THE MIRACLE ON THE SOUTHWEST BORDER:
ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION SMASHED
A Direct Field Report on the Arizona-Mexico No-Man’s Land

by Congressman Charlie Norwood, 9th District, Georgia
An on-going miracle is occurring this month in America’s Southwest, a miracle with a direct impact on our district.  After decades of being told that it is impossible to stop illegal immigration on the Arizona border, it has been all but halted since April 1 through the very means we were told wouldn’t work – dedicated manpower and willpower.
This past Sunday, the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus, of which I am a member, sent two senior staffers to investigate first-hand a chain of events beginning in late March which could force Congress and the Administration to dramatically rethink our approach to combating illegal immigration.
I insisted that John Stone from our Washington staff be a part of that first two-man team, so that we would have the most direct information on the situation possible.  Stone is currently a Captain and public affairs officer with the Virginia Defense Force, the reserve to the Virginia National Guard, and a homeland security policy advisor.  He partnered with retired Marine Colonel Fred Peterson, an expert on international homeland defense. They went into the border zone independently from any other federal agencies, with Caucus instructions to investigate every side of what is occurring in the zone, talk with any and all sources both on and off-the-record, and report those findings back to Congress.  Their final and full report will be filed May 2, but their initial findings need to be known immediately.
The catalyst for the new focus on the border is a controversial movement by private citizens who are simply fed up with the ineffectiveness of federal efforts to combat the problem. They call their effort the “Minuteman Project”, and have kicked off what they describe as a “Neighborhood Watch” effort to help our Border Patrol control illegal immigration through additional free, volunteer manpower. 
Our Border Patrol has officially responded with less than open arms to the offer of free help, in spite of complaining for decades of not having enough officers to adequately cover the vast desert region.  It is estimated that more than half of the current 16 million illegal aliens in this country walked right through this same sector, yet the Border Patrol still says “no thanks.”
Vigilantes or Patriotic Volunteers?
While that hasn’t slowed the Minutemen down in bringing their 30-day project to reality, it has created an uncomfortable situation of armed civilian volunteers operating without first being sworn in by a lawfully authorized local, state, or federal agency.   
That is a legitimate concern.  One of the foundations of our Republic is that our military and law enforcement answers through an established chain-of-command to publicly elected officials.  It is one of the key differences between the 200-year success of our nation and economy and the banana republics to our south that are the precise cause of so many folks wanting to flee to the United States.
Yet it is likewise an underlying principle of our Republic that elected officials faithfully act to defend and enforce the laws of the land, including our immigration laws.  And our elected officials have repeatedly failed to take the necessary steps to do so.
Are the Minutemen vigilantes?  That is a question for which Congress needed direct, unedited feedback from the field to attempt to answer.
President Bush has said he is against “vigilantes”, while not directly calling the Minuteman volunteers by that name. But Mexican President Vincente Fox has directly referred to the Minutemen as “vigilantes.”  An interesting statement from a President with troops under his command who consistently violate our border.  He obviously doesn’t mind taking our law into his hands, he just has a problem with us doing the same with our own law.
So what is a vigilante?  From a variety of sources, a vigilante is “One who takes law enforcement into one’s own hands; vigilantes often operate in secret.”   The Caucus investigation has so far uncovered the following field evidence:
* No Enforcement Efforts:  Project organizers are maintaining rigid rules that volunteers take no enforcement action whatsoever.  They simply report the location of suspected illegal immigrants to the Border Patrol. Our team confirmed all volunteers are drilled on avoiding confrontation, even if provoked, and under instruction to allow all persons to pass unobstructed, and without verbal harassment.   They are allowed to provide emergency aid to illegal immigrants if necessary, and our team investigated one incident of an illegal immigrant who fell behind his group, and was actually provided emergency food and water by Minutemen while Border Patrol agents were in transit. An illegal immigrant who claimed on Wednesday (6 APR) to have been detained by the Minutemen is likewise reported to have received food, water, and money from sympathetic volunteers before changing his story, reportedly after outside coaching.
