti-immigrant sentiment, the newspaper bellyached. This is sheer lunacy that doesn't deserve a response.

Just as stupidly, Democrat Nancy Pelosi rushed to defend MS-13 gang members after President Trump labeled the thugs "animals" for their violent behavior.  "They are all God's Children," Pelosi lectured to applause from the adoring media. Only Ms. Pelosi would champion MS-13 members.

Those who support open borders, like Ms. Pelosi, apparently believe the influx of MS-13 members is a small price to pay for granting sanctuary to whomever chooses to illegally enter the United States.  This should frighten every American, including those who back increased legal immigration.

As Americans become more aware of the MS-13 risk, the backlash will be even more thunderous than the Post predicts.  The FBI recently posted this warning about MS-13 on its website: "...this growing, mobile street gang could be operating in your community now or in the near future."

Politicians who ignore this sober assessment put Americans in danger by doubling down on their agenda to promote illegal immigration as a humanitarian cause.  Their first priority should be protecting citizens.  By soft peddling illegal immigrant crime, pols are undermining your security.