Posted on 03/07/2004 7:23:24 PM PST by nonliberal
Bush Backs Off Fingerprinting Mexicans
Mar 7, 2:18 AM (ET)
By JENNIFER LOVEN
CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) - President Bush gave Mexican President Vicente Fox a gift to take home on Saturday: his pledge to exempt certain frequent Mexican visitors from onerous new security checks at the U.S. border.
The visit by Fox to Bush's Central Texas ranch, held a year and a half after it was originally scheduled, was designed to lay past disputes to rest. But with Bush eager to boost his standing in the U.S. Hispanic community, the nation's fastest-growing voting bloc, American politics were never far from the agenda.
Bush used the leaders' joint appearance before Mexican and American reporters to make clear how he sees the November election, in which he almost certainly will face Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. "The question is who brings forth the best pro-growth policies ... who (is) best to lead this country in the war on terror," Bush said.
Over intimate meals, relaxed discussions and an early-morning drive through wintertime-lush canyons to some of Bush's favorite spots on his 1,600-acre property, Bush and Fox aimed to look forward, not back.
The warm ties that characterized the two leaders' relationship three years ago had soured after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Bush shelved work on a migration accord coveted by Mexico; Fox abruptly backed out of a planned visit to Bush's ranch in August 2002 over a death-penalty dispute and refused to back Bush at the United Nations on an Iraq war.
On Saturday, side-by-side in casual clothes and the warm March sun, horses and cows grazing placidly in a meadow behind them, the two men sought to project an air of cooperation on immigration, trade, Haiti and anti-terrorism measures. Neither publicly mentioned other divisive matters - such as the water Mexico owes the United States or a continued disagreement over Mexicans on death row in the United States - that still divide the North American neighbors.
"Mexico and the United States are more than neighbors," Bush said Saturday, sprinkling Spanish throughout his remarks. "We are partners in building a safer, more democratic and more prosperous hemisphere."
Still, there was very little of the effusive mutual admiration that usually features prominently in Bush's appearances with world leaders.
Though immigration issues were foremost on Fox's mind, he left Texas with some new assurances but no ironclad agreements.
Under the US-VISIT program, already in use at many airports and seaports, visitors from certain countries must be fingerprinted and photographed before entering the United States. When the system is expanded later this year to the busiest land entry points as well, it would ensnare the many Mexicans who regularly travel back and forth with so-called border-crossing cards.
Fox said the fingerprinting and photograph requirement now won't apply for border-crossing card holders, celebrating "the news that was confirmed today with regard to visitors to the U.S. from Mexico."
Fox also applauded work by the two leaders to advance a proposal Bush offered in January to give temporary visas to illegal immigrants, most from Mexico, already working in the United States.
But Bush was pessimistic about the prospects for congressional passage of his temporary worker proposal - saying "there's no telling what's going to happen in an election year." Also, he said little about the border-crossing issue while his aides signaled it is far from settled.
Bush told Fox in their Saturday morning meeting that he is committed to the exemption, though details still need to be worked out, White House spokesman Sean McCormack said. However, McCormack wouldn't confirm that the remaining issues were merely technical, saying the matter is extraordinarily complex, and could not offer a timetable for a final agreement.
On Friday, the White House said it was strongly considering a proposal under which the multi-use visas that those frequent Mexican travelers have could be used in place of the US-VISIT checks at the border checks. The documents already require background checks, fingerprinting and photographs.
"We will work to ensure a system of safe and orderly migration," Bush said. "We're making progress."
"President Bush has invited Vicente Fox back to the ranch in Crawford. An immigration proposal long-awaited by Latinos has been laid on the table. It must be an election year," said New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democrat who has been talked about as a possible Kerry running mate.
Bush defended his handling of the economy against Kerry's attacks and a new report that showed U.S. payrolls increased by only 21,000 jobs last month, about 100,000 fewer than expected. Without mentioning Kerry by name, Bush implied the Massachusetts senator would raise taxes and derail the economic improvements Bush has overseen.
"Raising taxes will make it harder for people to find work," the president told reporters.
Kerry, who said while campaigning only a couple hundred miles away in Houston on Saturday that Bush has left the nation in economic ruin, has called for repealing the portions of Bush's tax cut that went to wealthy taxpayers. Bush characterizes that as a tax increase.
"George Bush is a walking contradiction and a walking barrel of broken promises," Kerry said.
The president also didn't shrink from his campaign's use of images from the Sept. 11 attacks in his first round of campaign ads. Some victims' families have said the pictures' use for political gain is offensive.
"How this administration handled that day as well as the war on terror is worthy of discussion," he said.
I think they should all be required to carry a truth in advertising tag line.
"This is reason 2,416,812 why I won't be voting for Bush again."
I never said they were getting a free pass. I understand perfectly well that these people have been fingerprinted, photographed, and have gone through a background check. I also know that the means by which these cards are issued are severely flawed:
The State Dept. presumes that the people who apply for these cards will not use them to immigrate to the United States. It is up to the applicant to defeat that presumption. 10 million Mexicans have been able to defeat that presumption and have been given the cards. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of them have used the card to enter the United States legally and have violated the terms of the visa by overstaying and working illegally in the US. The US Visit program would have been a check on all this misuse, and Bush's backtracking on this shows that he simply intends to make it easier for illegal immigrants to come into, and stay in, the country.
