[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 156 (2010), Part 6]
[House]
[Pages 8497-8503]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                        THE U.S.-MEXICAN BORDER

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Ms. Titus). Under the Speaker's announced 
policy of January 6, 2009, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. CARTER. Madam Speaker, I've been coming up here on the first day 
of each week that we're back in session to talk about the rule of law 
and how the rule of law needs to apply to those of us who serve here in 
Congress, those who serve in the administration, and that it is the 
glue that holds our society together. And if we, in turn, are going to 
circumvent the rules of law, then we, in fact, are chipping away at the 
very foundation of the American culture.
  Today we're going to shift gears a little bit because we've talked a 
lot about what's going on up here and some folks that have had some 
problems following the rules, but I don't think we've ever seen a more 
glaring example of a violation of the rule of law and the failure to 
enforce the law than what is happening on the southern borders of the 
United States.
  You see right here on May 17, 2010, Real Clear Politics, Threat on 
the Border with Mexico: Possible Terrorists Entering the U.S., and it's 
a picture of people climbing over a barrier, a very strange-looking 
barrier, to be honest with you. It's got a big hole in the middle of 
it. I don't understand exactly what it is. But we've had an issue, and 
those of us who have been in this Congress for a while have been very 
concerned, and I, in particular, have been very concerned about this 
situation down on the Texas-Mexico border, the New Mexico-, Arizona-, 
and California-Mexico border.
  So I want to go back with you for a while to when I first went with 
parts of the Homeland Security Subcommittee of the Appropriations 
Committee to look at the border between Texas and Mexico. We've made 
trips. We've gone all up and down that border. I happen to have been on 
the one that was in my home State down on the border. I went with my 
colleague on the other side of the aisle, Henry Cuellar, down to Nuevo 
Laredo, Mexico, and Laredo, Texas, across the border. And we talked 
with the Border Patrol about their issues, and that was way back in, I 
believe, 2004, maybe 2005.
  I sat out in the dark with a Border Patrolman along the banks of the 
Rio Grande with his surveillance equipment, and it was in the 
wintertime, but it wasn't cold. It doesn't get real cold down in that 
part of Texas. ``Cool'' would be the word. It was not a whole lot 
colder than it is right now outside in Washington, D.C. And he and I 
watched, I think it was, 2 miles in either direction of the border. 
Right there, right next to what I would call the city, because right 
across the road was a housing project, were apartments, were hundreds 
of people walking in the streets. It was 10 o'clock at night, and there 
were people everywhere.
  I talked to him about the illegal crossings coming into this country, 
the danger. And it was a dangerous place. In fact, while we were on the 
bridge between Nuevo Laredo and Laredo, John Culberson picked up a 
flattened bullet head slug, if you will, from probably a 9-millimeter 
or something like that, that had flattened out when it hit the bridge, 
the international bridge between Mexico and the United States. He 
carries it around in his pocket with

[[Page 8498]]

him now to remind people that this is dangerous business that our 
Border Patrol is dealing with down there.
  Well, since that time, international drug cartels have moved to the 
border of the United States, and they are fighting a border war just a 
stone's throw from the places where American citizens live up and down 
the border from Brownsville all the way across to San Diego, to 
Tijuana. The crime will take your breath away.
  I spent 20 years in the judiciary. Many of my colleagues did the 
same. I have seen lots of crime. I have tried lots of cases involving 
horrible situations. But while we were down there on that trip with my 
friend Henry Cuellar, we saw pictures in the Nuevo Laredo newspaper of 
a woman who was the wife of a police official in Laredo who had been 
kidnapped and burned alive, and she had been set down in a business 
chair very much like these ladies sitting over here that are taking 
down the minutes or are recording the proceedings, sat in that chair, 
had three tires full of gasoline shoved down around her body, and she 
had been set on fire and burned up alive.

