Thread: Texas-Mexico border fence will hurt poor on both sides, UT p

Texas-Mexico border fence will hurt poor on both sides, UT panelists say

By Joshunda Sanders
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, March 29, 2009

Some indigenous groups' way of life also will be threatened, researchers fear.

Ongoing construction of a 670-mile fence along the Texas-Mexico border approved by Congress in 2006 was the topic of a panel Saturday at the University of Texas titled "The Border Fence as a Human Rights Barrier".

The four panelists, researchers from the university's Working Group on the Border Wall, agreed that the wall poses a variety of human rights issues, including disproportionate hardship on the poor on both sides of the border. The panel was part of the fifth annual conference called "Human Rights at UT: A Dialogue at the Intersection of Academics and Advocacy."

The conference marks the five-year anniversary of the Bernard and Audre Rapoport Center's efforts to explore international human rights issues. Topics discussed during the three-day conference covered a range of issues, including genocide in Rwanda, global economic policy and health care.

Homeland Security officials say the border fence was not intended to stop illegal immigration but to make it more difficult for people to enter the U.S. illegally. The Sept. 11 attacks revived the immigration debate and advanced the idea of a border fence. Intelligence officials have said gaps along the southern border could provide opportunities for terrorists to enter the U.S.

But Jeff Wilson, an assistant professor at UT-Brownsville, says that when the fence is completed, it will have gaps in places where the wealthy live.

He recounted a trip to meet a reporter at a Cameron County country club. He said the two encountered dozens of armed border patrol agents at the club on the day they met. A suspected drug smuggler had driven a black Suburban into the Rio Grande and swam to Mexico, Wilson said. "And yet," he told an audience of about 20 people Saturday, "the fence stops at the country club."

Wilson and Jude Benavides, also an assistant professor at UT-Brownsville, have both conducted research that found that more lucrative and developed parcels along the border are not in the path of the fence.

People most likely to be affected by the wall, Benavides said, would be poor, less-educated Latino families. "Cameron County is one of the poorest counties in the U.S.," he said. "On top of that, we're enforcing more disparities."

As of February, according to the Homeland Security Department's Web site, parts of the wall were just starting to go up in Texas near El Paso.

When it is completed, the fence is expected to infringe on ceremonies conducted along the Rio Grande by an indigenous group, the Ysleta del Sur Pueblo, Shannon Speed, an assistant professor of anthropology at UT said. She said the fence also would impede the Kickapoo tribe from crossing freely between Texas and Mexico, a right secured through an agreement with the U.S. government.

Part of the problem with the construction of the fence, Wilson said, is that there are still fundamental questions about it. "It's very difficult to figure out where the wall is going to be and what part of it has actually been built," he said.

joshundasanders@statesman.com; 445-3630

http://www.statesman.com/news/content/n ... cxtype=rss

All the Kickapoo need to do is check in whjen they pass.

Build more fencing....

UT is biased. They extensively promote illegal immigration and always object to border security.

I guess the cartels are going to have to move onto the campus for them to get it.

Dixie