I will, as long as Bush follows his let-'em-all-in-if-they're-not-terrorists strategy
Sparky, you're little agenda here is pretty evident. You're purposely ignoring the facts that have been placed on these threads so many times it's funny, and continue to try and twist your little rant around to stir the pot.
Look around you dude, the regular "Jorge Bush" folks aren't even cheering you on.
Nice numbers there guy. A person would think that if you were actually interested in stemming the flow of illegals immigrants you would actually welcome an initiative that would eliminate costly redundancy so we can divert more hours and dollars to the more important issues.
But if efficient isn't really your concern then of course you're simply going to try and make something out of this that it isn't.
I bow to your superior a$$hood.
I'm not here to have people cheering me on. If you were cheering me on, I'd be concerned. I'm not ignoring facts. You'll have to take that gripe up with someone else.
I've never said that these people haven't been fingerprinted or photographed, obviously they have to have been for the US Visit screening to take place.
Are you also in favor of streamlining US Visit by not screening Middle Easterners? They, after all, have gone through probably a more strenuous process than the Mexicans have to get their visas?
The vast majority of the thousands of illegals using us as their gateway do not pass through the official Ports of Entry. They don't have any legal documentation at all and hop over any stretch of border fence that looks unguarded.
Dubya and El Moocho Grande are just posturing and pandering for the masses on both sides of the border. And as usual, doing absolutely nothing to fix the underlying causes of the problem.
The simple issue is that this bogus thread tried to make the claim that Mexican nationals were going to be allowed to enter the country without being fingerprinted or photographed, and that lie has been exposed for the agenda it is.
But keep on trying to salvage something from it.
well, it looks as if the way Bush wants to help you folks is to make it easier for them to enter legally so they don't have to hire polleros. They can use their pollero fee to buy false documents that will get them through their screening at the consulates.
I didn't address that issue. FWIW, it is misleading as stated - obviously anyone who has a clue about US Visit knows that there must be fingerprints and photos on file in order for the machine-read prints and photos at the port of entry to be compared against. My posting on this thread doesn't endorse that mis-statement any more than yours does.
Good point. Any blanket exemption would render all cards meaningless. And face it, you and I can duplicate just about any card on the computers in front of us. I've actually done it, but had to mess them up to look authentic. Email me -- jackelopebreeder@hotmail.com -- and I'll send you a matricula consulares in the name of your choice that will pass muster in any of the misguided locales here in the States that decided to accept them. Just for fun I issued matriculas to both of my dogs.
Locally, most of the legal border crossers are well known to the agents at the Ports of Entry. Take my friend Hector as an example. He crosses three of four times every week. I even set up his daughter's wedding reception here on this side of the border.
But then Luis from Xoahaca shows up at the POE and wants to be just waved through...with the bed of his truck just a whisker away from erasing the tread from his tires. Hmmm. I personally would subject him to fingerprints, retinal scan, DNA testing and a body cavity search. Sorry, Luis, but we ran out of KY...take a deep breath and try to relax.
Read my tagline, slick. It isn't a joke.
I actively hunt illegal aliens crossing the border in Cochise County, Arizona. I don't give a rat's ass what nationality they are. I haven't caught any Finnish reindeer herders or New Guinea headhunters yet, but it could always happen tomorrow. The first group I turned over to the Border Patrol included four Chinese.
Here's reality for you. We have one set of illegal alien trails here that everybody calls OTM alley. That's Other Than Mexican.
A good number of Middle Eastern types have been caught here. They pay anywhere from $30,000 to$50,000 to be smuggled in by Mexican coyotes. Somehow, I just don't think they paid that kind of cash just to get that dream job at a 7-Eleven in Nashville.
Do you think illegals just ghost through here with no impact on the local population? Let's see -- vandalism, theft, burglary, assault, car-jackings, rape. Our sheriff has an average of 250 new illegals charged with felonies in his jail every week.
There are only 120,000 of us legal locals here in the entire county. About 30,000 are Hispanic and most of them are just as pissed off as I am. We no longer give a sh!t if everyone else gets cheap lettuce, cheap lawn care, and cheap labor.
Finally, I really don't care which of the two losers ends up in the Oval Office next year. If Dubya had any cojones at all, he would have planted a boot tip in El Moocho Grande's crotch on Saturday and sent him crawling back to Mexico to fix his cesspool of a country. Yeah, I know, it'll never happen as long as that bunch of Spanish grandee wannabes are running the place.
Any chance you have an explanation for why a country with a $900 billion GDP has 40% of its population living in starvation? Or why us gringos are expected to bail them out?
I'm not referring to legal migrants - I'm referring to the Illegaliens - those who steal their way into the US and who steal some $40 billion annually from taxpayers in taxpayer funded services - from medical care to foodstamps for their anchor babies. Those, my friend, along with the felons who hire, support, encourage, and aid them, are destroying the infrastructure of America.
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