Thread: Congress works to ease OTM problems

Congress works to ease OTM problems

By Bill Sontag
Del Rio News-Herald
http://www.delrionewsherald.com/report.lasso?wcd=9164
Published May 23, 2005

“Del Rio would be a logical place for some of the detention beds, and of course, with them you get officers,� U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison said.

Hutchison, in town Friday for BRAC deliberations with civic leaders and Air Force brass, responded to a News-Herald question about expanded and new missions at Laughlin Air Force Base.

“We should be looking at other missions that could go with this base,� Hutchison said earlier in her Del Rio International Airport press conference.
Hutchison said she considers the base important to “homeland security.�

After Hutchison’s whirlwind visit, Mayor Dora G. Alcalá relaxed in her City Hall office and considered possibilities of a base-sited detention center for “Other Than Mexican� illegal immigrants.

“I could see that at Laughlin,� Alcalá said. “But when you think of OTMs, why not gather them in the community, take them to Laughlin and fly them out of here?�

Conventional wisdom says such a practice is simply too expensive, but Alcalá hopes better judgment will prevail, considering the risks of setting OTM’s free to go where they wish with little accountability.

A new immigrant detention and processing center in Pearsall, 125 miles east of Del Rio, boasts just over 1,000 “detention beds.�

The South Texas Detention Complex is strikingly similar to facilities proposed here last year by a Del Rio consortium of business, government and civic leaders.

Alcalá and Del Rio realtor Michaelanna Hunter called the proposal an “Institutional Removal Program,� featuring detention capacity to deal with skyrocketing numbers of OTMs.

OTM illegal immigrants typically descend on and cross the U.S. border from Central American, Caribbean and South American countries.

More than 80 percent of apprehended OTMs are released into the U.S. population in South Texas border cities because there are insufficient detention facilities for the hordes now attracted to the promise of a brighter future in America.

But according to statistics provided by Paul Berg, U.S. Border Patrol Del Rio Sector chief patrol agent, OTMs apprehended in this sector alone could fill the Pearsall complex in a week.

And McAllen Sector OTMs could max out the South Texas Detention Complex in less than four days.

Of the four Border Patrol sectors spanning the Texas border along the Rio Grande, McAllen and Del Rio top the list of OTM apprehensions, followed by Laredo and El Paso sectors.

The Pearsall complex will also include both space and function of an immigration judge to expedite processing.

But Carl Rusnok, director of communications for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Central Division, headquartered in Dallas, said Saturday that processing OTM’s is not inherently expeditious.

“They go before an immigration judge, under the Department of Justice’s Executive Office for Immigration Review,� Rusnok said. “And the judge will determine whether they should be removed from the country, or be allowed to stay.

“Next they may receive a final ‘order to remove,’ but then they can appeal the order. It’s not a quick process.�

So the glut of immigrants and the slow judicial process seemingly conspired with the lack of detention capacity along the U.S.-Mexico border between Del Rio and Brownsville to force the release of more than 52,000 OTMs within the past eight months.

Key members of the Texas congressional delegation are sponsoring legislative funding solutions to staunch what they see as hemorrhaging security on the border with Mexico.

“Ignoring the problem is ignoring the war against terrorism,� said U.S. Rep. Henry Bonilla in a May 12 press release.
Bonilla announced success in keeping $690 million in the House budget preparations for Homeland Security appropriations.

Detention facilities holding nearly 4,000 beds may be on tap if the funds find their way into the next budget bill.

Hutchison announced last week that she and Sen. John Ensign (R-Nev.) co-sponsored a successful amendment to the Senate’s Fiscal Year 2006 budget resolution that would fund 2,000 more Border Patrol agent positions.

The proposed $352 million would be “transferred from international affairs,� according to Chris Paulitz, Hutchison’s Washington office public affairs chief.

In addition, Hutchison also announced her support for an amendment, passed in the Senate on May 10, to this year’s spending bill for “Emergency Defense.�

The supplemental funding would provide an immediate “down payment� of 500 new Border Patrol agents, against the total of 2,000 to be funded in the FY 2006 “omnibus� budget bill.

In addition, the Senate’s emergency-spending supplement for this fiscal year would add facilities in south Texas for 1,950 “detention beds,� $4 million for officer training, and 50 additional U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement investigators.

U.S. Sen. John Cornyn has joined the frenzy of support for tightened borders. According to Don Stewart, the senator’s Washington office press chief, Cornyn is chair of the Immigration, Border Security and Citizenship Subcommittee of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The subcommittee has held four hearings on the topics this year, Stewart said.

“And that’s three more than were held last year,� he added.

According to Stewart, Cornyn, like many of his Texas colleagues in Congress, endorses an across-the-board approach to border security problems.

“This summer, he intends to introduce comprehensive legislation to address enhancement of border security, better interior enforcement procedures, better employee accountability, and a plan for temporary guest workers,� Stewart said.

Why in the WORLD when the majority of illegal aliens are Mexican, would they only be working to detain and remove OTMs?

Only a sick and corrupt process would devise such a distinction as OTM.

I think OTM is discriminatory.

I think a better objective for the detention and removal process would be:

AIA--All Illegal Aliens!

Afterall, THIS IS what our Laws Prescribe.

Who are these people, where do they wear their souls, and where do they get these silly ideas and the money for them?

Does anyone remember approving a plan that would "detain and remove" only OTMS?

Did I miss something?

I don't understand just OTM's either...nor do I understand hearings..and I surely don't speak appeals. These are NOT citizens...and do not have the rights of citizens. Period.

RR