Border Patrol: President's Immigration Plan a 'Slap in the Face'
by Fred Jackson and Chad Groening
January 12, 2004
(AgapePress) - As President Bush heads to Mexico City today to promote his amnesty program for illegal aliens, a group representing Border Patrol agents is calling that program "a slap in the face to anyone who has ever tried to enforce the country's immigration laws."The Bush plan would give legal status to millions of mostly Mexican citizens who have crossed the border and are now living in the U.S. illegally. The vice president of the National Border Patrol Council, John Frecker, has written his 9,000 members to urge them to challenge the Bush plan.
According to The Washington Times, Frecker's letter concludes the president's proposal amounts to a declaration that his agents have risked their lives for nothing in efforts to stop illegal aliens. (Read John Frecker's Letter)
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Gary Bauer |
Meanwhile, one of the president's staunches supporters says the president is "going down the wrong road" with his proposal. Gary Bauer, at one time a Republican presidential candidate, heads up the Campaign for Working Families. He says last week's unveiling of the "guest workers" program will prove disastrous for the U.S."The last thing we should be doing in the middle of a war on terrorism is moving toward any sort of amnesty for the millions of illegal immigrants currently in the United States," the conservative spokesman says.
Bauer contends that if the country continues to fail to control its borders, it will be impossible to tell if someone wants to enter the country to work, or to do it harm. "The first thing you have to do is control the security at your border," he says. "We are not doing that, and to do an amnesty in this atmosphere is a reward for those who came into the country illegally." He adds that in his opinion, the proposed plan will encourage more illegal entry into the country, not less.
But even as the opponents of the plan mount their offensive, President Vicente Fox of Mexico says the Bush program does not go far enough. Fox has told reporters that instead of amnesty programs, he wants all immigration borders across North America removed to allow people to live and work in the country of their choosing -- be it Mexico, the United States, or Canada.
