Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to address the border security crisis that is part of daily life in my southern Arizona district in Arizona's Eighth Congressional District. I am really proud to represent one of the most diverse parts of the…
Mr. Speaker, I rise tonight to address the border security crisis that is part of daily life in my southern Arizona district in Arizona's Eighth Congressional District. I am really proud to represent one of the most diverse parts of the entire country. I represent a district that is over 9,000 square miles and is one of 10 U.S.-Mexico border districts.
The U.S.-Mexico border has changed a lot over the years. I am a third-generation Arizonan. I represent a lot of people in my district who are multi-generational Arizonans. After decades of building up the U.S.-Mexico border in California and in Texas, there has been a systematic funneling of illegal immigration, the flow of traffic, illegally through southern Arizona. This has become the most porous part of the U.S.-Mexico border.
So today, together, my constituents live in a situation on the front lines of a national border security crisis. We live and breathe the Federal Government's failure to secure the border with Mexico. Every day my constituents are subjected to home invasions and to burglaries and to cut water lines and to graffiti, an unbelievable amount of garbage and trash that's left behind by illegal immigrants who are crossing through the border, and by people increasingly who are drug smugglers, people that are human smugglers, the cutting of fences, the threats and intimidation by armed smugglers, and the violence that they experience on their own land, on their own ranches, their own property.
In this hour, I am going to talk about action that I and others have taken along the U.S.-Mexico border here in Washington. But more importantly, I am going to talk about the lives of the constituents that I represent, the people of Cochise County, the ranchers who live on the U.S.-Mexico border.
It's always been my belief that if the decision-makers here in Washington, if they could hear the stories, the impact that illegal immigration has on the lives of my constituents, that there would be greater action here in Washington, the decision-makers, elected officials, people in the administration, policymakers, that they would move to greatly enhance the security along the U.S.-Mexico border. So that's what we are going to talk about tonight.
I think it's important to begin this hour with the most heart- wrenching story of all, the tragic death of Robert Krentz, a fourth- generation rancher whose family has been on his land for over a hundred years. Actually, the Krentz family has had their ranch before Arizona even achieved statehood.
On March 27, Rob Krentz, who was working on his ranch, was murdered by an assailant who was later tracked to the Mexico border. He and his dog were both ruthlessly murdered on his land. They were left to die. They were shot. Law enforcement officials believe that Rob was killed by a smuggler.
Next to me is a photograph of Rob and his brother Phil, the two Krentz brothers. This was run on the front page of a local newspaper, the Tucson Weekly. Frankly, the image tells it all. You see the two brothers, you see them in the tack room, their hands, their boots, their lives right there represented.
Reporter Leo Banks wrote the companion story in which he interviewed Rob's family and the neighbors. Banks wrote the following:
``What has to be noted first is the inevitability of what happened. Something like the Krentz murder was coming, and everybody knew it. The stories residents told this newspaper, the frustration that they feel trying to keep property and families safe in smuggler-occupied territory were like a freight
train in the night. Down the tracks you see a faint light, coming closer and closer. On March 27 in Cochise County's big country a mile west of Paramore Crater, the train arrived. The aftershock has been so powerful, because the killing exploded the lie about a secure border that Washington, D.C., has been working hard to promote.''
On its front page, the Tucson Weekly asked the question, ``Will the murder of a respected Cochise County rancher change anything on our border?'' Mr. Speaker, tonight I ask the same question. Again, will the murder of Robert Krentz on March 27, a respected rancher in my district, change anything on the border? Well, it has changed, and we know that today. The President has announced the deployment of the National Guard to the U.S.-Mexico border.
I knew Rob Krentz. I knew his family. He participated in the meetings that I convened between ranchers and the Border Patrol. He was and is-- he was a family man. He was a good neighbor. And he was a friend to all who knew him.