* Transparency:  The Minutemen organization has opened its operations 100% to media, government, and public inspection. Local, national, and international press, along with all government agencies, have access to all Minutemen facilities in the area, as well as being offered the opportunity to observe all field operations.  Our team accompanied newspaper reporters on an overnight observation of a high drug-trafficking area this week.  Stone and Peterson confirm the reporters had full access to the entire operation, and the ability to talk to all members of the team.  Some individual Minutemen team members chose not to talk or have their picture included in the story, which is within their rights, consistent with standard public affairs operations guidelines of state and federal agencies. By contrast, the U.S. Border Patrol did not allow our team to accompany their agents through ride-along requests that are traditionally provided as a courtesy to congressional fact-finding missions.
From these initial findings, if the Minutemen are “vigilantes”, then so are all Neighborhood Watches that are not formally recognized by a law enforcement agency. 
Elements at Play
The Minutemen: Leaders of the Minutemen Project say they currently have placed around 650 volunteers in the field. They have been in the field since Saturday, April 2, and will be relieved over the coming weeks by another thousand or so volunteers. They estimate somewhere between 1000-1500 volunteers will participate before the project is over at the end of the month, with around 500 in the field at any given time.   
The Border Patrol: The Border Patrol says they hasve pulled in 534 seasoned agents from elsewhere in the country to reinforce the 2600 agents already in the sector.  The Border Patrol says these reinforcements have nothing to do with the Minuteman Project, and are a planned step in the ongoing Arizona Border Patrol Initiative.  The agents have yet to make it to Cochise County -360 of them will not be on the line until they graduate from the academy in September.
  Coronado Memorial National Park: The National Park Service has trucked in an undetermined number of tactical officers from other states.   Coronado Memorial National Park covers nearly 5000 acres on the border with Mexico.
The Media: Our team identified the Los Angeles Times, the San Antonio Express, La Raza Radio News 97.9FM, NBC/MSNBC Crew West, the Associated Press, FOX News, and multiple European media outlets remaining on the scene long-term. Members of these and other media are constantly following the Minutemen, and have at times disrupted observation efforts.
Opposing Groups: The ACLU; La Raza; Hispanic separatist Dr. Armando Navarro; street gang MS-13; Mexican drug and human trafficking gangs, and Earth Liberation. 
Fort Huachuca: The U.S. Army maintains its own security and patrols over the base area, frequently used by illegal immigrants.  ROTC Cadets from Arizona State University on training duty at the base apprehended and detained 16 illegal immigrants earlier this week; 513 illegals were apprehended on base in March.
Border Action to Date
Prior to the Minuteman Project observation posts becoming active on April 4, open-borders advocates protested and sent observers into the field, reportedly for the duration of the project.  These groups included the ACLU, Earth Liberation, and others.  Stone observed what is believed to be elements of these groups attempt to disrupt observation posts.
The Salvadoran street gang MS-13 along with Mexican human smuggling and drug rings has reportedly threatened armed attacks against the Minuteman volunteers.  This MS-13 gang is the very one which is spreading so rapidly across our country, with a worldwide membership of 700,000, and a history of vicious machete attacks in the Washington, DC suburbs.  It seems they object to having their illegal access to our country blocked.  
The government-controlled Cuban press is telling the world that “armed racists” are standing by to shoot innocent migrant workers. 
Mexican President Vincente Fox has ordered his military to mass on the U.S. border in higher numbers than usual, “just in case,” of a confrontation.   There won’t be, as the Minutemen are under strict instructions to walk away from confrontation, but this policy position of Mexico is worth noting.   This is the same Mexican military that provides water, aid, and traveler’s advice to immigrants seeking to cross our border illegally, to help them do so.  According to multiple reports, beginning April 1 the Mexican military has been blocking immigrants from attempting to cross the section of border patrolled by the Minutemen, and advising illegals to cross to the east and west of the Minutemen’s area of operations.  They are telling these immigrants that “crazed ranchers” are waiting to shoot them on sight on our side of the border if they cross in the wrong place.
