John Boehner wants National Guard on southern border
John Boehner wants National Guard on southern border
http://images.politico.com/global/20...er_328_js4.jpg'It is time that we confront the crisis along the border head-on,' wrote
By SEUNG MIN KIM | 6/20/14 11:15 AM EDT
Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) fired off a letter to President Barack Obama on the escalating crisis of unaccompanied minors trying to illegally enter the United States, urging him to deploy the National Guard to the border “immediately” to aid in the response.
In the letter sent Friday, Boehner blamed the Obama administration’s immigration policies for perpetuating a belief that “once they reach U.S. soil, they will be able to stay here indefinitely.” That has been an argument used increasingly in recent days by congressional Republicans who view Obama’s immigration policies as too lax.
The National Guard could deal with the needs of the undocumented children apprehended while trying to cross the border, which in turn would allow border patrol agents to focus on guarding the U.S.-Mexico boundary, Boehner said.
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“While we understand that many of these individuals are coming to this country to escape violence and hardship in their home country, the current climate along the border and our enforcement policies are only encouraging them to risk their lives and those of their children,” Boehner wrote. “It is time that we confront the crisis along the border head-on through immediate and aggressive action.”
According to a White House official, the Obama administration plans to step up its efforts to detain and process their cases in immigration court.
Boehner’s request came the same day as top House Republicans wrote to Obama, urging his administration to crack down on the surge of unaccompanied children trying to enter the country illegally through tougher enforcement of immigration laws.
The recommendation by key committee leaders include detaining families who have recently crossed illegally into the country in “appropriate shelters” along the southwestern border, deporting the immigrants who are ineligible to stay in the U.S., and making public-service announcements in U.S.-based Latino media on the dangers of coming illegally from central America into the U.S., via Mexico.
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“To end this dangerous migration, it is essential that the U.S. enforce our immigration laws and create effective and necessary deterrents so that potential illegal immigrants understand that their dream of reaching and being allowed to remain in the U.S. is unrealistic, and it is a virtual certainty they will be repatriated to their home countries,” the Republican lawmakers wrote.
“Furthermore, they must understand the risks they are taking to enter the U.S. illegally are far outweighed by the costs – including the cost of human lives and the consequences of violating U.S. immigration laws.”
The surge of unaccompanied minors along the southern border has become a serious crisis demanding attention from Washington. U.S. officials have detained almost 50,000 minors this fiscal year — a figure almost double from just one year ago. The new administration efforts to manage the problem were first reported by The New York Times on Friday.
Obama has called it an “urgent humanitarian situation” and has assembled an inter-agency task force to assemble a response. And Vice President Joe Biden will convene a summit later today in Guatemala with top officials in the region to address the crisis. The meeting will include Guatemalan President Pérez Molina, President Sánchez Cerén of El Salvador, as well as a top government official from Honduras.
Republicans have increasingly seized on administrative actions from the Obama administration on immigration — such as the 2012 initiative that allowed many young undocumented immigrants who have been here for years to stay in the country with work permits — as a key factor that has been driving the crisis on the border.
Indeed, the letter Friday underscored that point, saying lawmakers were “concerned” that the administration’s immigration policies “are creating a dangerous incentive for illicit networks to smuggle thousands of children into the United States.”
Democrats have disputed that as the root cause, instead pointing to the rising levels of violence and gang activity in their home countries. The children come mostly from El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras. In his letter, Boehner also urged State Department officials to “immediately” begin talks with those three countries that would streamline the process by which the apprehended immigrants would be returned home.
Under the Obama administration policy — known as Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — these minors who recently crossed wouldn’t qualify because they didn’t arrive in the U.S. before June 15, 2007. Nor would they qualify for legalization under the Senate’s sweeping immigration bill passed last June — the cut-off date in that legislation is Dec. 31, 2011.
The GOP’s requests outlined Friday contrast with a plan rolled out by congressional Democrats one day earlier, which largely urged focus on anti-smuggling and anti-trafficking efforts, as well as programs to combat violence in the minors’ home countries. Democrats also called for alternatives to detaining immigrants who crossed illegally.
“This is not an immigration crisis,” Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), a key player in immigration policy, said Thursday as he outlined his plan. “This is a humanitarian and refugee crisis.”
Lawmakers who signed the letter Friday were House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers (R-Ky.); House Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman John Carter (R-Texas); House Commerce, Science, Justice Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Frank Wolf (R-Va.); House Labor, Health and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee Chairman Jack Kingston (R-Ga.); House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul (R-Texas); and Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.).
The letter’s signers did not include House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), whose committee oversees immigration policy. He separately sent a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson on Thursday with a list of 20 questions about the crisis on the border, including the number of people trying to cross into the United States illegally and how they are attempting to do so.
The Republican-led House will hold two separate committee hearings on this issue next week — one in McCaul’s committee and another in Goodlatte’s panel.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/0...#ixzz35CDzw8MJ