                              {time}  2110

  That was done as a threat to the police department in Laredo to 
either get in line with what the criminal element in Nuevo Laredo 
wanted to do or suffer the consequences. That was a shocking thing. I 
carried that back up here and showed it to our committee members. Some 
of them were ill from looking at it. And I pointed out that this is a 
lawless society we have created on this border.
  Now I have a theory, and I think my theory is based on some pretty 
good police discoveries we have made over the last 25 years in police 
work. During the time when they cleaned up New York City and made it a 
safer place to be, they discovered, and this was the chief of police 
and the mayor, at that time it was Rudy Giuliani, that a bad criminal 
environment breeds crime. So if you have a neighborhood where there are 
old junk cars in the front yard, there is trash in the front yard, they 
haven't taken things off the stoop, broken windows, that is a 
neighborhood without pride, and the criminal element breeds in that 
neighborhood. But if you get the criminal element out of there, you get 
the criminality of that environment out of there, the neighborhood 
improves. And you put a beat cop there that allows them to know that 
law enforcement is there, law enforcement is involved, then the public 
can feel confident, and they start to take care of their neighborhood 
and in turn make the crime move elsewhere. And they cleaned up New York 
City with that basic theory. They went back to the old, walk-the-beat 
cop theory that came out of the 19th century.
  Now, why do I mention that? Well, people say to me why do you think 
the cartels who were in Colombia and other parts of the country, why 
did they come and settle along the southern border of this country? I 
thought about it a lot. And it came to me that, you know what, 
lawlessness breeds lawlessness. So what were we creating on the border 
when we weren't enforcing some basic tenets of the law? We have laws 
that say you can't come into this country except legally. And millions 
of people, whether for good purpose or bad, and many, many for good 
purpose, I am not saying it is not, just for a job, but they were 
breaking our laws. And they were coming into this country. And where 
was this community of lawlessness? Along the Mexican border.
  That community of lawlessness, which was just sneaking people into 
the country and people sneaking into the country so, as many will tell 
you, just so they can get a job to feed their families. Of course there 
was a little criminal element, and a little more criminal element, and 
all of a sudden we have estimates of four or five drug cartels from 
Central and South America fighting a drug war from Brownsville to 
Tijuana, from Matamoros to Tijuana on the other side of the border. 
Twenty-three thousand people have been killed in the last 18 months in 
that war across the border. Mexico has brought in every kind of 
resource that they can afford to bring in to try to stop this, but it 
is out of control and it is bleeding across the border into my State 
and the other States that border Mexico.
  We are having a great conversation today in our country about a law 
that was passed by the State of Arizona. And I would argue that the 
State of Arizona, that law has a real clear message to the Federal 
Government: You know what, we have been waiting 10 to 15 years for 
anybody to realize how bad this is.
  Now back in 2004 and 2005, we were beefing up the Border Patrol and 
pouring homeland security money into building fence. We had resources 
that were dedicated to trying to stop this flood, but the flood was 
still coming. But they were doing the best they could, and they were 
catching a million, million and a half a day, but the estimate was for 
every one that got caught, 10 got across. The flood was ongoing.
  There are many reasons and faults you can lay upon that: employers 
were hiring these people and maybe they shouldn't; we didn't have a 
good identification system for people to know whether or not someone 
was an illegal alien in this country; and the argument goes on and on. 
But the reality was we were creating a lawless border from Matamoros to 
Tijuana. And that lawlessness drew in organized crime in the form of 
these cartels, and those cartels are slaughtering people, fighting it 
out on the streets. Sometimes gunfire is as prevalent on the border 
towns across the river from Texas as it is in Iraq or Afghanistan. Just 
recently, 35 people were killed in a shootout in Juarez, across the 
border from El Paso, in one day. Many of those were Federal officers of 
the Mexican federal police force and the army.
  You say well, what does that have to do with us? Phoenix, Arizona, 
one of the places where a lot of folks up north go to get some warm 
weather in the wintertime, a really wonderful town. I have been there, 
it is a great town. It reminds you of a cross between the west of New 
Mexico and the west of California blending together there. It was a 
laid-back group of people. They enjoyed life. But now they are the 
kidnap capital of the United States. And it is not Americans kidnapping 
Americans, it is illegal people coming across our border and starting a 
big business of kidnapping people. They kidnap them and hold them for 
ransom, and if they don't get the ransom on time, they send them a hand 
or an arm, and ultimately maybe a head of their loved one to let them 
know that they didn't pay the money, and that is what happened to their 
loved one. We don't live with that kind of horror in this country, but 
there it is right there in Phoenix, Arizona. And that means that this 
lawlessness that exists on the border of this country, the southern 
border of this country, is bleeding over into the United States. We 
have got to do something about it.
  So the Arizona folks, they wrote themselves a law. And they basically 
said, they basically defined some stuff that Federal officers have had 
the ability to do for a long time. And they talked about the fact that 
if Washington is not going to do something, we are going to do 
something to try to find out who these people are who are coming across 
our border illegally. We have international people talking about us. We 
have the United Nations talking about a law in Arizona.
  Well, I want to throw something out, and I see the gentleman from 
Utah (Mr. Bishop) is here. And I am happy to have my colleague and 
classmate to join me tonight. It pleases me to no end, but I want to 
start off this conversation by pointing out something. Mr. Lamar Smith, 
who serves on the Judiciary Committee, told to a group of us last week, 
a statistic that he produced, which is very eye opening. We are 
criticized by the United Nations. We are criticized by China. We are 
being criticized by Russia. We are being criticized by EU countries 
over there about our horrible immigration policy.
  Over the past year, we have brought in legally through the legal 
process in this country over 1 million immigrants. By the way, that 
number and more has been going on for just about as far as you can look 
back in time and

[[Page 8499]]

see in this country. More than 1 million came into this country last 
year. You say, why do I mention that? What is the big deal about that 
number? I have news for you, my colleagues, here it is: That number 
equals more immigration than all the rest of the world combined. So 
these people that are criticizing the United States and our citizens, 
who are acting like we should look to some others as example, there are 
no other great examples of people who welcome immigrants but the United 
States because the United States by itself welcomes more than all the 
rest of the world put together.