The Minuteman volunteers, with a heavy percentage of armed former U.S. military members, have held firm to their project goals in spite of these threats and distortions.  
Results – A Dramatic Decline in Illegal Immigration
Our team heard two conflicting stories on the results of these developments on the Southwest border.   But both stories have the same ending: illegal activity in this, the heaviest illegal immigration border sector in America, has been brought to a screeching halt.
The U.S. Border Patrol attributes any and all decreases in illegal immigration this spring to their own efforts to increase enforcement, primarily their bringing in those 534 seasoned officers from other parts of the country the week before the Minuteman Project kicked off.  They also credit the increased Mexican military presence on the other side of the border.   Their official stance is that the Minutemen Project has had little or no effect, and was timed by its volunteer organizers to try to claim success for the efforts of the Border Patrol. A fascinating position when you think about it – a reverse conspiracy theory, in which federal bureaucrats suspect citizens of designing sophisticated plots against them.  Interestingly, the Border Patrol had no knowledge of increased federal efforts elsewhere, such as the National Park Service team deployed to the state, or of whether U.S. Army enforcement efforts were increased.
Local law enforcement, and individual Border Patrol officers speaking off-the-record, say that illegal immigration has virtually stopped in the sector patrolled by the Minutemen as a direct result of Minutemen activity and publicity.
Regardless of the cause, a historic immigration reform myth has been exposed as a total travesty in just the first week of the Minuteman Project.   That myth is that it is impossible to stop illegal immigrants from crossing the border with any reasonable amount of additional manpower, that controlling illegal immigration could only be accomplished through new technology still years away from implementation, and that a necessary ingredient is immigration “reform” that would allow most of those entering our nation illegally to just walk across the border with impunity.   
That myth is now dead forever thanks to a remarkable first week of April on the Arizona-Sonora border. We can stop illegal immigration anytime we please by simply providing adequate and reasonable numbers of Border Patrol personnel, with Army or National Guard backup if necessary, to bring our national illegal immigration nightmare to an immediate end.
We have the manpower.  The only question left is whether we have the willpower.

REPORT FROM A MINUTEMAN PROJECT “MINUTEWOMAN” JUST BACK FROM THE FRONT LINES

I was on the Naco, Arizona/Mexican border 6 a.m. - 2 p.m. daily from Sunday to Wednesday, with two other Minutewomen and two Minutemen.
Below is the story a rancher’s wife told me, who lives on 800 acres of land, in the family since the 1880s. Their ranch begins at the Mexican border.
Her name is Robin. She and her husband, Edward, have four children. They came to our Minuteman post requesting that Minutemen be stationed on their nearby property.
Robin said she hears gunshot every night on her ranch. Has no idea exactly where it is coming from.
Since the Minutemen arrived, she claims the gunshots have stopped.
Recently, a drunken illegal alien wandered onto their ranch at night. She was home alone with her children. The illegal alien pounded on their front door. Robin said she and her terrified children crawled on their stomachs to the back of their house to get away from him. While retelling this event, her pretty eyes were filled with both terror and humiliation.
The family’s ranch is stampeded by illegal crossings. Years ago, they said their ranch was peaceful and safe. That it was rare to see illegal crossers.
The husband, Edward, said he was recently on his property and was astounded to count over 200 illegal crossers in a group nearby. He said he called the border patrol on his cellular phone.
He was told by the woman on the phone that it was not possible to see 200 hundred crossers because they would never cross in such a large group. As he was being told this, the 200 were crossing right before his eyes!
This ranching family thanked us profusely. They said if we needed anything - food, showers, rest - we were welcome at their home. The gruff rancher husband had tears in his eyes when he said goodbye, thanking us.
OUR MINUTEMAN TEAM
In our sector, teams of Minutemen from two to five set up on a hillside along a dirt road ten paces from the border of Mexico. I think we had a total of nine teams. Although too far to talk, you could see a Minuteman team on either side of you. We communicated with each team via walkie-talkie radios.
It was very well organized. We had a MMP supervisor driving by periodically. Each team was encouraged to fly their state flag.