He was described as a humanitarian, who would give water and aid to illegal immigrants who suffered from heat exhaustion and physical injuries as they trekked from Mexico across his land. He was, like fellow ranchers out in Cochise County, a straight talker. And he, like them, saw their lives changed by the increased flow of illegal immigrants and the drug smugglers.
Tonight I will share additional stories about the ranchers in this area, and I will call on my colleagues to join me in demanding that our government step up and do more, the responsibility here in Washington to help protect its citizens. The safety and security and the defense of its citizens should be our primary focus in Washington, D.C.
Mr. Speaker, the very first speech that I made on this floor, the floor of the House of Representatives in January of 2007, was precisely about securing the border. In some areas, border security has improved over time, and in many ways it has worsened. I've been proud to support legislation and appropriations that funded the border patrol and the Department of Homeland Security, including ICE, as well for increases in personnel and technology.
Democrats and Republicans have worked together to give the Department of Homeland Security the resources they need, and we have seen those resources in the Tucson sector. I have fought to increase funding to local law enforcement programs through the State Criminal Alien Assistance Program, also known as SCAAP. When the President's budget eliminated SCAAP, I led the fight to restore the funding.
And why this is important is that communities out in Cochise County and Santa Cruz County and Pinal County, as well as Pima County, they carry the brunt of this problem because the local law enforcement agents are oftentimes required to respond when a resident calls in need of help. They are responsible for a lot of the work that should be done by the Federal Government. The Federal Government has very increasingly not been able or not willing to reimburse the local law enforcement agents for the cost that they incur. We were able to augment the budget.
I also worked to establish Operation Streamline. It's a program that finally reversed many years of the catch-and-release situation that we had down in southern Arizona. So instead of just apprehending illegal immigrants and then immediately deporting them back to the border to find them crossing over the next day, back and forth and back and forth, we are now in a situation that instead, we charge these individuals and we incarcerate illegal immigrants for 30 days, which is a big deterrent for someone who's trying to pass north.
Last year and again this year, I introduced legislation with Congressman Sam Johnson from Texas to create a new mandatory electronic employment verification system for hiring employees. Our system would be a national employee verification system that would protect American citizens from identity theft and hold employers accountable for hiring illegal immigrants. The State of Arizona was the first State to authorize E-Verify, making it mandatory for all employers.
But we've seen a lot of problems with E-Verify, plus the fact that this situation of employee verification should not be a State-by-State situation. We need to have a national solution, and that's why Congressman Sam Johnson and I have introduced legislation NEVA.
Recently, with Congressman Brian Bilbray, I introduced a bill to crack down on the use of stored value cards, which drug cartels are using increasingly to launder money. In fact, Mr. Speaker, I have an example right here. This is an example of a stored value card that you can buy basically at any retailer. These stored value cards do not require any formal banking agreement. The threat assessment by the U.S. Department of Justice, the National Drug Intelligence Center, dubbed the cards an ideal money laundering instrument citing loose regulation, cardholder anonymity, and liberal limits on value reloading, withdraw, and spending on certain types of these cards. And again, you can go to a store and anyone can buy these stored value cards.
We're also seeing more stored value devices like cell phones where money can be transferred, hundreds of millions of dollars, through these types of devices.
According to a March 7, 2010, article in the Arizona Daily Star, the average amount of the 415 seizures on the southwest border in 2009 was $89,565, more than double the average seizure 5 years ago. That is why this legislation, the Stored Value Device Registration and Reporting Act of 2010, is so important. This is legislation that will include the stored value devices--either the cards or the cell phones--under the definition of a monetary instrument under title 31 in the United States Code. This will require cardholders to declare if they are carrying $10,000 on a stored value device to customs officers, because currently the Federal officials have absolutely no way of tracking whether or not this money is coming into the United States because individuals are not required to declare whether or not they have money on a stored value device.
