Posted on 06/18/2004 6:56:21 AM PDT by South40
WASHINGTON – An unrelenting flow of illegal immigrants is taking its toll on the Mexico-Arizona border, according to testimony before a Senate committee that told of thousands of abandoned vehicles, tons of trash, significant damage to an Indian reservation, and of a wildlife refuge marred with an ugly web of illegal pathways and roads.
The illicit traffic of immigrants and drugs is "causing a flood of crime, chaos and environmental destruction on our reservation," Ned Norris Jr., vice chairman of the Tohono O'odham Nation, testified yesterday. The reservation shares a 75-mile border with Mexico.
Border Patrol clampdowns in urbanized border regions from San Diego to Texas have pushed illegal traffic toward the reservation, which has become the busiest corridor for illegal traffic along the 1,950-mile U.S.-Mexico border.
Norris said the reservation's portion of the border has flimsy fortification: a three-strand barbed wire fence.
"And that's where the fence is up," he said. He added that in many places the fence has been ripped down by smugglers who drive vehicles loaded with immigrants or drugs into the United States.
Since the beginning of 2003, Norris said, 2,675 vehicles have been abandoned on reservation lands by smugglers who routinely steal trucks and cars in Phoenix and Tucson, drive them into Mexico and load them with drugs or immigrants for the return trip.
Immigrants crossing Indian lands by foot are littering it with 6 tons of trash per day, he said.
Also testifying to the Senate Commerce Committee was Roger Di Rosa, manager of the Cabeza Prieta National Wildlife Refuge in southwestern Arizona.
Di Rosa described a "spider web" of trails and roads that "damages and destroys cactus and other sensitive vegetation, disrupts revegetation efforts, disturbs wildlife and their habitat, and causes soil compaction and erosion."
He provided a moment of comic relief in an otherwise grim recitation when he said Cabeza Prieta's border was "in a little better shape" than the reservation's.
"We have a four-strand fence," he deadpanned.
Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., described the disorder at the border as "totally unacceptable."
"I'm shocked by what I've heard," said Nelson.
Committee Chairman Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., convened the hearing as part of his effort to win passage of legislation that would boost border enforcement with an array of high-tech tools, including unmanned aircraft.
"It's technology that's going to give us the capabilities that we need, particularly in areas where there are long borders which are simply not enforceable" without high-tech monitoring systems, he said.
But McCain also used the forum to make a pitch for immigration reform that would provide legal status for most of the estimated 7 million immigrants working illegally in the United States. He also wants to establish a guest-worker program to fill jobs that employers are unable to fill with U.S. citizens.
McCain sought support from Asa Hutchinson, undersecretary for border and transportation security at the Department of Homeland Security. Hutchinson oversees the Border Patrol, which in March announced that it was beefing up its presence on the Arizona border.
McCain said that without a program to match immigrant workers with jobs, the press of immigrants across the border will continue even if "we tighten it down all the way from Texas to San Diego."
After the hearing, McCain said he saw no chance for immigration reform legislation in this election year.
"There's no courage to address the issue," he said, acknowledging the controversy it stirs.
See #15.
I wish I had the link, but that story came out this Spring I think. Gives credence to the Watermelon label. You know, Green on the outside and Red on the inside!
All these high-minded liberal idiots such as McManiac must think that Mexico is little but a breeder factory for low wage proles or helots. I guess it is welcome to the New World Order courtesy of the stupid and evil people of entities such as the CFR.
Trash is not all they leave on our side of the border. A few years ago my husband found a human skull in his hunting pasture & another time a woman giving birth to a new US citizen. These are desperate people & they need help. Too bad they can't count on their own goverment to help them.
Actually, you've got it backwards. It's the far left wing greens who are sucking conservatives in.
Check out an article fron yesterday's Wall Street Journal about how ZPGers have set up phony "conservative" organizations and are funneling money to white supremists groups.