A New York flag was flying from the team to our west and a Florida flag flying from the team to our east. Our team flew an American and a Californian flag combo.
For 8 hour shifts around the clock, Minutemen - a giant neighborhood watch - were armed with binoculars, cellular phones and handheld walkie-talkie radios. We set up lawn chairs and umbrellas. Posted a sign that read, “Californians for Secure Borders.” In our spare time, we threw a boomerang, flew a kite. We played CDs.
In short, we were noisy and visible. Chris Simcox had said noise was a good thing at a Minuteman post to deter would-be crossers.
There was a showing of border patrol helicopters, border patrol SUVs, sheriff vehicles, border patrol on scooters. In short, there was a steady stream of law enforcement on this normally deserted stretch of border land.
We were told by local ranchers that they have never seen so many border patrol. That this show of force was for the MMP.
THE FENCE/the trash
The barbed wire border fence is a joke. It’s about shoulder high.
Our team’s section of fence, about a two block area, had four crossing areas. The barbed wire has been stretched and cut to accommodate crossers. On the Mexican side, trails through the desert shrubs lead up to the passage holes in the barbed wire fence.
Some of the holes are large enough to accommodate a pair of crossers walking hand in hand.
Our area was littered with many Gatorade bottles. Many, many plastic bags. Tins of foot fungicide. Deodorant cans.
There were endless numbers of cans, sweatshirts, a hair brush, razors, a cell phone, a little Spanish Bible, many backpacks, sandals, tennis shoes, blankets, a powder puff, tuna cans, Tequila bottles, beer cans, a well used address book in Spanish. We found three one dollar bills rolled up and covered in dirt. One of our Minutewomen found a black ski mask.
There were many toothbrushes and tubes of toothpaste.
It is heart breaking to see the beautiful desert literally covered in trash. The trash is just spread all over. If you walk a few steps there is some form of trash within view. Many, many plastic bags fly on trees and shrubs. The size of bags vary from those big, black outdoor trash bags down to the small postcard sized plastic bags.
Where the hell are the environmentalists on this issue of unbelievable trash? Is there anywhere else in the United States with such out of control environmental destruction that gets so little environmental attention? It is perplexing.
The Mexican side was desolate except for a train track and a highway in the distance. Desert foliage was crisscrossed with paths leading to the fence.
MEXICO BEEFS UP
ITS FORCE
We read in local newspapers that the Mexican government had beefed up their forces where the MMP were stationed.
For example, a Mexican group on Mexican soil that supposedly rescues crossers, called Grupo Beta, was stationed to encourage crossers approaching the 20 mile MMP teams to return home. We were told military were also in the area.
The Grupo Beta wore bright orange shirts and drove new orange trucks. We usually had one to two trucks within our binocular vision, with several orange coats per truck.
The local ranchers told us that they had never seen these “orange coats” before. It was a first for them.
We watched the orange guys with our binoculars. From our lawn chairs, armed with walkie-talkie radios and bottled waters.
We watched them drive around in their orange trucks. They would park under trees and eat their lunches. Get out and walk around. Go under bridges where migrants camp.
We would from time to time see people who may have been migrants [translation: illegal aliens] get in the backs of their orange trucks.
One time we saw a group of about 8 single file coming over the horizon. Our entire 9 team section activated. We were radioing each other. All posted with binoculars. We were a-buzz!
Well, they turned out to be reporters! American reporters interviewing the Mexican national government workers. They all walked up to the fence, with the “humanitarian” workers and we talked for quite a while.
The humanitarian Mexican worker spoke no English. But interpreters said they wanted to show us a baggy they handed out to crossers with snack bars and water They offered to give us food and water.
Another Mexican national farmer approached us later on horseback and stated illegal crossers only want to work. Again, we had a peaceful conversation.
But what we can say is that while we were posted for 24 hours at our section not one illegal crosser traversed the well-worn paths. They did not walk through the openings in the barbed wire, as they normally do.
Our presence stopped illegal crossings in this area - normally commonplace.