Mr. Speaker, at 6:20 early Sunday morning 2 weeks ago, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, also known as NORAD, detected a low, small-flying aircraft in southern Arizona near the border with Mexico. NORAD immediately scrambled two F-16s to intercept the ultralight aircraft, shadowing it for 30 minutes until that small plane returned to Mexico. This is just another example of how the drug smugglers are getting ahead of us by using these small homemade planes. They stealthily enter our country illegally.
Right before that, Congressman Dean Heller and I introduced another bill that will dramatically increase the penalties for the newest way to smuggle drugs, flying them in by ultralight aircraft. These single- pilot aircraft are capable of flying low and can land and take off quickly. They are very difficult to detect. We have reports of them flying up to 200 miles into our country from Mexico. They are being used to bring drugs into our communities and represents the latest threat to border security. And if they can bring in drugs, they can also bring in other materials that can threaten our national security.
I first learned about the illicit use of ultralights in a briefing by the United States Border Patrol. They told me that we needed to take action to crack down on the ultralight drug smugglers, and that's why I introduced the Ultralight Smuggling Prevention Act. Ultralights are typically used by people for sport or recreation and, as a result, are currently not categorized as an aircraft by the Federal Aviation Administration.
In the 2010 National Drug Assessment released by the National Drug Intelligence Center, they identified ultralights as one of the newest ways drug cartels are using to smuggle drugs into our country. And according to the CBP Air and Marine Operation Center, or AMOC, based in Riverside, California, there were 193 suspected incursions into our country and 135--make that 136 with the incursion 2 weeks ago--by ultralights from October 1 to the present time.
In October of 2008, AMOC detected an unidentified northbound low- flying aircraft 12 miles west of Nogales. A CBP surveillance helicopter was launched from Tucson and the low-flying aircraft was identified as an ultralight. The pilot landed southwest of Marana, Arizona, with 223 pounds of marijuana on board where Border Patrol was waiting to transport the pilot and the marijuana to another location.
In November of 2008 near San Luis, field workers arrived for work and discovered a crashed ultralight, a dead pilot, and 141 pounds of marijuana. And in December of 2008, the pilot of an ultralight collided with power lines and crashed southwest of Tucson. The pilot had been carrying, this time, 350 pounds of marijuana when he crashed.
It is time for the Federal Government to get ahead of the drug traffickers. We need to pass this legislation to outmaneuver these individuals who are trying to bring drugs into our country and to do us harm, and the Ultralight Smuggling Prevention Act will amend the Tariff Act of 1930 to include ultralight aircraft under aviation smuggling provisions.
There is an unintended loophole that needs to be closed. We have to get law enforcement the tools that they need to crack down on the drug smugglers. And because ultralights are not currently technically considered aircraft, they do not fall under the smuggling provision.
So under my legislation, individuals caught smuggling on ultralights can be prosecuted for using the aircraft in addition to being prosecuted for the drugs in their possession. When they are convicted of this new offense, they can receive a maximum penalty of up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The bill will establish the same penalties for smuggling drugs on ultralights as for smuggling on airplanes and in automobiles.
Mr. Speaker, as I said earlier, today is a good day for the southwest border. It's a good day for Arizona and the people of this country. President Obama has finally agreed to my repeated requests to deploy the National Guard to the U.S.-Mexico border. Today, the President announced that he will authorize 1,200 National Guard troops to be deployed to the southwest border. He will also request that $500 million be included in the supplemental spending legislation for enhanced border protection and law enforcement activities.
Just yesterday, I communicated with my two Senators, Senator McCain and Senator Kyl, as well.
I thought it was important that the Senate stand up for border security and include the $500 million in additional funding in the war supplemental making its way through the Senate this week. The fulfillment of my request is a clear sign the administration is finally beginning to take border security seriously.
I first called for immediate deployment of the National Guard after the March 27 murder of Rob Krentz. Arizonans know that more boots on the ground, even if we are starting with 1,200, I requested 3,000, but this is a start, and just because this is our first step doesn't mean it's the last step.
