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The safety of our Nation depends on border security, and keeping terrorists, drug runners and spies from crossing the border, not on how we treat 18 year-olds whose families brought them here when they were 15 years old or less.

I posted some of this on my blog yesterday at http://wingright.org/2011/10/05/rick-perrys-record-on-border-security/

Here's what Perry said about amnesty in "Fed Up!"

We can have all the immigration debates we want, but Americans are demanding that the border be secured first.
We have already been burned once by false promises of border security in exchange for tying security to other aspects of the immigration debate. President Regan, in 1986, signed the immigration reform and control act, which legalized close to 3 million undocumented immigrants. The law was supposed to be a comprehensive solution with provisions intended to clamp down on border security. These provisions were never enforced, and the subsequent explosion in illegal crossings has resulted in some 11 million illegal aliens living in the United States today an estimated 1.8 million illegal immigrants are currently residing in Texas, compared with 1.1 million in 2000. In ten years, that represents an increase of 54 percent or 70,000 persons each year coming to our state illegally. Today, the Pew Hispanic Center estimates than about one in ten people born in Mexico live in the United States. And all of this has occurred outside the system and to the disadvantage of others who have been waiting in line for many years. There are literally millions of people waiting to get into the country legally. p. 118-119

and . . .

A grand, bipartisan compromise on immigration similar to the failed 1986 law was attempted in both 2006 and 2007. In the end, the bill died, largely because the American people had been to this before. According to an ABC News poll taken in the heat of the debate in 2007, two-thirds of Americans did not believe Congress was serious about controlling illegal immigration.
Now, the current administration willfully refuses to enforce the laws on the books. While President Bush didn’t do as much as I had hoped, his administration did step up workplace enforcement, reducing the enticement for illegal immigration. President Obama on the other hand, has reversed course. He also has intentionally undermined one of the few successful measures the federal government has implemented. Section 287 (g) of the Immigration and Nationality Act allows the deputization” of local law enforcement after training from federal authorities so that they may process illegal immigrants detained in the course of law enforcement activities for removal. This program simply allows local officials to aid Immigration and Customs Enforcement in the application of our laws
Bowing to pressure from interest groups in favor of unchecked illegal immigration, the Obama administration has instead issued new requirements intended to curtail the program by making it more expensive, among other things. So the Federal government is now manipulating successful programs to stop willing local jurisdictions from doing the federal government’s job themselves. pp122-123
(Referring to the explanation about 287 (g) at http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2010/03/time-to-stop-the-rush-for-amnesty-immigration-reform )

Perry, Rick (2010-11-15). Fed Up!: Our Fight to Save America from Washington Little, Brown and Company. Kindle Edition.