                              {time}  2120

  Now, that ought to make us stop looking at ourselves as evil people. 
We, through a legal process, bring in more immigrants to our country 
and welcome them to be law-abiding citizens and come here and help make 
our country what it's always been, the great melting pot of America; 
and we do it legally. And they wait their turn. They get in line. They 
fill out the paperwork. They pay the fees. They do all that it takes to 
get here legally, and they are legal immigrants, and there are more of 
them than all the rest of the world combined has in their countries, 
added together.
  With that as our premise, that we are not evil people, we are people 
who care about immigrants, I'd like to yield such time as my friend, 
Rob Bishop from Utah, would like to spend in discussing this matter.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. I thank the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter) for 
introducing this issue and yielding the time.
  Madam Speaker and the gentleman from Texas, I think there are three 
terms I want to kind of emphasize over and over because it is the crux 
of the concern we have on our southern border: once again, it is 
illegal drugs. The bulk of the illegal drugs coming into this country 
are coming over on Federal lands in our southern border;
  The second one is human trafficking. And all the violence, especially 
the violence against women that is assumed with that concept of human 
trafficking coming across our border;
  And the fact that we have gaping holes in our border security, which 
is almost an open invitation for potential terrorists to come into this 
country.
  Now, the same issue, I need to be very clear, of our southern border 
is a concern in our northern border. But for the purposes of discussion 
today, I want to talk about the southern border and those three 
concepts: illegal drugs, human trafficking, and potential terrorists 
coming into this country. Because the bottom line is, Madam Speaker, 
Border Patrol is working. They're doing a great job. They are 
successful in urban areas, which means that most of the illegal 
traffic, the drug cartels, the human traffickers, potential terrorists, 
are now coming in rural areas along our southern borders because simply 
it is much easier.
  You can look at this map from California to El Paso, Texas. 
Everything that is colored is land owned by the Federal Government. 
Over 40 percent of the land along our southern border is Federal land. 
And 4.3 million acres of that Federal land is in wilderness category. 
This is the area in which we are having the illegal drugs and the human 
traffickers and potential terrorists coming because, flat out, it is 
easier to do that. And it's easier simply because our own Department of 
the Interior, which controls this land, to a lesser extent the Forest 
Service because they control lesser of the land, have simply placed as 
their number one policy for control of the land, realizing or 
protecting endangered species and wilderness categories, which simply 
means they are looking at the law very literally and, basically, hiding 
behind it.
  And one of the documents sent by the Interior Department says, 
Federal agencies are mandated to comply with a variety of land use 
laws, and compliance with that law, meaning wilderness and endangered 
species, both insulates those entities and agencies from legal 
liability.
  Now, what we're asking people to do is simply what I think should be 
common sense. But, unfortunately, the Interior Department and, to a 
lesser extent, the Forest Service, don't use common sense. They're 
hiding behind legal niceties.
  We realize that Homeland Security, which is in charge of our Border 
Patrol, gets this point. I was reading in the paper just today of a 
farm in Vermont that is now under potential threat of eminent domain by 
Homeland Security to take it over to beef up our border security along 
the north, which is so ironic because in the south that same entity 
that wants to beef up the security in Vermont is prohibited by another 
agency of government to do so.
  It is ironic because, as you see in this picture, this is part of the 
Federal land we have in the south, and you can there are vehicle 
barriers that are placed in this land. I want you to know those vehicle 
barriers are not to stop the drug cartels from coming in or the human 
traffickers. Those barriers are to protect against the Border Patrol 
driving into endangered species area and wilderness designation. It is 
to stop us from doing our job.
  Now, once again, I'm trying to emphasize again, we're talking about 
the illegal drugs coming in here, the violence and human trafficking 
and the potential, once again, of terrorists coming into this land.
  One of the eight entities along our southern border, and I read this 
in the paper on Sunday, it's the brown piece, if you can see it in 
Arizona--I hope I pronounce it properly--the Tohono O'odham tribe in 
Arizona, roughly about 70 miles of that border, recently participated 
for the first time, their tribal police and the FBI on Saturday of last 
week with the largest drug enforcement operation in tribal history.
  What they said when they raided homes to stop illegal drugs from 
coming in is that no longer is the tribe satisfied with having a 
corridor for the drug cartel coming into this country through tribal 
lands. They were setting down a marker that the tribe was going to 
enforce the border against illegal drugs coming into this country, 
which is the exact same thing, the message that should be sent out, but 
unfortunately the Federal Government isn't. The Department of the 
Interior, Forest Service, are not sending that same message out. 
Instead, as was mentioned by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Carter), 
Department of the Interior is holding Homeland Security for hostage, 
demanding money.
  Now, this is one of those strange coincidences. The Congress 
appropriates money both to Interior and to Homeland Security; and then 
all of a sudden we find negotiations between the two. Interior is 
demanding mitigation fees from Homeland Security. It's all coming from 
the same pot. Common sense would say we work that out ahead of time. 
But since 2007, at least $9 million have gone from Homeland Security 
over to Interior as mitigation fees. And apparently they have agreed to 
$50 million to do more than that, to try and protect these wilderness 
designations against incursion by Border Patrol because of all the 
damage they may do.
  Look, this is where the irony takes place. This is the wilderness we 
are trying to protect by keeping Border Patrol out. The trash you see 
in here was not made by Americans visiting this wilderness area. It was 
not made by the Border Patrol trying to protect the border and 
security. It was made by the illegal drug cartels and, once again, the 
human traffickers coming through and leaving the litter behind. In our 
effort to protect the land, we are destroying the very land we are 
trying to protect. And once again, this is just, flat out, not common 
sense.
  I could give you some quotes from Secretary Napolitano, a letter she 
sent out at one time. She said, One of the issues affecting the 
efficacy of the Border Patrol operations within wilderness is the 
prohibition against mechanical conveyance. The Border Patrol regularly 
depends upon these conveyances, and the removal of such advantage is 
detrimental to the ability to accomplish national security missions. 
While the Border Patrol recognizes the importance and value of 
wilderness area designations, they can have a significant impact on 
Border Patrol operations in border areas.