On Tuesday, we did see a young man appear among the orange guys who had a huge rifle slung over his shoulder. The Minutemen in my group knew the rifle make and said it had a scope. This guy was in his 20s, in a tee shirt, black pants and baseball cap. No uniform.
Our entire line watched him through binoculars. He would zigzag around. Talk to the orange coats. Zigzag more. Our radio walkie-talkie info finally declared they thought he was police. He eventually walked out of view over a hill.
When I related the event to a local rancher who stopped by to talk with us, he told me that the guy was definitely a coyote. He also said anyone out there on the Mexican side is part of the bribery and smuggling even if they are government employees.
BORDER PATROL AGENTS
There were border patrol supervisors who would drive around and talk to the press. They would spin a line worthy of Bush and DHS.
But when there were no supervisors around, the rank and file border patrol would occasionally speak to us. It was brave of them as they wear name badges.
One border patrol agent told me that the Mexican humanitarian orange coat guys routinely shake down the crossers. He laughed when I called the Mexican orange coats humanitarians.
Another agent told me that the border patrol was very glad we were there. When we asked about the so called sensors Minutemen were setting off, he laughed and said the spokesmen were saying what they’d been told to say.
He gave us a thumbs up when he drove off. They also communicated that the illegal crossing activity is very well orchestrated and run.
RANCHERS and locals
Our arrival has been controversial among the locals.
I stayed at the Bible College and went to the Bible College church on Sunday. Two pastors focused their talks on their gratitude for the Minutemen. One pastor asked for Minutemen to stand. There were only about five us in attendance.
The pastor then told the church people to go to us and shake our hands. But the churchgoers approached us and hugged us! Some held onto me like I was a life saver! A line formed as mothers, children, old ladies, teens embraced the Minutemen.
We did have locals express discord about MMP, but they were the exception in my experience.
Our night shift had said that a rancher had pulled up in his truck, emerged from the darkness, holding the hands of his two small children and thanked the Minutemen over and over. The night shift Minuteman told me that that the rancher had tears in his eyes as he thanked them. The Minuteman who listened to the rancher and told me of the experience, is a tough, muscular, no-nonsense former military guy. But when he told me this story about the rancher, he said his eyes welled up with tears too when the rancher expressed his gratitude.
When a group of us were at a local cafe, a local guy came up and grilled us. Gave us his stories about his mother’s property being ransacked by crossers. He then wrote down the name of a section where he asked the Minutemen to go to.
I told the locals that would give me suggestions that they should contact the leadership of MMP with their referrals. I was a peon just following the orders.
If you were a Minuteman, someone would inevitably request you patrol some section.
It absolutely makes my blood boil to think of government letting these hard working American citizens’ ranches literally be invaded! I told them all that they are heroes. Most said they will never leave their ranches!
ACLU
The ACLU types showed up. They wore white tee shirts with orange letters that read “Legal Observers.”
As we did a shift, it was always a treat to talk to anyone new. Locals. Reporters. Photographers. Minutemen wandering about.
It wasn’t any different when you would come upon an ACLU person. I talked to all of them I saw. We would just chitchat about whatever. Most seemed to be college aged. I told a couple I spoke to that I was glad they were there. I said they didn’t want violence and neither did we. I thanked them for being there watching.
After all, with them standing among us, they only made our numbers look bigger before the illegal crossers. In that regard, they made us appear larger in force.
Personally, I had no problem with the ACLU at the MMP. They would just stand around quietly in their matching tee shirts. As the week wore on, I noticed the number of ACLU observers diminished significantly.
It was apparent that where we stood illegal crossings stopped. The shift went by fast because there was always some rumor flying around. Like the day when the rumor went round that 12 rancher skinheads were going to attack the Bible College. There was always somebody new coming up to investigate our team.
Minutemen and ranchers would drive by with all sorts of comments. Reporters from London, Mexico, all over the US were constantly wanting to talk and be led around to see various sites.
And you could look through binoculars and watch the orange guys. Or birds. The media loved to film you looking through the binoculars. I would sometimes just be watching a bird or a butterfly when I was being filmed looking through my binoculars by the media.
