[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 152 (2006), Part 10]
[House]
[Pages 14068-14069]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




             SILENT BACK DOOR OF ILLEGAL ENTRY--PUERTO RICO

  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent to take Mr. Osborne's 
time.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Without objection, the gentleman from Texas 
is recognized for 5 minutes.
  There was no objection.
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, more news from the front: The border war 
continues. Our terrorist field hearings last week proved one thing: The 
vulnerabilities on our southern border are monumental. But it is not 
just our southern border coming under attack. It is Puerto Rico, that 
silent back door of illegal entry into America.
  This is something that we should be concerned with. Border agents 
there report a staggering lack of security. In fact, you can count on 
one hand the number of field agents that they have in Puerto Rico on 
patrol at any given time. Only four active patrol agents patrol this 
island at once, and they only have 23 agents on the whole island 
assigned to patrol an island with 363 miles of coastline. These field 
agents find themselves isolated with these limited resources. Our 
government even cherry-picks border agents there to send them to other 
spots, like our southwestern border.
  What could be more vulnerable than one agent patrolling 90 miles of 
coastline? Even the Blackhawk helicopters that they used to use are so 
broken down they don't even fly anymore.
  While we watch the southern border, the human smugglers, narcotics 
traffickers; and terrorists are not only watching our southern border, 
they are watching Puerto Rico, knowing it is an easy, back door gateway 
to America.
  With rumors of amnesty spreading throughout the world, especially 
Latin America and Asia, human smugglers are seizing the moment, causing 
crime and violence at the borders to skyrocket.
  This year Federal immigration officials say the waters off of Puerto 
Rico are filled with more human cargo than they have ever seen before. 
The tiny island just off Puerto Rico's coast, Mona Island, is a 
jumping-off spot for people who wish to illegally enter America.
  Last year, it was the site of more than 6,500 arrests of illegals 
traveling on rickety wooden boats called yolas. They storm Puerto 
Rico's beaches as if they were troops landing at Normandy or the 
Marines in World War II as they island-hopped in the Pacific.
  Out of 10 illegals that are crammed on one of these boats, border 
agents say they are lucky if they are able to capture two of them. And 
the smugglers who arrange these deadly and illegal invasions into 
Puerto Rico have seen a spike in their business.
  In 2001, for example, less than five Cubans were captured on Mona 
Island illegally entering the United States. But in the past 9 months, 
almost 600 have arrived; and they pay between $1,500 and $2,000 apiece 
to their human smugglers, and the human smugglers have yet to be 
prosecuted. It is so lucrative smuggling humans in the United States 
that it pays even more than trafficking drugs.
  But the most dangerous cargo are possible terrorists from Middle 
Eastern countries, China and Korea, that are

[[Page 14069]]

easily masked by the thousands who rush the border monthly, thousands 
who rush the beaches; and Puerto Rico's leaders are worried that the 
island's drug traffickers could collaborate with terrorist 
organizations. Because, you see, once people get to Puerto Rico, they 
are home free to the rest of America if they do not stay in the Puerto 
Rico vicinity. They could stay there and destroy vital infrastructure 
that we have in Puerto Rico. For example, one of the two insulin plants 
that exist in the whole world is in Puerto Rico.
  And, of course, Puerto Rico is unique because it has a cruise 
business. We don't have much of a cruise business down on the Texas-
Mexico border with the Rio Grande River, but they certainly have a 
cruise business in Puerto Rico. It makes a unique security problem for 
the United States, so we certainly need to beef up border security in 
this area.
  Once in Puerto Rico, illegal immigrants easily obtain false 
identification like birth certificates and driver's licenses. They 
fraudulently claim on these birth certificates and driver's licenses 
that they are U.S. citizens. So once they have convinced individuals at 
the border they are U.S. citizens, they easily assimilate into America. 
One official says getting a fake document in Puerto Rico is like 
getting a candy out of a candy jar.
  And airport security is not an obstacle either. At the airport on the 
northwest portion of the island, the 4:00 a.m. flight to the mainland 
of the United States, it is always full of people, but the Border 
Patrol is never there because they don't have enough agents to cover 
that portion and time zone.
  Mr. Speaker, Puerto Rico is an important part of America. It enjoys a 
unique relationship with the continental United States. It is part of 
America's homeland, and it is worth protecting from the sea of invasion 
by illegals.
  It is important that we have more border agents in Puerto Rico, and 
Puerto Rico needs the services of the U.S. Coast Guard. It cannot 
become the silent back door of illegal entry into the United States. It 
is a homeland security problem, it is a border security problem, and it 
is a national security problem.
  And that's just the way it is.

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