Immigration

It has been said that American voters like solutions to political problems that are quick, cheap or paid for by someone else.  In such an environment, elected officials are encouraged to postpone addressing problems that don’t fit the mold.  After a problem escalates into a crisis, the unnerved electorate reverses its position and the political … Read more

I got this story from June Wortman’s newsletter. She calls the incident harrowing, and I can’t disagree. The rapidity with which police forces escalate encounters with citizens who don’t behave exactly as they would wish, or worse, actually insist on being treated with respect and accorded their civil rights, is increasingly reminiscent of how an … Read more

Have you wondered why the Border Patrol is so keen on placing a permanent checkpoint on I-19?

The answer is the GAO and OMB. The Office of Management and Budget ‘Expect More’ evaluations (note that last year’s evaluation which specifically referenced the Tucson Sector’s lack of a permanent checkpoint has been flushed down the memory hole before I thought to archive it) and the General Accountability Office’s Congressional reports (pdf) both have identified the lack of permanent interior checkpoints as a major inefficiency in the Border Patrol’s efforts to interdict contraband and illegal immigrants over a period of several years. In order to improve efficacy, and keep the OMB and GAO off their back, the Border Patrol, and Homeland Security, had made pushing back the Kolbe Doctrine a major priority.

Jim Kolbe, through his position on the powerful House Appropriations Committee, had been able to keep the Border Patrol from allocating any money to permanent checkpoints in the Tucson sector. The result was measurably lower performance in interdictions in comparison to border sectors with permanent interior checkpoints. The Border Patrol has been chomping at the bit to institute permanent checkpoints in the Tucson sector since Kolbe first restricted them in 2002, and it got its opening when he retired in 2006.

With Kolbe’s retirement, it wouldn’t have mattered whether a Republican or a Democrat won with respect to permanent checkpoints. In fact, arguably, if the Republican won, his ideological commitment to controlling illegal immigration probably would have pushed him into building permanent checkpoints much sooner, and with much less impact mitigation and community input than Gabby Giffords has managed to extract from Homeland Security and the Border Patrol. In any case, the Border Patrol was hell-bent on getting its permanent checkpoints, and no freshman legislator was going to stop them.

I certainly find plenty fault with our Congresswoman when I think she deserves it, but those who are tempted to blame Gabby for the coming of the permanent checkpoint to their communities are barking up the wrong branch of the government. Gabby can’t hold back a flood with a teaspoon, but she has done a hell of a decent job to ensure that people in the affected communities had a say in the process.

Extracts from the report on the flip…