[[Page 8500]]

  For example, it may be inadvisable for officers' safety to wait for 
the arrival of horses to pursue, for pursuit purposes.
  One of the major challenges in deploying our SBInet technology to 
remote locations along the border is ensuring compliance with 
environmental regulations. Environmental regulations may be subject to 
varied interpretations, depending on what level of the agency or the 
organization is involved. The removal of cross-border violators from 
public lands is a value to the environment, as well as to the mission 
to land managers. That's what we should be doing.
  Here is also where the human element comes in here.

                              {time}  2130

  2002, Park Ranger Kris Eggle was shot and killed while in the line of 
duty while pursuing a member of the drug cartel who had crossed into 
the U.S. border illegally through one of those areas.
  In 2008, Border Patrol Agent Luis Aguilar killed in the line of duty 
after being intentionally hit by a vehicle that had illegally crossed 
into the United States through Federal lands again.
  Rob Krentz, a long-time pioneer down in the Arizona area. This is an 
elderly gentleman who just had his back fused and had one hip 
replacement and was scheduled for another, so the ability to either 
fight or flee was not in his vocabulary. He was murdered along with his 
dog, once again by a member of the drug cartel who came across on 
Federal lands which prohibits the Border Patrol from going into those 
lands because of endangered species. And when the murder took place, he 
went a long, circuitous route to get back to Mexico, going once again 
through those exact same lands that are not open to the border 
security.
  For example, I showed you the picture of the barricades. Well, this 
is the area in which the murderer entered this country and exited the 
country. Now, once again, those barricades are not to stop the drug 
cartels and the murderers from coming in. Those stop the Border Patrol 
from having mechanical access to these particular areas.
  The Krentz family sent out a release that said, ``The disregard of 
our repeated pleas and warnings for impending violence towards our 
community fell on deaf ears that are shrouded in political correctness, 
and as a result we have paid the ultimate price for their negligence in 
credibly securing our border lands.''
  Because this family came and testified before Congress in 2007, these 
are the words they told Congress at that time. ``The Border Patrol 
should not be excluded, nor should the national security of the United 
States be sacrificed, in order to create a wilderness area that is not 
even roadless, as required by law. It has almost produced a state of 
war on drugs. It is now too dangerous to hike. There are break-ins, 
high-speed chases, fatal and nonfatal shootings. The pristine areas of 
the proposed wilderness areas have already been trashed. Drug smugglers 
should not take precedence over honest, hardworking Americans who 
recreate and whose livelihood is damaged.'' They estimated $6.2 million 
in damage to their ranch and water lines because of illegal foot 
traffic.
  And finally, they gave a plea that was not heard. ``We are in fear of 
our lives and safety and health of ourselves and that of our families 
and friends. Please defend the law and our rights. We live it. We have 
been refused legal protection for our property and our lives when 
dealing with border issues and illegals. We are the victims.''
  Mr. Krentz is no longer here, once again, because we put a higher 
priority on the sacredness of the wilderness characteristic of land and 
endangered species than we did on simple common sense of controlling 
the border to stop the drug cartels, the human traffickers and the rape 
trees that go along with them, and the potential of terrorists.
  A couple of weeks ago, once again, a deputy was wounded on wilderness 
land where he was forced to leave his vehicle and walk into the 
wilderness area, by the rules of how we handle this land, where he 
walked into an ambush, again by a drug cartel. He lives, but he was 
wounded for it.
  We have an area down in Arizona called the Organ Pipe National 
Monument, one of those creations of executive fiat that we did so well 
with. Two-thirds of that national monument within the United States is 
off limits to Americans because we do not control it. The drug cartel 
controls that territory. We are talking about the sovereignty of the 
United States. We are giving it up along the southern border to the bad 
guys.
  These are people who aren't picking tomatoes or milking cows. These 
are drug runners. These are human traffickers. These are people who 
create violence of unspeakable levels against women at all times. These 
are the potential terrorists. And we, because of our inaction, are 
giving up vast stretches of American property to the drug cartel so 
that not even Americans can go into these national monuments. There is 
no common sense. No rational person would ever say this should be our 
policy. But indeed, we have come to that particular policy.
  I am very disgusted with our Secretary of the Interior who talks very 
good about this issue, but has yet to change the policies, and people 
are getting shot and killed down there. We mentioned the Arizona law. I 
think if the law that has been proposed by the ranking Republican on 
both Judiciary and Homeland Security and Natural Resources and myself, 
who is the ranking member on the Public Lands Subcommittee, if we were 
to have that policy, it would have eliminated a great deal of the fear 
and anxiety that was the primary motivation of this particular law.
  If people realized the priority of this Congress and this Nation is 
to secure the border to stop the bad people from coming in, to stop the 
drug runners and the human traffickers and the terrorists, perhaps 
there wouldn't be the need to create some kind of State entity. But 
that's what we should be doing. And what is so sad in this Congress is 
during this past year both Houses of Congress have recognized that.
  The Senate added language to an appropriations bill that said, 
despite our other rules, border security and the securing of our 
southern border will be the highest priority on our southern border. It 
was passed in the Senate, stripped in committee before it came to the 
floor, and therefore was not added to our law.
  We here in the House took another bill, and on a motion to recommit, 
we added almost the exact same language; overwhelmingly passed here in 
the House in a bill that now sits in the Senate and is now going 
nowhere. Both Houses, bipartisan, have recognized that this is common 
sense, this should be our joint policy, but as of yet, we have yet to 
move forward on that.
  Secretary Salazar at one time went to the southern border. We issued 
four challenges to him. I would like to reissue those challenges:
  End the Interior Department's policy of having Homeland Security and 
Border Patrol having to gain permission for access to all territory;
  Two, acknowledge that environmental damage and destruction is 
happening by all these illegal crossings;
  Three, stop impeding the Border Patrol's access both electronically 
and on foot to these particular areas, and;
  Number four, end the Interior Department's practice of extorting 
mitigation funds from Homeland Security.
  Those are four things that could be done administratively and should 
be done administratively today. If we could do that, we would know that 
we would put a great dent on the illegal drugs that are destroying this 
country, the illegal violence that is taking place on that border, and 
the potential of terrorists, as we simply have gaping holes in our 
southern border--and, ironically enough, in our northern border--that 
need to be stopped simply by saying our number one goal in the southern 
border is to stop this illegal activity by securing the border. And 
after that, after that, then we can move on to other issues.
  But if a nation is going to be sovereign, we must control all our 
lands and we must control our border. And

