[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 155 (2009), Part 11]
[House]
[Pages 14947-14948]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                    THE WAR FOR THE BORDER CONTINUES

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE of Texas. Madam Speaker, the out-of-control violence along 
our border is made up of more complex elements than most people 
realize. The criminal cartels controlling our southern border are a lot 
more powerful than we are led to believe. They are international 
organized crime cartels that make money off the weaknesses of others. 
They traffic drugs, money, weapons and human beings across our southern 
border. They leave death, doom, and destruction in their wake.
  Make no mistake about it, there is corruption on both sides of the 
border that facilitates the lawlessness that is taking place there. 
Just last month the former sheriff of Starr County, Texas,

[[Page 14948]]

Rey Guerra, pled guilty to Federal narcotics charges. He admitted to 
facilitating intelligence that helped Mexican drug traffickers invade 
the United States and evade counternarcotics efforts. That included 
trying to find out the identity of confidential informants.
  Madam Speaker, he needs to be locked up forever for his betrayal of 
this country and law enforcement. But he is just one of a growing 
number of recruits from both sides of the border that are facilitating 
this avalanche of corruption and anarchy along the southern frontier.
  The Mexican criminal cartels have added a layer of intelligence that 
better resembles foreign recruitment of spies during the Cold War than 
a traditional criminal enterprise. The huge amounts of money paid to 
these officials allow these criminals to traffic people and drugs into 
our land.
  There is a huge difference in the size and scope of these 
international criminal activities and the typical domestic law 
enforcement agencies and their duties. As more and more of the violence 
spills over into Texas and other border States, there is an urgent need 
to get this lawlessness under control.
  The cost of this culture of crime is hammering border States. The FBI 
is stretched too thin, they don't have the manpower to address this 
cross-border corruption, and they are fighting domestic Federal crime 
and jihadists.
  Right now we are asking local sheriffs in border States to do double 
duty, as if they are agents of Interpol. Our domestic police forces 
should be freed up to do what they do best, fight crime in their 
counties and their communities.
  Our Drug Enforcement Agency is doing a noble effort to control these 
international criminal cartels that more and more resemble an army at 
the border than the Cosa Nostra, but the FBI has not been given enough 
American resources. The Border Patrol is overrun, outmanned, and 
outgunned.
  Our government has limited their rules of engagement. Their standard 
operating procedure is nonconfrontational. Heavily armed bad guys come 
through with their contraband of drugs and humans, and yet little is 
done when they confront our Border Patrol. These cartels are made up of 
a hybrid of many of the worst elements of organized crime. They include 
terrorist cells, international espionage agencies, and a foreign 
military.
  But why are we acting as if we can no longer defend our borders and 
citizens from this lawlessness? It is the philosophy of some that we 
should wave the white flag of surrender and lessen, not strengthen, our 
border security. This is absolute nonsense. The Mexican organized 
criminal cartels are sophisticated, and they are deadly. Maybe it is 
time to put the United States military on the border. There is no 
higher duty for the American military than to protect the borders of 
its own Nation from international criminal invasion.
  It is interesting, Madam Speaker. We use our military thousands of 
miles away to fight the drug war in Afghanistan, but we won't use them 
at home. Why not? There is no answer from the administration.
  We should rotate deployments of our military to the southern border. 
Our brave men and women are routinely deployed for desert training. Why 
not concentrate these deployments on the border? This frees up our 
domestic law enforcement to do the job they should be doing, which is 
rooting out corruption on our side of the border.
  Madam Speaker, I have flown with the National Guard along the Texas-
Mexico border. They do a tremendous job working with the Border Patrol 
and the DEA. But a handful of helicopters is not enough to secure the 
border. The Air National Guard needs more equipment, more money and 
more troops to capture the outlaw cartel gangs. The U.S. gave Mexico 
$1.5 billion to fight the cartels. That money should have been given to 
our border protectors, not the culture of corruption on the Mexican 
side of the border.
  A lot of attention has been rightly focused on our southern border 
over the past few years. We have increased the boots on the ground, 
installed some cameras and erected some barriers and fences and 
sensors. The efforts have not sealed the border, however.
  As the violence gets worse in Mexico, we must get a border strategy 
in place now before it erupts into a level of widespread violence and 
more corruption that engulfs our own citizens.
  It is not going away, Madam Speaker. The drug cartels are in it for 
the long haul because of their lust for money. There is a war against 
drugs going on on the border, even though we are told now that we 
should not, because of political correctness, use that term.
  The first duty of government is to protect the people. The government 
needs to focus on border protection. Meanwhile, the border war 
continues.
  And that's just the way it is.

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