[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 93 (Monday, July 17, 2006)]
[House]
[Page H5248]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
BLAZING GUNS
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, news from the second front: The border war
continues. It sounds like a scene from Lonesome Dove or some other
western movie. Hundreds of shots were ringing out over the Rio Grande
River, piercing the night for a period of minutes. But movie villains,
this was not. These are real outlaws that are shrouded in darkness and
shooting at Americans, just like in the old days.
The gunfire belongs to the border, the U.S.-Mexican border. Just last
week, in the moonlight, was a scene of machine gun madness. It could
have been a fatal barrage of bullets.
Last Wednesday night, Border Patrol and Hidalgo County, Texas,
sheriff's deputies patrolling the Rio Grande River, the international
border between Mexico and the United States, stumbled upon two boys
from Mexico that were running from outlaws on the Mexican side. They
had just raided their ranch and kidnapped their father and killed a
ranch hand, so they were fleeing these criminals.
They were swimming to the safety of the United States. They were
hiding in the cornfields of Mexico for several hours while machine gun
carrying killers were looking for them.
But violence did not end on the Mexican side of the river where it
started. The victims swam across the river to their escape into the
hands of U.S. law enforcement officers. Seconds after stumbling on the
boys, law enforcement officers on the border and sheriff's deputies
were engulfed in a barrage of bullets.
The bad guys on the Mexican side of the border, these thugs who were
lying in wait, would wait no more, and they decided to fire on American
peace officers from their side of the river. As many as 10 men with
machine guns turned their guns to fire 200 to 300 rounds of ammunition
at law enforcement officers on the American side of the river.
Luckily, the Americans had built a levee on the American side, just
like a fortress, and they were protected from these kidnappers who
would shoot their automatic weapons as if they were on the Israeli-
Lebanon border. Their bullets ricocheted off this dirt wall. The
deputies dove behind it, but they never returned fire to the Mexican
side.
This gang-style rural warfare you hear about on battlefields is in
our own American backyard. In just the last year and a half, this is
the fifth time Border Patrol has been shot at.
Former Texas Ranger Doyle Holdrige put it best. He said, ``After dark
on the Texas-Mexican border, it gets western.''
You won't even normally find Hidalgo County deputies in that area of
the border. Their sheriff doesn't allow them to go there. He said it is
too dangerous to patrol that portion of the river. Instead, the sheriff
only reacts to calls for help, spending the rest of the time trying to
make their presence known in neighborhoods that are in fear living on
the border.
Sheriff Lupe Trevino says the Federal Government has left the gate
wide open, allowing thugs, plain criminals, to do damage on the
American side of the border. He says drastic cuts have washed away
homeland security funding and drained funds from community policing
from this border area in South Texas.
Sheriff Trevino says a lack of enforcement, lack of funding and lack
of Federal support has left local authorities to stand by, while
guerillas fire machine guns at them, invaders take over their
neighborhoods and leave local law enforcement in harm's way while on
border patrol.
Mr. Speaker, this shootout of 200 to 300 rounds barely made the news
last week. We hear all about the border shootings on the Israeli-
Lebanon border, but, Mr. Speaker, our government should be as concerned
about the gunfire on our border as we are about blazing guns in the
Middle East.
And that's just the way it is
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