Washington has clearly heard our message. Republican Congressman Ted Poe and I sponsored a resolution calling on the President to send the National Guard to the border many weeks ago. We did another press conference today. This goes to show this is not a Republican or a Democratic issue. This is an issue that affects all of our constituents and all Members of Congress. It's an American issue.
Tonight, again, I reiterate my request to the House, the Senate, and the President to step up and do more. We need to secure our U.S.-Mexico border, period.
The Tucson sector, as we see on the map here, this is my district, and this includes the Tucson sector, which goes all the way over to the farther west part of the State, has been an area that has been confronted by narcoterrorists who have killed thousands of people in Mexico and have brought their violent ways to the United States and, in particular, to our area.
My district has over 100 miles of border with Mexico, and the drug smuggling and the traffic has systemically been funneled through this area. Again, as we have closed off California and Texas, we have been funneling all of this activity through southern Arizona. And, as you can see, the more urban areas, the dense part like Tucson and Sierra Vista, are away from the border.
But here along the line, you see an incredible vast amount of open space. And this is where the ranchers of Cochise County live. These are individuals who have had their ranches for hundreds of years, some of them, who are not being protected.
The Tucson sector, and I would like to put up a chart here of the Tucson sector of the Border Patrol, because it accounts for almost 50 percent of all the apprehensions of illegal immigrants and the drug seizures across all Border Patrol sectors in the Nation. This is to represent what we are actually dealing with in southern Arizona in my district.
So as you read the chart from fiscal year 2005 up to fiscal year 2009, in fiscal year 2005, there were 439,000 apprehensions in that year. And for every individual apprehended, we believe, possibly, one, or two, or maybe three, or maybe more get away. In fiscal year 2006, 392,000 apprehensions; in fiscal year 2007, 378,000 apprehensions; in fiscal year 2008, 318,000 apprehensions; and in fiscal year 2009, 241,000 apprehensions.
We have seen almost a 50 percent decrease in the number of people that are being apprehended, which is a good sign. It shows that the border security measures that we put on the border are working.
But it's an interesting story when you look at seizures in terms of marijuana. In fiscal year 2005, 488,000 pounds of marijuana were seized. And then it increases. In 2006, 616,000 pounds; in 2007, 897,000 pounds; in fiscal year 2008, 816,000 pounds; and a banner year last year, fiscal year 2009, 1.2 million pounds of marijuana seized in the Tucson sector of the Border Patrol.
When you look at cocaine seizures, fiscal year 2005 was an anomaly. We had 1,200 pounds seized. And then in fiscal year 2006, we had about 100 pounds; fiscal year 2007, 177 pounds; up to 2009, 524 pounds of cocaine.
You see, again, a decrease in the number of illegal immigrants and an increase in the amount of drugs, marijuana and cocaine, seized in the Tucson sector of the Border Patrol.
Personnel in fiscal year 2005: The United States Border Patrol had 2,339 Border Patrol agents in the Tucson sector. We have vastly increased that to fiscal year 2009. We are almost at 3,700 boots on the ground Border Patrol agents in the Tucson sector.
In terms of prosecutions, in fiscal year 2007, there were 5,447 prosecutions. That number has more than tripled in fiscal year 2009, with over 17,000 prosecutions that are now taking place in the Tucson sector because of the increased and enhanced enforcement activity that we have there.
Operation Streamline, I talked about this earlier, making sure that we are actually detaining for 30 days illegal immigrants who are crossing into our border illegally. As we started up a couple of years ago, this is the work of many hardworking individuals. In 2008, 9,638 prosecutions, and in fiscal year 2009 over 15,000 prosecutions with Operation Streamline. That sounds like a lot until you go back and look at the number that in 2009 we had 241,000 apprehensions.
I would like to now relate in the words of my constituents what we are actually dealing with along the border. And I really believe that the ranchers out in Cochise County speak for themselves the best, and I asked them to submit stories to me of real accounts. And I have collected their letters over the days and the weeks and the years that I have served in this capacity.
