CBP chief assesses the border: Alan Bersin, in El Paso, assures safety, backs Mexico's fight
by Ramon Bracamontes \ El Paso Times
Posted: 01/06/2011 12:00:00 AM MST


Armed with statistics stating that 90 percent of those who try to enter the U.S. illegally in this region get caught, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin assured El Paso on Wednesday that the border is secure, safe and under control.

The problem, Bersin said, is that the rest of the country thinks the border is out of control.

"I've thought a lot about why that is," he said. "The answer has to be that the violence in northern Mexico is real and unprecedented. Because of that violence, the threat that it will spill over is there. While we haven't seen the spillover violence, the risk is clearly there."

Bersin said the drug cartel violence that has hurt Juárez and Mexico for three years will probably never spill into the U.S. Since 2008, more than 7,300 people have been killed in Juárez in a war between the Juárez and Sinaloa drug cartels, and more than 30,000 people have died across Mexico as a result of drug violence.

Bersin spent most of Wednesday in El Paso talking to local law enforcement officials, community leaders and educators. He also met with business leaders and elected officials.

Mayor John Cook said the local community used its meeting with Bersin to talk about implementing a new commercial truck-tracking program that will allow secure 18-wheelers to cross into the U.S. quicker. The program is being engineered by a local company, Secure Origins, and it is ready to be used, Cook said.

"We told him we are ready to start with the program, and he is going to help," Cook said. "I was very happy with his response."

Bersin said that securing the border has to go hand in hand with moving goods through the ports of entry in a more efficient manner.

"We can have safe borders and expedite traffic at the same time," he said.

On the national security front, Bersin said drug seizures and apprehensions of undocumented immigrants are down in California, New Mexico and Texas because of the agent buildup in those states. In 1995, there were 2,500 Border Patrol agents, and fewer than that in customs. Today, there are more than 21,000 Border Patrol agents and 22,000 customs agents.

That increase in personnel has led to a dramatic drop in arrests and seizures in places such as El Paso and San Diego, which historically were the main smuggling corridors.

In 1993 in El Paso, Border Patrol agents arrested 285,781 people who tried to enter the country illegally. By last year the count had dropped to 12,251. The same type of decrease occurred in San Diego, and Bersin said new technology shows that 90 percent of people trying to enter the country illegally are being caught.

The only place that is not as secure is Tucson, Bersin said.

"Tucson is the last stand," he said. "We are going to take efforts this year to control that section."

He also reiterated that the U.S. needs Mexico's help in securing the border, which is why the U.S. must support Mexico in its fight against the drug cartels.

While he didn't say Mexico is winning the war against the cartels, he did say that Mexico has had major victories in its campaign against the cartels. But more important, Bersin said, the people of Mexico continue to support Mexican President Felipe Calderón and his war against drug traffickers.

"What the people of Mexico have recognized is that you cannot develop a democracy when organized crime pollutes your politics," he said. "I have great confidence that Mexico will succeed."

http://www.elpasotimes.com/news/ci_17021562