Border Agents Assail Bush's Plan

HOUSTON — U.S. Border Patrol agents, charged with enforcing the nation's border laws, are furious about President Bush's proposal to create a guest worker program for millions of illegal immigrants, union leaders say.

In interviews this week, nearly three dozen current and former agents across the nation called Bush's proposal an insult to the thousands of men and women who have devoted their careers to fighting illegal immigration, including wave after wave along the California-Mexico border.

The agents — many of whom otherwise support the White House — savaged the Bush proposal as a grab for Latino votes and a favor to the business community, factions of which rely on cheap immigrant labor. And they say they are bracing for a rush of people trying to sneak into the United States.

"We get rocks thrown at us. We get shot at. We get spit on," said James Stack, a representative of the agents' union and a 16-year veteran who patrols the border near El Paso.

I'm sorry, but I see it differently. Of course they were short of resources, but the fact is that MILLIONS of illegals have entered during the time when these people were SUPPOSED to be keeping them out. That is failure on a massive scale, and this article is the bitter residue of it.

I have experienced both success and failure in my life, and I hate failing. Excuses are always comforting, but every excuse is, by definition, WHY YOU FAILED. Now I believe that failure to control the borders must be shared by many others, but the presence of so many illegals within the Country is a fact that must be dealt with realistically, not by soundbite solutions.

Particularly since 09/11, we have realized the necessity to address this problem in a new way. Now we must think of true enemies, those who mean to injure, terrorize, and kill us instead of just avail themselves of our bounty. And the a major part of that is to deal with the problem of the millions already here that we can't even identify.

The border patrol has an average of about 3 agents per mile along the Mexican border. But they have to cover 3 shifts (24 hours), 7 days a week. And they also have to concentrate most of their efforts at the entry points, leaving mile after mile unguarded much of the time. Air patrols and technology help, but arrests require agents, and a single agent is potentially as much a target as an enforcer. Also, away from authorized entry points, this is security and guard duty. Anyone crossing out here is breaking the law.

In order to truly seal the border against both kind of intruders, even the remotest part of the border needs to have two or three man patrols, 24x7x365, going by often, and not so far apart that they cannot effectively reinforce and fill in for each other. This would take the equivalent of at least two Army divisions - and the US Army has just 10 active divisions now.

And then, what about the border with Canada? And the East and West Coasts?

The fact is, we are beefing up the border patrol, and adding more technology to help them, but it will not approach sealing our borders for years. And we will not and can not just round up all the illegals already here - both a manpower and an intelligence problem. So the next best is to make a list, as the President's proposal will do.

Also, we need to pass legislation that confers citizenship on those born here ONLY when the mother is here legally, to end the "anchor baby" problem. And we need to allow - and encourage - states to deny benefits to illegals. The courts have interfered with this, so it might require curbing the courts with a Constitutional amendment. I might support that, for several reasons.

You berate the USBP for failing to do their job, then in a subsequent paragraph you admit they are understaffed and underfunded.

Not only do they show courage every day but they have shown courage in exposing Bush's amnesty-on-the-installment plan for what it really is.

Perhaps the FBI agents who frantically tried to search the computer and belongings of suspected terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui in August 2001 should have kept their obedient little mouths shut as well? Truth is, their bosses misunderstood the law on foreign intelligence surveillance warrants.

With all due respect to your well written post, I will take seriously the word of the men and women who are down there on the front line, rather than the pandering machinations and press release pap of Karl Rove.

I did not intend to berate the USBP as much as to point out that they were carping about their own failure to control the border, however difficult that task might be. It has happened many times in the past. Examples include the listless fighting as the truce date approached in Korea, and the holding action in Vietnam before the final US withdrawal.

When the motivation to succeed fades, performance suffers. It becomes more important to avoid mistakes than to accomplish missions, more important to follow rules than accomplish objectives.

Part of the problem comes from the active hostility to their mission from MANY city and state authorities that have passed "sanctuary" laws forbidding cooperation with the INS. So they face a difficult task to execute, but that does not make them experts on policy.

I still believe that sealing our borders will be impossible as long as the incentives to penetrate them illegally remain so strong. We will not be able to reduce that incentive without providing a legal alternative, along with proper identification, documentation, and tracking, as the President suggests. And we have no hope of learning who is already here if we treat them as criminals. Of course, they are criminals in that they entered illegally, I can't argue with that, but their undocumented presence here is an invitation to crime, exploitation, and a host of other problems, all bad.

If the incentive to sneak in for economic reasons is removed, and those who do enter are identified, the illegal entries will be reduced drastically. Over time, the number of undocumented outlaws will decline to a manageable level, and we may reach a point where we can really attack the problem directly. Reduced illegal crossings, along with beefing up the border patrol, will ease the burden of policing the border. And finally, after all these years, we might really get a handle on it.

The President's plan is not a lifetime amnesty. It includes incentives to return to Mexico, and a way to return freely, without penalty. Please consider it carefully before you mischaracterize it and reject it for the wrong reasons.

President Bush has made several mistakes - don't mention CFR to me, for one - but he has a penchant for proposing actual, realistic solutions to problems instead of papering over them. I just do not believe that any other solutions I have heard of can actually be put in effect and work, and this one might.

Please consider it carefully before you mischaracterize it and reject it for the wrong reasons.

I not only READ it. I have STUDIED it -- section by section.

First source was: http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2004/01/20040107-1.html

Then I sought out a non-partisan, purely legal analysis.

