Thread: Janet Napolitano: 'This is a civilian border'

Napolitano: 'This is a civilian border'
By: Josh Gerstein
September 17, 2010 05:13 PM EDT

Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano on Friday warned against militarizing the U.S.-Mexico border and insisted that, despite a public outcry over illegal immigration and violence in the area, security along the nearly 2000-mile-long dividing line with Mexico is actually improving.

“This is a civilian border,â€

Homeland Security chief rebuffs Gov. Rick Perry on U.S. border patrols

04:51 PM CDT on Friday, September 17, 2010
By TODD J. GILLMAN / The Dallas Morning News
115 comments

WASHINGTON — The nation’s homeland security chief left little doubt Friday that Texas Gov. Rick Perry — rebuffed repeatedly in his demands for more National Guard along the border — can forget about getting more troops.

The federal government has already invested $600 million to tighten security, Secretary Janet Napolitano said, noting that illegal immigration and smuggling are down, while violence from Mexico’s drug war remains contained across the border.

“He is a governor. He always has the ability, in a way, to bring up National Guard, if he’s willing to pay for them,â€

[quote][b]“This is a civilian border,â€

what the hell is a civilian border???
this makes no damn sense.

your job is to keep the homeland safe. hence the name of your department,. HOMELAND SECURITY.

Now do you job and dont tell Congress or the American people that immigration reform needs to be passed. ENFORCE THE DAMN LAWS ON THE BOOKS. and do your damn job


and since she took a cheap shot at my governor. janet, you incompetent fool i have one word, TREASON

More of the same, IRRESPONSIBLE ARROGANCE!

Why hasn't Obamy thrown her under the bus yet?? Seriously is she that dumb??

Nappy, we have news for you. But you have to pull your head out of your back door wind tunnel to read it....the border is WORSE than ever! Have you been smokin' some of that dope being muled northward or are you just plain stupid? Civilian border? If you don't get off your fat folded backside you are going to find out just how Civil-ian the border is going to get. Are militias going to have to show you how to secure the border? Quit shovin' those cream cheese bagels down your pie hole and come down here yourself and stand by one of those idiot signs that you had posted. Reality just might smack some sense into that empty cavity you have sittin' on your shoulders!!

So it's OK to patrol our sea and air borders with the US military, look at how they keep Hatian and other sea born illegals out, but not our land border with Mexico? Sounds like racism to me, special treatment for "The Cosmic Race" maybe?

Feds again tell Perry no more guardsmen
Homeland Security chief says governor can call up more units to border anytime — at Texas' expense
By STEWART M. POWELL
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Sept. 17, 2010, 11:24PM

WASHINGTON — Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano again rebuffed Texas Gov. Rick Perry's call for more U.S.-paid National Guard troops along the Texas-Mexico border, insisting Friday that current deployments are enough and the governor can call up troops anytime — at his own expense.

Napolitano's comment was the latest riposte in politically charged exchanges between Texas' Republican governor and President Barack Obama's administration dating back to Perry's call for 1,000 federally paid National Guard troops 20 months ago.

Perry's office has said spillover drug cartel violence along the border is a persistent threat to Texans and Obama's administration should pay for protection.

Obama ordered 250 National Guard troops to the Texas border at federal expense in August as part of an emergency call-up of 1,200 troops along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Perry spokeswoman Katherine Cesinger said the stepped-up border security measures have been "grossly insufficient," particularly since border security and homeland security remain federal responsibilities.

"As a former border governor, Secretary Napolitano knows how greatly unjust it is for this administration to pass the cost and burden of keeping the entire nation safe on to the taxpayers of Texas," she said.

Resisting call for troops
Gangland battles continue unabated in Ciudad Juarez across from El Paso, but they also have escalated dramatically in the states of Tamaulipas and Nuevo Leon along Texas' southeast border.

The administration has resisted calls for additional troops, citing a $600 million buildup of federal law enforcement personnel and technology already committed in response to Mexican drug wars along the border.

"We have been putting resources into the border at an unprecedented rate," Napolitano said Friday.

The Obama administration is "paying particular attention" to border communities concerned about spillover violence, she emphasized.

But neither the U.S. Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection nor local county sheriffs are seeing signs of violence threatening U.S. border communities, as some Republican politicians claim, Napolitano said.

Insufficient resources
National Guard troops are being deployed where they are needed and "if that need changes, they will be moved," Napolitano said.

Perry, she said, can call up the National Guard in Texas if he wants to pay for it: "That's always an option available to a governor," she said.

Perry has criticized the administration for giving Texas only 20 percent of the federally paid National Guard troops along the southwest border when the state's border accounts for 64 percent of the 1,969-mile border.

"I don't need a Washington briefing to tell me that the car bombs going off across the Rio Grande, the cartels recruiting teenage Texans as hit men and bullets from shootouts hitting UT-Brownsville and El Paso's City Hall are signs that things are going from bad to worse," Perry told the National Guard Association Convention last month. "America needs swift action and sufficient resources to protect our border communities and the families who call them home."

Perry, as commander in chief of the Texas National Guard, activated 48 troops, two Blackhawk helicopters and 10 high-clearance military vehicles at state expense in early September to support search-and-rescue efforts after flooding from the remnants of Tropical Storm Hermine.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/met ... 06714.html

[quote]“This is a civilian border,â€