Conservative Critics Rip Bush's Border Plan Involving Nat'l Guard
by Chad Groening and Bill Fancher
May 18, 2006
(AgapePress) - - A big photo-op -- that's what one immigration reform organization thinks about President Bush's plan to send 6,000 National Guard troops to the Mexican border. And still another group says the press conference on Monday at which the plan was announced was a waste of time. The president's plan calls for the Guardsmen to be used in temporary supporting roles only, leaving front-line Border Patrol officers to intercept those attempting to cross over into the U.S. illegally. According to the Pentagon, National Guard troops from the four border states -- California, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas -- will make up the bulk of personnel for the mission. Lt. Gen. H. Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, explains that most of the troops will be deployed in groups of about 100 for three-week periods, allowing time for travel to the border and training before they begin their assignments. Most of the jobs, says the Guard, will involve transportation, surveillance, logistics, and medical support.
But Ira Mehlman of the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) does not think the plan will do anything to diminish the illegal immigrant problem.
"As best anyone can tell, this is going to be a giant photo-op," says Mehlman. "The television cameras are going to come down there, and they're going to get some pictures of the guys walking around the border." The FAIR spokesman while that will make for "nice television pictures, ... it really isn't going to make a dent in the massive problem of illegal immigration."
Mehlman is convinced the president is still not serious about protecting the nation's southern border.
"This does not signal a change on the part of the administration when it comes to enforcing our immigration laws," he says. "What it signals is a recognition that they are in deep political trouble. The American public doesn't believe that [the government is] serious about enforcing the borders, enforcing workplace regulations here in this country, and this is an attempt -- and a rather feeble one -- to convince them that he's actually serious about it."
The president, he notes, has had a five-and-a-half year track record of doing nothing about border enforcement. Consequently, say Mehlman, the president has "no credibility with the American public" when it comes to securing the border.
Another critic of the White House's handling of the immigration problem thinks the president's speech on Monday evening was a waste of time. John Lofton with the Constitution Party says he was not impressed with the president's speech.
"I think it's a disgrace. I mean, here you have the President -- what, he's in the fifth year of his presidency? And now he's saying this is an urgent matter? Well, if it was urgent, why didn't he move on it earlier?" Lofton believes "it's absolutely obvious what Bush is doing. His poll numbers are down."
He adds there is what he calls a "terrible irony" with the plan. "The terrible thing here ... is that he has used up a lot of our National Guard," he says, "and you can't really put National Guard troops on the border now -- they're burned out."
Lofton says illegal immigration is a hot issue with conservatives, who make up Bush's main base of support. And the speech, says the Constitution Party official, was an attempt to regain their trust and their votes.
Chad Groening and Bill Fancher, regular contributors to AgapePress, are reporters for American Family Radio News, which can be heard online.
