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Can Richardson make rest of U.S. care about Mexico line?

By Jeffry Gardner
Tribune Reporter
August 27, 2005

Fifteen American states border foreign countries - 18 if you count states adjoining Texas. Just kidding! We love Texas.

Eleven states run smack into Canada, though a couple share a Great Lake or two as the borderline. Three states abut Mexico, while another, Texas again, shares the Rio Grande with it.

Perhaps it's the common-language thing, but Canadians aren't flocking into the United States seeking opportunity - only our horrible health care. Go figure.

Of course, non-Canadian residents of Canada use that nation's lax immigration rules to drift into the United States - something the Canadian Parliament repeatedly states it's going to do something about, as soon as its members and government ministers can unanimously agree on an appropriate vilification of President Bush for use in news releases and off-camera remarks.

But some estimates place as many as 7 million people, out of a total of 103 million, from south of the border in our nation. Some do so legally. Most don't.

Testimony before Congress in 1999 estimated that the influx of illegal immigrants to the United States from Mexico and Central America was running about 300,000 annually. That number has nearly doubled during the past six years.

The federal government is charged with keeping our borders secure. Practically speaking, however, Americans in 35 states aren't too concerned about ranches being robbed, highways being driven by drug runners, or schools and hospitals being flooded by people who reap the benefits at zero expense to them.

Add the 11 states along the Canadian border, and you have 46 states in our republic that, by and large, don't care about illegal immigration from Mexico.

Enter Gov. Bill Richardson. With a lot of lights, cameras and action, he seized the national spotlight - again - by declaring a state of emergency in the counties that border Mexico.

In a typical and brilliant political stroke, Richardson is getting his cake and eating it, too. On the one hand, Richardson is a driving force in the Democrats' efforts to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants. With motor-voter registration available, this could be a gold mine for Democratic voter rolls.

But wait: Aren't only U.S. citizens supposed to vote in our elections? That opens the door to the issue of requiring voter IDs, doesn't it? What a tangled web, eh?

Politics aside, though, our driver's licenses are our most common and universal identification. Offering them to illegal immigrants poses an enormous security risk all its own.

Still, Richardson gets to posture now as a "get tough on illegal immigration" governor. It's paying off, too. He's playing the national political talk-show circuit - precisely what you want if you're not running for president.

But let's give him his props. With the White House paying little but lip service to the problem and Congress obliging the constituents of the states that seem not to care, Big Bill is drawing some much-needed attention to the problem.