[[Page 8501]]

there is nothing that should stop us from doing it. Common sense tells 
us that. Unfortunately, common sense is not the rule today. It must be 
the rule today.
  I yield back to the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. CARTER. And I thank my friend. Reclaiming my time, I thank you 
very much for that explanation. And, in fact, I learned a lot from the 
explanation.
  One of the questions that I was always curious about and should have 
asked is these vehicle barriers that they kept talking about were part 
of the fence, and they weren't really building a fence, but they were 
building vehicle barriers where the vehicles couldn't get back in 
there. And it was my impression from what I had learned from law 
enforcement that vehicles weren't their problem; it was foot traffic 
that was their problem. Now I learn the vehicles kept law enforcement's 
vehicles out.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. If the gentleman would yield?
  Mr. CARTER. I certainly do.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. It is one of those peculiarities that has 
happened that some of the barriers that used to be used and are now 
surplus because a bigger fence is now in place have now been put into 
other areas. And indeed, it's been a barrier to stop Americans and the 
Border Patrol from going into road areas in these particular areas.
  It is not necessary for us to have a fixed fence along the entire 
border. But where we do not have a fixed fence, we need to have the 
electronic devices necessary for monitoring that area, especially the 
hilly areas, the very mountainous areas along the southern border. That 
makes a whole lot more sense. The problem is, if once again you have 
identified wilderness characteristics in that land, you may not put the 
electronic recording devices on wilderness land. Therefore, the Border 
Patrol is forced to move their recording devices area, which once again 
creates these huge gaps in the security. That's what we are trying to 
say.
  There is nothing wrong with trying to protect the wilderness, trying 
to protect endangered species, but first of all, we have to stop the 
drugs. We have to stop the human trafficking. We have to close these 
gaping holes for potential terrorists coming in here. If we can't do 
that, the wilderness characteristic has no meaning. It has no value to 
us. That has to be our number one priority. Common sense tells you 
that.
  That's why I am proud that on the bill that we have, Representative 
King from Homeland Security, Representative Smith from Judiciary, 
Representative Hastings from Resources joined together, along with 40 
other cosponsors, to try to push this through again and make clear that 
what we are doing is simply what common people would say is the right 
thing to do.
  I yield back again.

