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Border patrol agent reacts to wall executive order |
A thick fog recently blanketed the U.S.-Mexico border along Imperial
Beach, Calif., a prime opportunity for border crossers to probe
vulnerabilities in both the fence and the beleaguered agency patrolling
it.
In SUVs or ATVs, Border Patrol agents with video
surveillance equipment and binoculars spent hours, as they do every day,
scanning the hilly and treacherous terrain that connects Tijuana,
Mexico, to Southern California to try and prevent anyone trying to
illegally cross the border.
By the next morning, the processing rooms at the U.S.
Border Patrol Imperial Beach Station were filled with men. They
included two men from Turkey who washed up onshore on surfboards and
wearing wetsuits. Federal agents spent hours that morning questioning
nearly a dozen detained men who were suspected of being from Pakistan.
It’s just a snapshot of what happens every day along
the busy San Diego sector of the U.S. Border. Agents say they are doing
all they can to protect the border, but for years have found themselves
in a losing battle against a well-financed and sophisticated network of
smugglers.
"We are undermanned and there are revisions and
renovations that need to be made in the infrastructure along the
border," says Chris Harris, a veteran Border Patrol agent and director
of legislative and political affairs for the National Border Patrol
Council.
Agents hope all that changes under President Donald Trump.
BORDER PATROL CHIEF, WHO ONCE BACKED IMMIGRATION REFORM, REMOVED FROM OFFICE
Harris said the unprecedented support the agency has
received from Trump will reinvigorate an agency that has for years been
hampered by inadequate funding, dismal resources and seesaw policy
changes.
On January 25,
Trump laid out a forceful
yet controversial border security policy through a series of executive
orders that included suspending “catch and release,” moving forward on
building a border wall and pledging to hire 5,000 more federal agents.
The move drew outrage among immigration advocates
across the country. But to the rank-and-file agents who have attempted
to guard the border with a vague and contradictory mission for the past
eight years – and saw morale plummet to historic levels – it was a
welcome move they believe will make their agency more effective.
“When Trump was elected, there was an increase in
optimism among the agents, but nothing like what we’ve seen in the past
few days,” Shawn Moran, vice president of the National Border Patrol
Council, said in reference to Trump’s executive orders.
Moran said he saw first-hand how morale plummeted
under the Obama administration. Agents, he said, felt handcuffed by
stringent policies that prevented them from doing their jobs. Under
“catch and release,” they were releasing nearly 80 percent of the people
they apprehended trying to enter the U.S. illegally, Moran said.
Moran said he is not totally surprised at the
opposition Trump is receiving from sanctuary city mayors and the public,
who he believes does not understand the implications of illegal
immigration.
“I’m not surprised by the reaction,” Moran said, “people just don’t get it.”
DHS SECRETARY: BORDER WALL SHALL BE FINISHED IN TWO YEARS
But overhauling the agency will not be an easy task.
Harris said it will entail a philosophical paradigm shift and will
require agents to rethink how they approach their missions.
“Our skill sets have atrophied in this arena during
the last eight or so years concurrent with the previous presidential
administration,” said Harris. “It will take a complete paradigm shift in
some of the ways we conduct business, and even in the way we think. Our
operational mindset needs to be rethought and rechanneled.”
Despite Mexico’s pledge to stem the flow of Central
American migrants entering its country from bordering Guatemala, the
numbers have increased over the past year.
The number of unaccompanied children apprehended at
the Southwest border jumped nearly 50 percent between fiscal years
2015-2016, from 39,970 to 59,692. In the first three months of this
fiscal year (Oct. 1-Dec. 31), 21,321 have already been apprehended,
according to Border Patrol stats.
But it is the number of family units apprehended that
is staggering. Apprehensions jumped 95 percent between fiscal years
2015-2016, from 39,838 to 77,674. The numbers for the 2017 fiscal year
have already surpassed the total for 2015, with 44,843 apprehended the
past few months, according to Border Patrol.
Trump has made it his priority to stem the flow of
migrants coming in through the porous border – saying it’s a matter of
national security.
“The unprecedented surge of illegal migrants from
Central America is harming both Mexico and the U.S. and I believe the
steps we will take starting right now will improve the safety in both of
our countries. It's going to be very, very good for Mexico,” Trump said
when announcing the executive orders. "A nation without borders is not a
nation. Beginning today, the U.S. gets back control of its borders,
gets back its borders."