There are some doors in this Republic which open only with great difficulty, opportunity, for instance, or common sense. And then there are some that swing so freely a man might pass through them three or four times before anyone thinks to oil the hinges.
Such is the case of Cesar Daniel Reyes-Rodriguez, a Mexican national, now sentenced to 30 months in federal prison for returning to the United States after having been formally shown the exit on three prior occasions. One begins to suspect the invitation to leave lacked a certain firmness.
The Department of Justice states that Mr. Reyes-Rodriguez was in the country on April 27, despite receiving exit papers in June 2019, October 2019, and again in June 2023. Like a man who cannot recall where he parked his horse, he kept turning up in the same place.
His latest rediscovery came courtesy of the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, who arrested him on April 26 under suspicion of a fourth DUI offense since 2016, a record suggesting that if he respects no border, he has even less regard for the dividing line between sobriety and a steering wheel. His past also includes felony convictions for possession of a controlled substance with intent to sell, which rounds out the résumé in a manner no employer would admire.
Mr. Reyes-Rodriguez pleaded guilty to being a previously deported alien found in the United States. He will serve his sentence, followed by three years of supervised release, and then, once again, be escorted out of the country.
And here we arrive at the quiet punchline: a system that can count to three deportations with perfect accuracy, yet still seems surprised when the arithmetic produces a fourth return. One might suggest that borders, like rules, are only as real as a nation’s willingness to keep them.
Until then, the door will go on swinging, and men will go on treating it less like a boundary and more like a suggestion.
The Old Blog in the Desert 
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