This is a letter that was sent to me following a community meeting that I convened at the Apache schoolhouse 4 days after Rob Krentz was murdered. The author wrote, I am angry. I had been operating at a slow simmer for some time now. Then last Saturday, when he was working on his ranch, Rob Krentz was murdered in cold blood. He was shot along with his dog. Now I am more than angry. Rob was a fourth-generation rancher in Cochise County. Friends and family, some with hunting hounds and horses and every kind of law enforcement official that we have, went into an all-out search mode for his killer, but the killer had a nearly 24-hour headstart on them by the time they found the body.
They followed his tracks to the new fabulously wonderful, multibillion dollar and completely ineffective fence at the border and then into Mexico. They returned to their homes and jobs sick that they could not catch this killer before he made it back across the border. I have known Mr. Krentz and his family for many years and considered them friends. We are not close but have become friends largely because of common beliefs and issues that arise from living in these huge arid landscapes. Most of us here have what the general population would consider conservative leanings when it comes to politics. We prefer and have to take care of ourselves for the most part. We do not have the option of calling for help in emergencies much of the time because we do not have phones, radios, or cell service when we are out in the landscape or on isolated roads. When you live here you have to be prepared to handle your own emergencies. It is expected that may include a snake bite, a car wreck on an isolated stretch of the highway, a neighbor with car trouble. That sort of thing.
But for the last 4 years or so, that has included illegals that carry fully automatic weapons. That is a little tougher to prepare for, especially when official response time is 1 to 4 hours and the official that does respond is usually alone and only allowed to carry a measly pistol to respond with.
Two years ago a Bureau of Land Management fire crew was pulled off a fire when a fire they fought flushed 17 illegals out of a canyon, and they were all carrying automatic weapons. Most of us have guns, as did Rob Krentz. His was found in a scabbard on his Polaris Ranger where they found his body.
The people who killed him, according to a garbled radio message his brother received, appeared to be hurt and needed help. That bit of acting may explain why Rob did not have his gun out and ready to use.
Just the day before Rob had helped Border Patrol officials with a drug bust on his ranch. More than 300 pounds of marijuana was confiscated. Was the killer one of the thwarted smugglers seeking revenge? We do not know and probably never will.
The people that I represent have told in person and on phone and in emails that this is the sort of situation that they are facing on their ranches.
Like the story of Kelly Kimbro and the Glenn family. They have the Malpai Ranch, very, very close to where Rob Krentz' ranch is. On May 14 of this year, a couple of nights ago, a half-mile east of Airport Road in Douglas, 10 of the concrete filled 6-inch steel casings that serve as uprights on the border fence were cut off at the ground with cutting torches and that piece of fence removed for a drive-through.
Our friend was called down to go down there yesterday with his boom truck and try to hoist it back into place. I know how to use a cutting torch. When you try to cut into something filled with concrete, it is nasty and dangerous and very hard work. My point is that it would have had to take hours or days to do this. It is on the border road, one- half mile from Douglas. If the border was being patrolled . . . one more instance when it is not. This is no longer a laughing matter. What the heck is going on? Why did this have to happen?''
This is a story from May 16. This is a story from Wendy Glenn: ``Last summer, our well on the border had a solar panel stolen from it right between the border road and Geronimo Trail Road. The control box, float and wire were taken also. It was taken and carried out by a fellow over a mile on the border road before he went into Mexico. The fellow had to climb up and unbolt it and let it down to the ground and then had to carry it off. Surely he had to have been seen by some Border Patrol people as all this happened.''
Other reports coming from Susan and Louis Pope on May 18: ``Last night, there was a large group that crossed our lower place on the State line between Arizona and New Mexico. As far as we know, they are on their way north. Tonight, we had the illegals talking on the radio; they're making plans about tomorrow morning.
