[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 52 (Thursday, April 3, 2008)]
[House]
[Page H1995]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[[Page H1995]]
                 POLITICAL PRISONERS RAMOS AND COMPEAN

  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, as we talk about the war on the first front in 
Iraq and Afghanistan, we must remember that there is another war going 
on on the second front, and that is the border war between the United 
States and Mexico. All of the politicians that are running for 
President this year are talking about everything. Some things are just 
not important. But one thing they're not talking about is the border 
war in the south part of the United States, between Mexico and the 
United States.
  Two years ago, two border agents by the name of Ramos and Compean 
were tried and convicted for doing their job on the Texas/Mexico 
border. What happened was, that in February of 2005, Ramos and Compean 
came in contact with a drug dealer. He came into the United States at 
Fabens, Texas. Most of America's never heard of this little small Texas 
town.
  He's driving a van. He sees the border agents and he turns around and 
he tries to run back to Mexico. He abandons the van. The border agents 
give chase. An altercation occurred down in the Rio Grande riverbed. 
Shots were fired. The drug dealer disappears into Mexico.
  It turns out that the drug dealer had been shot by one of the border 
agents, and it turns out that the van that he was driving had, get 
this, $750,000 worth of drugs in the van.
  So what does our Government do? Instead of trying to find the drug 
dealer to prosecute him, our Government goes to Mexico, finds the drug 
dealer and promises him a back room deal, a deal to testify against the 
border agents, claim that the border agents unlawfully used their 
firearms, even though they said they fired in self-defense. And they 
make a deal with him not to prosecute him for his drug smuggling if he 
testified. And he did testify against the border agents, and 2 years 
ago they were convicted.

                              {time}  1330

  But unbeknownst to the jury, and what the U.S. Attorney's Office 
would not let the jury know, is that before the trial took place, this 
star witness, backroom-deal witness, brought in another load of drugs 
into the United States for money. The U.S. Attorney's Office knew about 
it. They didn't want the jury to know about it, and they kept it out of 
the trial. Now the whole world knows the U.S. Attorney's Office was 
deceitful in that trial.
  Those border agents are serving 11 to 12 years in the Federal 
penitentiary. The President pardoned 157 people in his administration. 
Fifteen of them last week. Some of them were drug dealers. But why 
doesn't the President pardon these border patrol agents for doing their 
job?
  The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has heard this case. I suspect 
they will reverse it because the U.S. Attorney's Office was deceitful 
in the trial and prosecution of these two border agents because they 
were relentless in prosecuting them.
  Our government is on the wrong side of the border war. We're trying 
to hire more border agents, and people don't want to join the Border 
Patrol. One reason is because our government doesn't support them. When 
an altercation takes place, they side with the other guys instead of 
siding with our border agents.
  And this is not the first time the U.S. Attorney's Office has been 
caught cheating in a trial. A border agent by the name of David Sipe 
was arrested by our government because he was in a fight and assault 
with a drug dealer down in Texas. And he was prosecuted for a civil 
rights violation, but it turns out in his trial the U.S. Attorney's 
Office hid evidence in that case as well, but they got caught; and that 
case was retried and the jury found David Sipe not guilty because the 
U.S. Attorney's Office, once again, didn't want the jury to know the 
truth about the person that came in contact with our border agent.
  So it's time our government gets on the right side of the border war. 
Defend our boarder patrol agents. Secure the border. Make sure that the 
war on the second front is won, that people not be allowed to come into 
the United States illegally for any purpose, especially drug smugglers; 
and our government needs to quit taking the side of drug dealers from 
foreign countries and start siding with the American Border Patrol 
because they're doing their job to protect the rest of us.
  And that's just the way it is.

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