It's the liberals who are promoting racism and making it look respectful to conservatives.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110005227
"In fact, CIS, FAIR, NumbersUSA, Project-USA and more than a half-dozen similar groups that Republicans have become disturbingly comfy with, were founded or funded (or both) by John Tanton, a retired doctor in Michigan. In addition to trying to stop immigration to the U.S., appropriate population-control measures for Dr. Tanton and his network include promoting China's one-child policy, sterilizing Third World women and wider use of RU-486. FAIR, where Mr. Krikorian once worked, is run by Dan Stein and shares advisers and personnel with CIS and other members of the Tanton nexus. As our Jason Riley noted in a March op-ed, "By Dr. Tanton's own reckoning, FAIR has received more than $1.5 million from the Pioneer Fund, a white-supremacist outfit devoted to racial purity through eugenics." "
They're desperate, yes. But it's not for the American people to care for them.
They are creating animosity between two countries and their citizens with their constant invasion of our land. And their president refuses to help them, other than to help them get over our border. The more we try to defend our border the more we are held accountable. That's just ludicrous.
Invaders, thugs, and other assorted undesirables!
Race baiting again, I see.
So are these folks racist too?
What does one have with the other. Everyone knows that leftist and evil Dums are the biggest racist in the world. don't get the connection, unless you are trying to say that white supremacist are conservatives. they absolutely are not, they are fascist. Just like the rest of the dums and lefties. You apparently believe everything you see and read in the leftist media.
When you consider the high numbers of Latinos who oppose ILLEGAL immigration, the "anyone who opposes ILLEGAL immigration must be a racist" argument is a losing one.
"An unrelenting flow of illegal immigrants is taking its toll on the Mexico-Arizona border..."
Not to worry. Our president is aware of the invasion and will put a stop to it as soon as he's reelected.
Sure he will. Right after he lobbies congress for approval of his amnesty scheme.
I hope you saw the treasonous sarcasm in my post.
The fact is that Third World illegal aliens bring much more than trash and sicknesses and terrorism into our country. They also bring in crime, job losses, cultural erosion, majority dilution, educational chaos, language barriers and the ultimate extinction of our country, culture and way of life.
If this is not treason of the highest order, I don't know what is.
They say demographics is destiny and has its terrible consequences. And it will if the American people don't see the writing on the wall in time to avert the catastrophe that is to befall upon us soon. If they don't then nothing will prevent national civil unrest and bloodshed on American cities.
I am not suggesting that the American people should be responsibe for them. I am just commenting on what desperation can drive people to do. The woman was giving birth under a bush 30 miles into rugged terraine after she crossed the Rio Grand & by the time an ambulance arrived, she & the baby were gone. These are tough people, kind of like the ones who first settled this land wouldn't you say? Not like the softies we/I have become.
The article eludes to illegals trespassing on Indian Reservation lands. This land is protected by Treaty, I assume.
Can the local Native Americans take matters into their own hands where illegals are trashing their property?
And until they start doing something besides playing cat and mouse, and then sending them back to try again...it will continue.
LARGE FINES for employers would be a start. Jail for those harboring would be a good followup.
Releasing tigers along the border would be #3. You or your loved one by crime and/or disease, or economic hardship and public school and resource overload? Or them?
Easy choice. It's our country. Some things are black and white.
I ain't buying the faux concern you're selling, Bill.
Sen. John McCain, "It's technology that's going to give us the capabilities that we need...
Even with high-tech monitoring, Congress would still have to provide the funding so there are agents there to apprehend them.
But McCain also used the forum to make a pitch for immigration reform the "it's not really an amnesty" that would provide legal status a big reward for most [try ALL] of the estimated 7 million [he's low-balling it] immigrants illegal aliens working [selling fake IDs, drugs, stealing cars, gang activity, bankrupting hospitals, crowding the schools, producing anchor babies] illegally in the United States.
He [McCain] also wants...
He wants whatever Fox tells him he wants.
McCain said that without a program to match immigrant workers these law-breakers with jobs, the press of immigrants illegal aliens across the border will continue even if "we tighten it down all the way from Texas to San Diego."
Try taking a shot at it [no pun intended], John. You might also try matching them up with a jail cell.
Softies? How about civilized? Are you extolling the virtue of putting your child at risk by having it in the desert? Are you saying they are better off than we are? Then why do they come here?
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