``There are at least two groups coming up the west side of the Pelloncillos Mountains. There are also groups on the south end of the Chiricahuas.''
Here is an email from May 19: ``Today resulted in recovering several bundles of dope, but since air support was not available, the mules got away. Just as soon as the Border Patrol left the area, the spotter was on the radio again guiding and gathering the group back together. Two loads of dope came down the highway. They crossed out of Arizona into New Mexico, and the Hidalgo County Sheriffs Department caught one and the other got away. We understand that the Lordsburg Border Patrol will get two helicopters next week from the New Mexico National Guard, but they cannot cross into Arizona to help with the Border Patrol here.
``Now guess where all the illegals will wind up? Yes, you are right, in our back yards. We want everyone to know that there is not a road on the border in the Pelloncillos Mountains. The horse patrol has a vital part in helping stop the crossers, but air support is absolutely critical.''
Another email from May 19: ``It is 9 p.m., Sunday, May 19. I just found out that there are no night scopes available for the area from the New Mexico line to Douglas, 50 miles, tonight. Just one mobile surveillance system in New Mexico, another mobile surveillance system five miles north of Douglas, and one MSS, as well, close to the border, about 15 miles east of Douglas. The Border Patrol is just about blind tonight. There are supposed to be four units, but not tonight. We need to get these people some help.''
I'd like to show an illustration of, again, what some of the situation looks like in terms of having illegal immigrants that are coming into the area. The following email comes from the Stroller family, who are winter visitors in my district. Given the dangers that they now face on their land in Arizona, they have made the difficult decision of not returning to our State. This is from May 18: ``Hello, friends. It is with great regret that we've decided to leave our little Arizona winter retreat. It has been with much thought that we have decided not to return. We worry about you, our friends, and wish that you had the flexibility that we have to not be there during this dangerous time.
``Whether you are fearful for your safety or not so much is of little consequence as to how we are feeling. We worried when hunting this winter or just walking next door on our 160 acres, will we be confronted by a camp of illegals? What will we do with one shotgun, one camera, and four dogs? Will Louis, that just dashed out of the doggy door at midnight barking madly, will he come back, or will we find him in the morning with a bullet in his head?
``Guess what we're trying to say to you is we don't want to do this anymore. It isn't worth the possible consequences. We will miss the magnificent views, but even more, we will really miss you. Thank you for the wonderful years.''
Another story that I heard at the Apache Schoolhouse, the ranchers and other residents of this beautiful part of the country have seen terrible changes over the past few years, and they have been calling on their government to take action to protect them and to finally secure the border. Their plea was well summarized in a letter that was recently personally delivered to the Governor of Arizona and to us, the congressional delegation. In the email he said: ``Over the past 8 years, we have experienced many break-ins, burglaries, and attempted home invasions. Two of the attempted home invasions occurred just last month.''
He says: ``As someone who actually lives on the U.S.-Mexico border, I am here today to share with you a partial account of my family's experiences living near the Arizona-Mexico border for the past 10 years. We are a fifth-generation Arizona ranching family. By no means is this account all inclusive, but is intended to give you an understanding of the mayhem and the trepidation we are going through every single day on the borderlands.
``My words are offered to you in good faith and are not intended to be inflammatory toward any culture, nationality, group, or agency, but I refuse to weave political correctness into their meaning, which has so far distracted from the important work of credibly securing our borders first for the citizens of Arizona and the United States.
``Border security has been promised for so many times over the past 30
years without delivering security and safety to our families. These are my opinions on the matter. The U.S.-Mexico border is out of control and has been for a very long time. We laugh out loud when we hear the politicians claim that the border is more secure. This uninformed view is a political fairytale. People in Washington making these statements don't live here. And if they did, they would have a far more different view from the remedial policies which need to be immediately actioned on our and the country's behalf to secure the Arizona-Mexico international boundary.
