A new spin on illegal immigrant
“catch and release” programs
Tuesday, November 17, 2009
By Carl Braun
Examiner.com
Wackenhut buses like these are used to transport illegal aliens in the ATEP initiative. (cadt browne)
|
On my first trip to the border in 2005 an off-duty border patrol agent unofficially attended one of our meetings. I asked him: “Have you ever seen the same person illegally cross the border twice?” The ignorance of the question is today apparent but back then we, like most Americans, knew little to nothing of what was happening each day along the Mexican border. The agent laughed and told us that he had seen the same people cross illegally every day and on one particular shift had arrested the same family three times!
In the olden days (now known as “back in the day”), the Border Patrol would catch an illegal crosser or crossers, take them to the local office, fingerprint them, photograph them, give them a bottled water and peanut butter cheese crackers and take them to the nearest border crossing. There they could return home or run down the fence line and try again…usually the latter. This became known as “catch and release” and contributed a great deal to the daily onslaught of illegal border crossers.
Catch and release was officially ended in 2007 but at the end of the day something must still be done with the illegal border crossers and they would eventually all be turned back over to their home countries. For the last year or so though a new program has been very successful at stopping repeat offenses. It is called ATEP or Alien Transfer and Exit Program and it has been officially implemented in Arizona, California and now in Texas.
Here is how it works.:
Illegal aliens arrested in the border area are fingerprinted, photographed and screened. Mexican men between 20 and 60 years of age who do not have criminal charges other than crossing our border illegally are taken by bus to another location for repatriation. Sometimes the trip is 500 miles or more. A person arrested in California, who may be from Oaxaca Mexico (Southern Mexico), is transferred to Nogales in Arizona where they are given a sandwich and sent home. The Mexican authorities provide these men with bus tickets to their villages, or to central Mexico, temporary shelter and a voucher for food. Their mission and ours is to get them out of the border area. It is working.
The main goal of the Border Patrol however is to break the smuggling cycle. Process an illegal in CA and send them across the border to Tecate and you can almost set your watch to when they will appear once again at the fence waiting to cross. Send them 500 miles away and you will probably never see them again. Since they do not have any money or contacts in the new locale, most return home. Statistics show that 65% of those repatriated are never caught again. That leaves 35% who may have crossed successfully another time.
Families are never broken up and only healthy Mexican males are chosen for ATEP. Individuals from other countries are flown home and families are released closest to where they were arrested. Programs like ATEP are assisting the Border Patrol and Customs and Border Enforcement in attaining operational control over parts of the southern border. Not everyone on the north side is a fan. Governor Rick Perry of Texas views the program as the Federal Government once again punishing Texas by sending aliens caught elsewhere to it's borders. In a letter to DHS Secretary Napolitano, Governor Perry expressed his concerns that the program does nothing more than transplant potential illegal border crossers to the Texas border from neighboring states.
Regardless of your position, the ATEP initiative apparently works and is another positive step towards reducing illegal traffic.
Carl Braun is an analyst for the Homeland Security Policy Institute Group and he’s logged 5,000-plus hours on the border. He has written several books including his most recent on Border Insecurity, “Above All Else”
. Contact Carl at Carl.Braun@BPAUX.org.
NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, any copyrighted material herein is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For further information please refer to: http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml
|