                              {time}  2140

  Mr. CARTER. I think common sense is more in short supply in this 
place than any place else on Earth. If we had more common sense that 
makes sense, and you know you mentioned something that--I don't like to 
use shock value when talking to the American citizens but they ought to 
know when we say lawlessness on the border, you mentioned something 
that is a horrible thing. The rape trees.
  Now, with all of your imagination just think about this. These are 
like monuments to women who have been brought across the border from 
the other side of the border, and then the people who brought them rape 
them before they move on, and they hang their undergarments on the tree 
as a monument to that rape. And our folks who patrol the border call 
those ``rape trees.''
  Now, if that doesn't get your attention about lawlessness, I don't 
know what's going to. But when I learned about that, you know--and then 
I talked to a man from Rock Springs--which is a pretty darned good ways 
from the border in Texas--and the interesting thing is, if you look at 
that map that Mr. Bishop laid up there, you didn't see any Federal 
lands in Texas. Texas is the only State that entered the Union 
retaining its public lands.
  But it even makes for more problems for us, too, because all of the 
land along the Rio Grande River in Texas belongs to Texans--ranchers 
and farmers and so forth. And we start dealing with barriers. That even 
creates a bigger problem in some ways by--because these folks, it's 
their private land and you have to deal with them.
  So whatever you do, the issues of our law, they stay in the way. But 
putting up barriers to interfere with the enforcement of the law I 
think is aiding and abetting criminal activity. But then I wouldn't 
mind taking it to a jury. I think it would be an interesting argument.
  But the stories that you just related to me--John Culberson, also a 
Member from Texas, related that he had seen in New Mexico and Arizona 
lookout posts that are established on the Indian reservations and on 
the public lands where they sit up there and look for the Border Patrol 
so they can radio back and bring people across at various areas. It's 
like they own that. It's like that's their ranchero. That's their place 
on the border. We are having our country invaded. And it's bad enough 
to talk about people coming over, all of these poor people coming over 
to get a job. True. Absolutely. Some great folks coming over trying to 
get a job. But we could do better. We could figure out a way to get 
them over here without this lawlessness on the border, because if 
you're not going to defend your country, then what good are you? What 
good is this place if we're not going to defend our country?
  And your description--in our land. They are invading our land that 
belongs to the United States of America. My Lord. We ought to be 
willing to defend that land.
  I yield back to my friend
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. If I could just amplify that point in some small 
degree. And once again, as the gentleman from Texas recognized, as you 
notice, there's only one national park along the Texas side. Everything 
else--which is an added benefit because Texas now cooperates a whole 
lot easier than unfortunately some of the Federal agencies do that are 
from New Mexico through to the Pacific Coast. But you're right.
  There are, within these drug cartels, they do have lookout spots with 
night vision, machine guns. They have all of the equipment that's 
necessary as they now are engaged in a war amongst themselves.
  The deputy who was recently shot was the 12th shooting that took 
place in this area. The bulk of those shootings are not necessarily 
against Americans but cartel versus cartel. The difference was this is 
the first one that actually got hit with one of these shootings. And 
what is more illustrative of this situation, as this deputy was 
basically lulled into an ambush, and especially as our good friend, the 
rancher down there, who was doing nothing more than simply traveling on 
his land in a cart because he did not have the ability to move very 
freely, in the past drug cartels when approached would disappear. What 
we're finding out now is there's a change of attitude. All of a sudden 
now they are not running away. They stood their ground, and they shot 
the rancher, and they shot his dog. They stood their ground, and they 
lured the deputy into an ambush and shot him.
  There is a change in the attitude that is taking place there. And as 
the gentleman from Texas said, this is a change that's not taking place 
in Mexico--which would be bad enough--this is taking place in the 
United States. And still the Federal Government does not change its 
policies and procedures to combat that.
  We seem as if there are land managers who are satisfied with making 
sure that drug cartels control our territory.
  In Oregon Pipe National Monument, indeed the land manager down there, 
Mr. Baiza, seemed to be more concerned about the fact that the Border 
Patrol, instead of doing a Y to back up and go around, was going in a 
circular pattern on his land than he was about the fact that two-thirds 
of his land is controlled by the drug cartel, and

[[Page 8502]]

