Video: Inside Immigration Reform: Securing the U.S.- Mexico Border
[Transcript excerpts. See original article for video.]
...RAY SUAREZ: It's critical to the debate over immigration reform: security along the United States' nearly-2,000-mile border with Mexico.
Nogales, Ariz., is a case in point. A long stretch of fencing separates the 20,000 residents there from more than 200,000 people just across the border in Nogales, Mexico... U.S. Border Patrol agents process millions of legal crossings each year.
But more than 124,000 people were caught crossing illegally last year... And Republicans say they shouldn't be given a path to citizenship until the border is secured...
RAY SUAREZ: On the other hand, many Democrats argue the border has never been safer. They point to nearly 20,000 U.S. Border Patrol agents patrolling the boundary and to a network of cameras, sensors, drones and some 700 miles of fencing...
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: I think it's important for everybody to remember that our shared border is more secure than it's been in years. Illegal immigration attempts into the United States are near their lowest level in decades.
RAY SUAREZ: Indeed, some 1.6 million people were apprehended on the southwest border back in 2000, while in 2012, the number fell to just over 350,000. So, how secure is the border?...
SHERIFF TONY ESTRADA, Santa Cruz County, Ariz.: You know, I can definitely say that, because I have been there 45 years along the border with Mexico, and we have had more resources, more technology, more boots on the ground...
CAPT. ROBERT WILSON, Hudspeth County, Texas, Sheriff's Deputy: Well, I agree with the sheriff that there has been more resources thrown at the border, and maybe in that area.
But, in Hudspeth County, Texas, we have 99 miles of river border with Mexico, and the border is not secure in that area. We still have continued cartel activity across the river. We still have folks from our communities being executed, taken from Texas and executed in Mexico. And the immigration problem, the people coming over is the same. It hasn't diminished...
RAY SUAREZ: Let me follow up with you, Capt. Wilson. Is it possible -- you mentioned 99 miles of river frontier with another country -- is it possible, is it affordable to seal Mexico off from the United States in those places to control cross-border movements?
ROBERT WILSON: I don't believe it's feasible to completely seal the border with Mexico. And I don't believe you would want to. I mean, there's a good relationship with that government. There's commerce and trade, and I think that needs to continue...
[See original article for video.]
CAIRCO commentary
We live in an era where the mainstream media is complicit in furthering the agenda of corporate-political special interests as well as the La Raza (The Race) special interest fringe groups.
The oligarchs who run the mainstream media (MSM) know that an amnesty for illegal aliens will be a great way for them and for corporate America to line their pockets for years to come.
Several aspects of this PBS video illustrate obvious biased coverage:
1. The Secure Fence Act of 2006 called for at least 700 miles of double layered fencing along the US - Mexico Border.
As of February, 2009, The Department of Homeland Security had constructed only 5% of the border fence called for by the Secure Fence Act of 2006, yet in locations where the fence was built it has significantly cut illegal immigration.
Just because Napolitano and Obama say the border is secure does not mean that it is secure.
American Border Patrol has flown and documented every single mile of the border (see Border security and porous border fencing). Why was American Border Patrol not interviewed as experts on the border?
2. The video states that Democrates believe the border is secured and that Republicans say that illegal aliens should not be given amnesty until the border is secured.
That false contrast deliberately obfuscates the point. Poll after poll show that Americans want their border secured and existing laws against hiring foreign job seekers fully enforced. The Democratic party wants more illegal alien entries, which result in more undocumented Democrats. Corporate sponsored Republicans ("Conservatism, Inc.") want an unending stream of cheap, foreign job seekers. Both parties have abandoned their constituents.
3. In the video, Wilson is spot on in questioning whether we want to secure our border. Corporate special interests and their beholden politicans want an open border. The mainstream media is implicitly biased in support of the amnesty / open borders agenda.