Posted on 05/02/2008 11:16:41 AM PDT by SmithL
El Paso, Texas (AP) -- Josefa Gonzalez Loya has sneaked across the Mexican border at least 128 times in the past eight years. And each time, the Border Patrol has been nice enough to give her a lift home.
Gonzalez and a group of other women and children — all Indians from the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca — have no interest in staying in the United States. All they want to do is panhandle outside El Paso businesses, using the children as lures.
At the end of a productive day, they wait for the Border Patrol to come pick them up and drive them back to the border.
Little dramas like this play out day after day, accounting for thousands of arrests but hardly any prosecutions in the past several years.
The Oaxacan immigrants fall under a loophole that gives border agents discretion to keep some adults and children together and out of jail.
"They do qualify for jail and prosecution," Border Patrol spokesman Ramiro Cordero said. "However, we've got to look at the humanitarian factor first if we are going to have to separate the family."
Nearly 500 Oaxacan (pronounced wah-HAH-ken) women and children in colorful serapes have been rounded up since the fiscal year began in October, accounting for thousands of arrests.
The middle-aged Gonzalez and some of the others make a mad dash across the Rio Grande with the help of a guide. Occasionally they get caught trying to slip across, but evidently they are good at evading the Border Patrol, even though they use the same general area over and over. Sometimes, authorities realize they have arrived when they see the little footprints the diminutive immigrants leave along the banks of the Rio Grande.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
After 128 “detentions” there is no more room for “humanitarian” gestures.
This policy has got to stop.
“”They do qualify for jail and prosecution,” Border Patrol spokesman Ramiro Cordero said. “However, we’ve got to look at the humanitarian factor first if we are going to have to separate the family.””
Actually, you can make that work in our favor.
Border Patrol= Uncle Sam’s taxi service
Take the profit out of doing it, and they'll quit coming.
All I can say is...........jeeze.
Hmm this is interesting. Well, I can see why the Border Patrol isn’t too concerned about these women— they are not trying to stay in the US, not using government services, are obviously not a threat and are not taking jobs away from anybody who belongs here. According to the article the local businesses don’t even mind them. So, I can understand why the Border Patrol doesn’t want to spend their resources chasing them around when there are dangerous people and illegal immigrants who are keeping them busy. The police ignore quiet panhandlers all the time because they have more serious things to attend to. It’s really just the same thing. I think the Border Patrol would pay more attention if they were stealing money or dealing drugs or kept trying to move here. I don’t think they’re necessarily falling down on the job here.
A 2nd illegal entry IS a felony. We are a nation of laws. Those laws are not left optional and for the Border Patrol to decide. If we pick and choose which felony will and which felony will not be prosecuted, as in the case of illegal immigration, then we give more legal rights to illegal alien felons than American citizens, who, when arrested/imprisoned for a felony, would have NO choice but to be separated from their own children. Time and again we hear excuses being made for them. They steal our jobs, steal our SSNs, steal our federal benefits, including education and medical care and we are expected to swallow the excuse that they just want a better life for their families...that they are just doing the jobs Americans won't do anyway. When we aren't being blamed for allowing it to happen all these years, we are accused of being racist xenophobes. If we don't draw the line at punishment for a felony, where do we draw it?
Agree completely. And there is also the amount of manhours spent administering this revolving door.
Not using government services? Isn’t the Border Patrol transit service a government service? And BTW, if the Border Patrol is going to run a transit service (and clearly this is a regular transit service like a city bus line and not a necessary but tangential part of the Border Patrol’s duties) are they allowed to discriminate on the basis of ethnicity? I thought Rosa Parks ended that.
Yes, that’s true, but I can sympathize with why the Border Patrol isn’t cracking down on them. These women aren’t actually stealing jobs, federal benefits, or anything else. They’re just beggars. If the local businesses aren’t bothered by them then I can see why they’re not being treated like a priority. Seriously, how many police departments make panhandlers a priority? Yes it’s a crime, but they’re just naturally more concerned with crimes that are serious or are hurting somebody or that some citizen is at least complaining about. I think that’s all that’s happening with the Border Patrol here. I think they’re much less indifferent about gangs coming across the border or about illegal immigrants trying to sneak in than they are about beggar women who go home to Mexico every night and don’t take anyone’s job or try to have an anchor baby and get on welfare. Well, law enforcement people always let minor things slide but it doesn’t mean they’re doing a bad job. Now if you see the Border Patrol ignoring it when Mexican gangs and illegal imigrants come in then I’ll agree there’s a problem, but I’m inclined to give them the benefit of the doubt on this, that’s all.
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