Americans cannot go there unless they are escorted with an armed 
escort. And even then--it is amazing that as part of our publicity to 
attract people to visit public lands, we tell them, You can't go here. 
That seems like a bizarre concept, and it certainly doesn't define 
sovereignty as I thought sovereignty was defined.
  I yield back to the gentleman who was spot-on in that observation.
  Mr. CARTER. Here's another thing. We're talking about the rural 
areas, which, you know, one time we were having a hearing in Homeland 
Security; we were talking about helicopters, and we were talking about 
drones. And many people were asking about it. So I asked them, Okay, 
Now, there's at least some people that--we had Duncan Hunter at that 
time who was saying we not only needed a double fence for the entire 
border, but we needed a high-speed highway in between it so that the 
Border Patrol could respond quickly.
  And so I asked this guy about these helicopters. I said, Okay, what 
do you use these helicopters for? He said Well, we go out and we spot 
these large groups of immigrants that are crossing in Arizona and New 
Mexico and some in California. I said, Oh, so if our electronic 
equipment gives you a signal that there's something there, you go out 
there and you look at them from your helicopter and you swoop down. No, 
no, no. We don't swoop down. We check to see if they have adequate 
water and food supplies. And if they don't, we drop them water and food 
supplies so they don't die in the desert.
  Well, that's very compassionate. But now I hear from my friend in 
Rock Springs who was talking about sitting on his back porch of his 
ranch looking down into sort of a drawdown behind his place, and his 
wife said, Look there. That looks like 20 illegals crossing our 
property. Get in the truck and go down and run them off. And he said, 
Mama, wait a minute. And he picked up his binoculars and looked, and he 
saw at least the two at the front of that line of folks had automatic 
weapons over their shoulder, and the two at the end of the line had 
automatic weapons over their shoulder. And all of them had large 
backpacks on their back, obviously carrying drugs.
  And he said, Mama, you don't shoo those people off. They'll kill you. 
We'll call the Border Patrol. Hopefully they will do something about 
it. He called them. They didn't get there. They tried but they didn't 
get there. They were too far away.
  But here's something from CNN. This was May 18, 2010. Tuesday, May 
18. That's pretty current. Twenty-five people have been killed over 
this weekend in drug-related violence in the Mexican border city of 
Ciudad Juarez. Among those slain were 30 Federal police personnel, 
including three officers who had been engaged in controlling the ever-
increasing spate of violence in the north Mexican City. Ciudad Juarez 
in Tijuana state is now the world's murder capital with near a thousand 
murders occurring since January 2010.
  This city lying close to the border with Texas of the United States 
has witnessed a surge of violence in recent times over control of the 
key drug smuggling routes to the U.S. between rival gangs of Sinaloa 
and Juarez cartels.
  That's a clip out of the newspaper. That's day before yesterday, 
right? Or today. That's yesterday. Yeah. No, it's today. That's today. 
That's out of today's newspaper. But that's about this last weekend.
  Now, we can't stand still and let this happen on our border. We are 
sending soldiers into harm's way in places around the world to stop 
violence and 23,000 people have died across the border in a place 
where, by the way, by Texas standpoint, many of us call--used to be one 
of the places that we dearly loved to visit. We have friends that we 
know of across the border. In my lifetime, I've been across that border 
more than a hundred times, probably 500 times.
  So although there were places you didn't want to go over there, there 
still was--they were still a sister city. People forget that El Paso-
Juarez is a city of I think almost 3 million people. It's a huge 
metropolitan area. That's a big city over there across the border. And 
look at the violence that took place this weekend.
  We see the shows on television with the gangs shooting at each other. 
But they are happening across the border from major cities like El 
Paso.
  I yield back.
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. I appreciate that, and I understand we do have 
some sensitivity to the issues that are taking place in Mexico, and I 
am proud that the Mexican government is starting to crack down on the 
illegal drug cartels on their side of the border. And it is a violence 
that is spilling over. And in some respects, we don't have the ability 
to control that.
  But where we do have the ability to control--and once again I have to 
go back to the fact that our land policy is now the prime area in which 
the violence is taking place, in which the drug cartels are trying to 
go, where we do have the ability to control, it is simply wrong for us 
not to do that. It is wrong for us to have as our national policy--it's 
wrong for us to have any other national priority than securing our 
southern border for the safety of our people.
  And once again, what we are talking about is the worst kinds of 
people we want to keep out of here. We're not talking about stopping, 
as you mentioned very early on, stopping all immigration in this 
country. There are certain kinds of entrepreneurial spirits we want to 
have in this Nation. The drug cartels are not that person. The human 
traffickers are not that person, are not that. Those who are bringing 
in potential prostitutes are not that. Those who are actually doing the 
rape trees with the monuments--just unthinkable violence--those are not 
the kind we're after. And the potential terrorists carrying a bomb or 
any other kind of device is now something that we must have as 
uppermost in our consideration.
  And that's why when we have the opportunity at least to establish 
policy and procedures on the Federal level that deal specifically with 
Federal land, it is just flat out wrong of us not to insist that we do 
that.

                              {time}  2150

  Mr. CARTER. If the gentleman would yield for a moment. Question: When 
America retains or takes public land, aren't we as a body of Americans 
stewards of that land for this Nation? Isn't it our job to take care of 
the property that the Federal Government has? Isn't that the job of the 
Interior Department, to be a good steward of that land, to make sure 
that land thrives and it is safe and it is a part of the body politic 
of the whole country's ownership?
  Now, how can they possible think that it is for the well-being of the 
American populace to have our land that we own as a body politic full 
of drug dealers, rapists, and prostitute smugglers? Why in the world 
won't they open the roads up to our law enforcement to go in there and 
stop this?
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. The gentleman, if I may, asks a pertinent 
question, a two-part question. First, I wish the Federal Government 
didn't own quite so much land; I would be happier with that. But if 
they are going to take control of that land, they have to take control 
of that land.
  In deference to some within the Department of the Interior and Forest 
Service, because once again I think common sense would say if people 
were of like mind and people were of good purposes, they should be able 
to sit down and work these situations out. This is not rocket science. 
This should be common sense. But in deference to some of them, the law 
to which they look for guidance says they have to manage it for 
wilderness designation and endangered species aspects first. That is 
the way they are interpreting it. I personally think they could 
reinterpret that very easily administratively if they chose. But that 
is the interpretation, which is one of the other reasons I think the 
law that we have proposed, the law that passed in the Senate but didn't 
get over here, that we passed over here but didn't pass in the Senate, 
needs to be put in place so we make it very, very clear that on