``Our small ranch is located adjacent to the Chiricahuas National Wilderness. Presently, I'm sitting in my new ranch house, which looks more like a fortress than a home. Day and night we suffer home invasions, burglaries, multi-thousand-acre fires, some as large as 20,000 acres, ranching infrastructure and personal property destruction perpetrated by both illegal aliens and drug smugglers. They break into our homes and ranches, they steal jewelry and firearms, ammunition, money, small cartable electronics to fence in U.S. interior cities and Mexico, maliciously vandalize our property. They destroy our livestock and so on.
``In 8 years, our home has suffered over 15 illegal alien and smuggling burglaries and four attempted home invasions; intolerable when you consider that I'm here most of the time. I gave up filing police reports. Why bother?
``The latest attempted home invasion occurred last Saturday when we were invaded in the early morning by an illegal alien and an accomplice while my wife was asleep. The perpetrators were about to enter and burglarize our house and who knows what else. They were later caught by our hardworking Border Patrol and the Cochise County sheriff. We understand their backpacks were full of stolen items from burglarized homes in Portal, and some, if not all, had prior arrest records.
``Last month, another smuggler entered our home and confronted my wife in her utility room before he was run off. And as I write this account, the Border Patrol and the Cochise County Sheriff's Department are on the mountain searching for several groups of illegal aliens.
``How many American citizens would tolerate a situation like the ones that we experience every single day? Why are we not able to live in safety and in security in our own homes like the rest of you in Tucson and in Phoenix and in Washington, D.C.?
``Many of the homes and ranches in the Portal area stretching to Douglas have been burglarized, vandalized, and invaded by illegals. No one, and I mean no one, dare leave their homes unprotected for longer than a couple of hours at a time. Can you imagine worrying about leaving your home to attend your son's out-of-state wedding for fear it is going to be burglarized and trashed upon your return? Not a pretty picture missing such important parts of your family's lives.
``As I read my statement upon a risk of attending this meeting, I wonder what I will find or face upon my return to our ranch later this evening. There are hundreds of these people illegally crossing through our valleys 24/7. It is a very scary situation when they're kicking in your door and the sheriff is located over 70 miles away and the Border Patrol is undermanned and under-equipped, and they can't respond in a timely basis to your call; when they're pursuing multiple illegal immigrant groups through the mountains 24 hours a day--yes, a very dangerous job we've asked them to do.
``From personal experience, illegal immigrants and smugglers have absolutely no fear of law enforcement, Border Patrol, nor State or Federal officials; in fact, U.S. citizens seem to be held to a higher enforcement and prosecutorial standard than illegal immigrants arrested for the same criminal activity.
You will appreciate the cynicism this creates for border residents when the same illegal aliens and smugglers are caught time and time again after being released back into Mexico.
If apprehended, one of the first questions they often ask the Border Patrol is: ``Which State am I in--the Ninth Circuit Court or New Mexico?'' They sure hope it's Arizona.
The large numbers of undetected illegal aliens and north-southbound smugglers using our vast, remote desert mountain country are never counted in numbers Washington is using. You can't count what you can't catch, and if Border Patrol apprehends 300,000 annually in the Tucson sector alone or if collectively they catch one in four, maybe over 800,000 or 850,000 have entered into the country illegally.
I must ask if this is really a border which has never been more secure. I don't think so, and neither do the majority of the American people.
This letter goes on. It talks about what's happening with the Border Patrol. Yes, it's true that we've had a lot of press on this, but unfortunately, up until today, we have not had a lot of action. The Arizona Cattle Growers have put together an 18-point border security plan. It's available on my congressional Web site. It's available on the Arizona Cattle Growers' Web site. It mandates that crossing the border illegally the first time is a felony charge for breaking into our country and that it prevents, for any reason, one from gaining U.S. citizenship or residency.
The individual ends by saying, ``For those of you who worry about `militarizing the border,' I can only say you're too late.''