I only regret I couldn’t stay for the full Minuteman Project! It was awesome. I met some great people from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Kansas, lots of Texans and Californians. Most were just run of the mill, salt of the earth typical hard working American citizens.
 Compiled by Sharon Stark, Little Rock

MEDIA HYPE TAKES TOLL ON DOUGLAS

I just love this.  All the anti-Minuteman propaganda has come back to bite those who spouted it — in the wallet.  Remember the constant harangue that the Minutemen were “vigilantes” and “migrant-hunters” and “racists”?  Well, now these lies and propaganda words are scaring off Mexicans who might cross the border legally to shop. 
This is truly rich with irony.  In their efforts to tar the Minutemen, a non-violent neighborhood watch group, with the gun-toting, KKK-vigilante brush, the politicians and business-types in southern Arizona have succeeded in shooting themselves in the proverbial foot and hurting their own economy in the process.  In the world of the professional liar and the propagandist, no deed — good or bad — goes unnoticed or unpunished.
Janet Conroy

Illegal immigration rises there, and small-business people see their income reduced because of fear in Mexico.
by Claudine LoMonaco
 Kevin Fenske pointed to freshly scuffed earth under a bent barbed-wire fence.
“You see?” asked Fenske as he knelt down to straighten the wire. “This is where they came in last night.”
Fenske, 44, owns a ranch and feed store half a mile from the Mexican border. He’s used to migrants crossing his land. But ever since the Minuteman Project, an armed civilian patrol that aims to seal the border, set up shop a little to the west of him, he said he’s been overrun. All the project has done is move traffic his way, he said.
“I’ve had more illegals this week than I’ve had in the last two months,” he said.
But Fenske said he’s angrier about what the project has done to his business, which he said has taken a 20 percent loss since the Minutemen arrived April 2. Like most business owners in Douglas, Fenske depends on customers across the border in Agua Prieta.
“They’re not coming because they’re afraid they’re going to be harassed,” Fenske said.
Fenske’s wife, Cynthia, said she’s seen a similar impact at the Wal-Mart Super Center, where she works. Wal-Mart has publicly denied a slowdown, but William Molaski, director of the Douglas Port of Entry, said the store reported a 12 percent drop to him.
While Minuteman volunteers insist their efforts are focused on stopping illegal immigration, others say their presence has created a fearful environment that has angered the town’s largely Hispanic population, frightened legal visitors from Mexico and hurt the town’s economy.
Douglas is a town of 15,000 people that depends on visitors from the much larger Agua Prieta, population 130,000, for 60 percent of its sales, Mayor Ray Borane said. He said business owners, including those at big-box stores built to take advantage of Agua Prieta’s population, have been expressing concern over the project’s potential economic fallout.
Borane is a critic of the Minuteman Project and has questioned the potential for violence among armed volunteers recruited over the Internet.
Like many people in Mexico, Agua Prieta native Jose Lopez refers to the Minutemen simply as “caza-migrantes,” or migrant hunters. He normally spends around $60 a week in Douglas on groceries. But the 49-year old carpenter doesn’t plan to cross the border into Douglas as long as the “migrant hunters” are around.
“I’m legal, but how do I know they’re not going to come after me?” Lopez said. “They’re migrant hunters. They’re bad. And they’re armed. That’s even worse.”
It’s illegal to carry a gun in Mexico, Agua Prieta Mayor David Figueroa said. “When you see somebody with a gun, you associate them with the worst elements of Mexican society - drug traffickers or criminals.” So even people with visas are scared and don’t want to cross, he said.
“Scare off legal visitors in an attempt to reduce illegal immigration?” asked University of Arizona economist Alberta Charney. Not a good idea, she said.
In a study she conducted in 2001, Charney found that Mexican visitors spent nearly $1 billion in Arizona and generated tens of millions of dollars in tax revenue.