[[Page 8503]]

these public lands, indeed, public security is the number one priority, 
and that we want to stop the drugs and the violence from coming across 
here.
  Mr. CARTER. And to yield to another question: Isn't it a fact that 
the kind of people that they are letting in there without any law 
enforcement being able to stop them are not what you would call good 
citizens for taking care of the wilderness nor good citizens for 
protecting endangered species?
  Look at that picture you are holding up there: bottles, cans, 
clothing. It looks like the city dump outside of the city here. Now, is 
that protecting our wilderness?
  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. That's the irony of the situation in which we 
find ourselves. The very land we are trying to protect is the land that 
is being destroyed by people who don't care about the quality and 
purpose of the land. And this is what we must stop. This is, 
unfortunately, what the reality of today is. And that is sad. And it 
should be one of the reasons why our policies should be very clear and 
very open, and why, when you talk to people, they shake their heads in 
amazement, because this just does not make common sense.
  I think you may have some statistics about that.
  Mr. CARTER. Just real quickly, we have this issue with the Arizona 
law. And I think everyone says that the Arizona law really is an outcry 
from Arizonans saying: if you are not going to do it, we are all going 
to get involved.
  But maybe the administration is setting a policy or a mindset here 
that is causing some of these things, because public opinion versus the 
opinion of our Speaker and our President seem to go in opposite 
directions.
  Public opinion, and I believe that after they heard what you said 
tonight, they would even say it louder, they would say: my Lord, if we 
are not enforcing our borders and all this horrible stuff is happening 
down there, somebody has got to. And I don't blame Arizona for saying 
we want to have the right to ask questions.
  So look at these polls: 51 percent, Gallup 59 approved; McClatchy 
Newspaper 61 approved; Fox News 61 approve. And yet President Obama; 
Attorney General Eric Holder; the Secretary of State, Posner; and the 
Department spokeswoman, P.J. Crowley, all seem to take the position 
that this is some horrible infringement upon goodness and mercy and the 
Constitution of the United States.
  Well, maybe we have got to get our minds set straight. We have got to 
start realizing that our job as Members of this Congress, this whole 
body, we take an oath to preserve, protect, and defend the 
Constitution. And in that Constitution, it tells us one of our 
responsibilities is to defend our Nation against all enemies.
  These are enemies of our country. If you don't believe it, I will be 
glad to take you down to places in Texas where the abuse of the drugs 
that are killing our children are clear to be seen on the streets, and 
you tell me if that's not an attack on our country for those drugs to 
come pouring in here. And you tell me the rapes are not an attack. 
Maybe it is happening to poor innocent people from foreign lands 
getting smuggled in here, but the rapes are taking place in the United 
States; and that aggravated sexual assault is taking place on those 
hundreds of women. That is a serious felony offense in every 
jurisdiction in this country. And we know it is going on, and we are 
using regulations to hold the hands of those who would protect those 
innocents. It drives you nuts to listen to this stuff.

                              {time}  2200

  Mr. BISHOP of Utah. I appreciate your emphasis on the public attitude 
there. I do not have a window into the hearts of what Arizona 
legislators may or may not have done. But in the back of my mind, I 
cannot keep telling myself, or I cannot keep wondering, that if we as a 
Federal Government had actually taken charge of our southern border and 
our northern border, if we as a Federal Government had stopped the most 
heinous of individuals who are freely coming in here now, perhaps the 
anxiety level or the anger level would not have made necessary the 
particular Arizona statute. Now, that's pure speculation on my part as 
well. But I cannot help thinking that if we were doing our jobs and 
getting all of the government agencies--Interior, Ag, Forest Service, 
and Homeland Security--to work together and do the right thing for 
people, just to take a commonsense approach, that we would lower at 
least the rhetoric of the discussion, and we would raise the security 
feeling of people, and maybe people like Rob Krentz would be alive 
today to be with his family.
  Mr. CARTER. Well, I thank the gentleman for coming down here and 
actually enlightening me on some facts that I was not aware of because, 
like I say, we retain our public lands in Texas. So we look at Texas, 
the issues--it's just as serious on the Texas border, but it's a 
different issue on the Texas border. But they're all serious. The 
incursions into Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California are getting 
worse every time they occur, and it's time for us to unite and defend 
our borders.
  We need an immigration policy that works. I'm for that. I think 
everyone is. But I'm not for rewarding criminal behavior. I will never 
be rewarding criminal behavior. We need to stop the border and seal it 
up and then come up with an immigration policy that is fair and takes 
into mind that the law has a purpose in this country. It is the glue 
that holds this society together.
  I thank my friend for coming and joining me.

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