That source was: http://www.legal-database.com/immigrationlaw.htm

I respectfully submit that I have probably read it more often (and arguably in greater detail) than you. I can also give you lists of credible analysis from *four* differing points of view on it. I don't "reject" things without careful and extended consideration. I leave knee-jerk reactions to the left. If you want to give me *specifics* on where I "mischaracterized" it, I would be glad to enter into a discussion -- but frankly I vote we shake hands and agree to disagree.

I DO respect your opinions and hope yours is the correct analysis, but I live in the "belly of the beast" and I know from hard experience that Denial is NOT a river in Egypt. But Karl Rove believes it sells well in bottled form so, to paraphrase a line from the Indy 500, "Gentlemen, Open Your Borders."

I cannot (and do not) pretend to have invested the level of effort you describe to this subject, so I am sure that you could outpoint me on specifics. I would like to point out that I did not intend to level an accusation of "mischaracterization", only to warn against a hasty decision that might result in it. If you saw it differently, I apologize.

But I am seriously concerned about the people who clamor to seal the border yesterday, while the rest of us round up, lock up, and deport the millions of illegals here already. This is both physically and politically impossible, disastrous economically, and questionable morally due to the genuine human suffering it would cause, both to the subjects and the executors of the policy. Legal authority does not confer moral authority. We would be creating concentration camps, and as a Jew I cannot tolerate that.

I truly want to see the problem solved, and depending on the details, starting from where we are right now, I can conceive of nothing better. The first step in solving a problem is to understand it, and we have been avoiding this one for years, to the point that we no longer can claim any understanding of it. But we do know that the scale is massive, beyond any capacity to enforce our way out of it.

Eventually, I believe that any real solution will bear a strong resemblance to these proposals. The number of illegals is at least an order of magnitude larger than the number of criminals, and I would guess that INS is an order of magnitude smaller than law enforcement. It took us a long time to make this mess, and it will take as long to fix it. Can we at least agree that this is NOT Bush's fault (entirely)?

I am seriously concerned about the people who clamor to seal the border yesterday, while the rest of us round up, lock up, and deport the millions of illegals here already.

Then you are concerned about one half of one percent of people in a nation of more than 281 million. Find me a credible citation from any *reputable* individual or group opposed to Bush's plan who has advocated "mass deportation."

We would be creating concentration camps, and as a Jew I cannot tolerate that.

This is *so* over the top -- in the context of this discussion and subject. Your posts have shown me intelligence and civility and frankly I'm disappointed that this is the last arrow in your quiver.

Eventually, I believe that any real solution will bear a strong resemblance to these proposals.

Then God help us. [When George Washington fell ill his doctors thought the "real solution" was bleeding him.]

Can we at least agree that this is NOT Bush's fault (entirely)?

The beginning the current crises began with Ronald Reagan's ill-advised amnesty in 1986. George Bush is merely exacerbating the problem with his ill-advised proposal. So, yes we end on a note of agreement!

There are dozens of posts on this forum, several letters to the editor in my local paper, and innumerable talk radio callers who seem to reflect these extreme solutions. Believe me, I am not directing these comments at you personally, and if you see that in my posts, either I am expressing myself poorly or you are inferring more than I intend to convey.

This is *so* over the top....

Perhaps you have skipped over some of the more extreme comments from others, but they exist. I admit that I misspoke when I said, "while the rest of us round up, lock up, and deport...", which might have implied that you were a proponent of these extreme measures. I should have said "others" and failed to catch my error. But I am concerned about what to do with the detainees if we adopt the "round up and deport" solution? Mexico could simply refuse to accept them, and then what?

I guess I don't understand what you think the solution ought to be, and just how it would NOT include most of the elements discussed earlier in our exchange. Any true solution must address certain realities of our current situation, including locating and identifying the millions of illegals already here, and somehow winnowing the real bad guys from the vast number whose only crime is their presence, illegal though it is. And it has to fit within the constraints of manpower and budget, political possibility, and human rights.

If the President and the republicans fail to address the problem, the democrats will certainly not fail to seize the initiative, and I am truly frightened about what their solutions would be. I picture the end of citizenship as a qualification for voting, as is the de facto case in too many places already.

Off topic, your comments about President Bush seem to carry a degree of disappointment far beyond what I feel, even with the betrayal of signing CFR. There, I think that his cleverness in passing off a political issue to be disposed of elsewhere failed, and he has yet refused to take responsibility for it. But I am willing to view that as a tactical failure rather than the kind of political manipulation practiced by his predecessor. And I still give him credit for honesty, integrity, and respect for his duties of office, as well as effective management of the executive branch. He is far superior to his opponents, past and present, and will certainly receive my vote.

Find me a credible citation from any *reputable* individual or group opposed to Bush's plan who has advocated "mass deportation."

There are dozens of posts on this forum, several letters to the editor in my local paper, and innumerable talk radio callers who seem to reflect these extreme solutions.

If the definition of reputable is all we disagree on at the end of the day, then I would say we are ahead of the game. Thank you for your well written thoughts, and for the civil discourse. Nice to know it's still alive in places.

nearly three dozen current and former agents across the nation called Bush's proposal an insult to the thousands of men and women who have devoted their careers to fighting illegal immigration

With all due respect for their work, and speaking as a throw-em-all-out advocate, this is like saying that ending Prohibition was an insult to the men who devoted their careers to fighting rumrunning.

I have read quite a bit of history about America in the 20s and I'll be damned if I have yet to see an account of a fifth of bootleg whiskey trying to access emergency medical care, enroll in school, apply for foodstamps, or undercutting the wage structure.

I agree that controlling the border is more valuable than controlling what citizens put in their bodies---but that doesn't make a loosening of immigration law an "insult" to those who have enforced the stricter laws.

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