Over the past several years, Augy Garcia of the Tucson-Mexico Trade office, has worked to increase Tucson’s share of that money. Today, Mexican visitors spend a million dollars a day in Tucson. Part of attracting them here is creating the impression that Arizona is a Mexico-friendly place, Garcia said. The Minuteman Project hasn’t made his job easier.
“People here ask me if we’re just a bunch of bounty hunters or something,” Garcia said at a large manufacturing conference in Hermosillo where he was trying to drum up business and fight off the reputation of the Minutemen.
“The long and the short of it,” he said, “is that these people come, and they have their right to express their opinion. But it does have consequences.”
Back on his ranch, Fenske works on his fence and wonders about his future.
“We’re a small business. It’s just us,” he said and twisted another piece of barbed wire into shape. “To lose 20 percent, whether it’s for a few weeks or a month, it’s going to take me months to make that up. To me, that’s not right.”
Editor: Fenske should be blaming the media for the drop in sales - not the Minuteman Project.

SOUTHWARD SHIFT OF AGENTS RAISES CONCERN

by Elizabeth Pierson 
Brownsville Herald
Civilian patrols of the international border in Arizona could compromise border security in the Rio Grande Valley, a Border Patrol union president said Monday.
He made the remarks to a delegation of Texas Democratic members of Congress who were at the Texas Capitol to demonstrate what they said would be devastating effects of President Bush’s proposed federal budget on Texans.
U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett, D-Austin, said border officials brought the problem to his attention during his visit over the weekend to Roma, Rio Grande City, McAllen and Pharr. Doggett’s district includes Austin and McAllen.
“There is real concern that because of the shortage that we created, that some of the people that we need to protect our borders here are actually being shifted to the most recent hot spot,” Doggett said.
T.J. Bonner, president of the National Border Patrol Council of the American Federation of Government Employees, agreed the problem is real.
In late March, the Department of Homeland Security announced it would add 500 Border Patrol agents along the 370-mile Arizona-Mexico border, Bonner said.
“It neglected to mention that most of those agents and resources would be taken from Texas, New Mexico and California, leaving the other 1,630 miles of border even less protected than they are currently,” Bonner said.
In Arizona, a group of property owners calling themselves Minutemen are conducting regular patrols of the Arizona-Mexico border this month in an effort to call attention to what they said is inadequate protection by the U.S. government against undocumented workers.
Of the 500 additional agents bound for Arizona, 155 will come from other parts of Border Patrol who volunteer for the duty. It is likely some of those will come from the McAllen Sector, Bonner said after he testified.
Another 210 will likely come from the new agents the budget allows for hiring, he said.
The rest will come from attrition, which means as agents retire or quit in the McAllen Sector, for example, new agents will be sent to Arizona, not McAllen, to replace them, he said.
“Right now we’re not able to keep up with the agents that we have, so obviously, we’re going to be expected to do more with less,” Bonner said.
Congress passed the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act in 2004, which authorized hiring 10,000 additional Border Patrol agents and 4,000 additional criminal investigators over the next five years, and building an additional 40,000 detention beds.
But the proposed federal budget would add 210 Border Patrol agents, 140 criminal investigators and 1,920 bed spaces, Bonner said.
State Rep. Veronica Gonzales, D-McAllen and state Rep. Juan M. Escobar, D-Kingsville, were among the state Legislators, all Democrats, who attended the hearing.
The Congressional delegation wanted to show Legislators and Texans how the federal budget would affect them. They called witnesses to discuss how the cuts would hurt their public hospitals, small businesses, college education and ability to protect the border.
U.S. Rep. Solomon P. Ortiz, D-Texas, whose district includes Brownsville and Corpus Christi, said he is particularly concerned about the security in light of the high numbers of Central American gangs and other organized criminals thought to be passing through the Texas-Mexico border.
People from countries other than Mexico detained after crossing are often released for lack of detention space, creating the possibility that a terrorist could roam the United States unchecked, he said.
“I am concerned with the criminal element that is coming across,” Ortiz said.
———
Elizabeth Pierson covers the State Capitol for Valley Freedom Newspapers. She is based in Austin and can be reached at (512) 323-0622.

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