There are a couple of additional stories, one being of Ann and Paul Palmer.
They say here, ``Let me give you yet another perspective from a farming family.''
On May 21 of this year, our confidence in the sheriff's department and in the Border Patrol is right at 0 percent. Within the last 8 months, we've had two different vans abandoned on our farm. The first time, they were running from the sheriff's department. On that occasion, the van ran through several fences and way out into a field of growing corn before it got stuck in the mud. At that point, the fugitives were on foot. The sheriff's department and Border Patrol were too scared to go into the cornfield to get them. They said they didn't feel safe leaving their vehicles and looking for people in the dark. So they left. This all happened 200 yards from our homes.
It's plain to me the only protection for our families comes from my son and I.
The following day, my son and I had to get the vehicle out of the field. Then when the sheriff's department did come back in the daylight, they gave it a cursory inspection. They told us that we should check to see that there was no dope before we pulled it out. Needless to say, this caused some serious economic damage to our having this vehicle. I mean, not only was that crop destroyed in that area, but there were deep ruts in the field and the labor and the materials to rebuild the fences.
The second occasion was after harvest. Many of us pasture cattle on our cornstalks, so there are large numbers of cattle in the cornfields. Late one night, our neighbor called, informing us that a van had run through several of his gates and was coming our way. He had three separate herds of 500 head, and we had one herd of 600 head of cattle that could have all been mixed up had our neighbor not been on the ball. That would have been a several-day sorting job. We got the van stopped before it went through the last fence. The people jumped out and ran.
By the time the sheriff's deputy, who had been lost, got there, we had tracked the people and knew which way they were going. This time, the sheriff's department said that, if we could give them the van--a 1977 Chevrolet--they would pursue them, and if not, they would not. I pointed out, by that time, that, if they got a record, the illegals would be gone. The sheriff's department left. The Border Patrol was supposedly coming with a tracker, but never showed up. There was no interest at all in apprehending these individuals, and, once again, labor and materials to rebuild the fences were expended by me and my family. I could go on and on, but you get the point, he says. From our standpoint, there is no will to do anything about the problem. The Border Patrol should be on the border, not 40 or 50 miles north of the border.
Willcox recently got a new Border Patrol station. That's 80 miles north of the border. They keep horses near the Willcox station. What are they doing so far north? The horse patrol comes in after a part of a day because they don't
have enough horses to ride all day. A private company or an individual simply cannot operate as efficiently as Border Patrol and stay in this business. Throwing more money at a poorly laid-out plan just means that you have a more expensive poor plan.
Here is another story by Ruth Cowan, a rancher near Tombstone, Arizona. This account took place on June 7. Fence run through. June 9, fence run through and cattle on the road. June 10, 20 arrests. June 13, fence run through and 20 arrests. June 14, 60 arrests. June 15, fence hit and two runners.
She talks about calls about cattle on the road both day and night, personal damage in 1 day, including three $150 gates that were run through, a float broken off losing 10,000 gallons of water in one spot and a faucet I installed to keep them from breaking the floats left open and the submersible pump pumping our precious desert water on the ground all night, two gates left open and my bulls were gone.
Some additional complaints.
My travel trailer has been broken into, my truck stolen, and the one they couldn't steal, which is a diesel, I had to get repaired. My insurance rates have gone up. Field days for the most requested field trip in Douglas, Arizona, cancelled due to discarded pornography, weapons, feminine hygiene products, trash, and associated health issues.
I believe we have an image of that.
The economic damage to my rangeland is devastating. Rangeland is being trampled by thousands upon thousands of illegals. Native vegetation can't grow.
Here we have images of the debris.
Lost income from cattle because they're now wild, and buyers give less. My new $2,400 bull ate a plastic sack and died 4 days later. Disease from my neighbor's cattle and broken fences resulted in my animals' aborting their calves, and then the cows sold at half price. I can't even get anyone to come look at the ranch because it's south of