Free Republic

by John HillStand With Arizona Illegal aliens are increasingly battling police to avoid capture. Last week in Phoenix, 2 illegals fought with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio's detectives after a traffic stop, to try and enable 10 additional illegals to escape into the desert. Last night near Premont, TX, one or more of a group of 15 illegal aliens in a van shot at a Texas DPS Trooper when the officer tried to stop their vehicle in a routine traffic stop on Highway 281, according to the Jim Wells County Sheriff's Office. After a short chase, the pursuit ended south...

McALLEN — Another reminder of why we need a secure border emerged this week, as U.S. Border Patrol officials confirmed three Afghan nationals were detained in the Rio Grande Valley - an increasing "hot zone" of cartel invasion and violence against American ranchers. Border Patrol confirmed the detentions, but would not say where or when they occurred. Enrique Mendiola, assistant chief Border Patrol agent for the Rio Grande Valley sector, said that human smugglers see moving people besides Mexican nationals as a "business opportunity." "Average smuggling rates for other-than-Mexican nationals far exceed those of Mexicans and Central and South Americans,"...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico (AP) — President Felipe Calderon on Thursday unveiled a “No More Weapons!” billboard made with crushed firearms and placed near the U.S. border. He urged the United States to stop the flow of weapons into Mexico. The billboard, which is in English and weighs 3 tons, was placed near an international bridge in Ciudad Juarez and can be seen from the United States.

MCALLEN - The secretary of Homeland Security is heading to the Valley. Janet Napolitano will be in McAllen on Monday and Tuesday. She'll be meeting Customs and Border Protection acting Commissioner David Aguilar. Napolitano will also spend time with state and local law enforcement officials. They're set to discuss border security, travel and trade. No other details on her trip have been released.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EumHUWY8yes Very interesting video, makes me think this is where Iran is setting up to hit the US from. When we end up in a war with them they'll enter and hit American soil thru Mexico (unless they already have sleeper cells in the US).

The Arizona governor could deploy an armed, volunteer militia to respond to natural disasters and patrol the Arizona-Mexico border for illegal immigrants and drug-traffickers under a legislative proposal (SB1495, creates a volunteer state militia) to fund a state guard. The state would pay $1.9 million to activate the Arizona State Guard, created last year through an executive order signed by Republican Gov. Jan Brewer. Arizona would join 23 other states and territories with active guards, but the state would stand alone (as) its militia focused on border enforcement…

Co-author of Arizona immigration law says 'self-deportation' workingBy Josh Lederman - 02/11/12 10:39 AM ET Immigration crackdowns in Arizona and Alabama are succeeding in persuading illegal immigrants to voluntarily leave the country, the co-author of tough immigration laws in both of those states said Saturday. Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, an ardent opponent of illegal immigration who has endorsed Mitt Romney, said jobs are opening up for Americans and school budgets flourishing thanks to tough new policies. "If you want to create a job for a U.S. citizen tomorrow, deport an illegal alien today," Kobach said to boisterous applause...

Mexico’s defense secretary has acknowledged that some areas of the country are outside government control, fueling the debate over the specter of state failure in the country. At a military ceremony yesterday, Mexican Defense Minister Guillermo Galvan Galvan addressed the national security situation in the country, pessimistically describing it in stark terms. “Clearly, in some sectors of the country the public security situation is completely overrun,” said Galvan, adding that “it should be recognized that national security is seriously threatened.” He went on to say that organized crime in the country has managed to penetrate not only society, but also...

by John HillStand With ArizonaFox Phoenix TV (KSAZ FOX 10) on Thursday showed a ridiculous propaganda piece purporting to show "the Arizona border" and how "safe" it is, as they follow Americans from around the nation on a "tour" of the border. Here's how they describe the piece: Make your own decision about life on the border. What is life on the border really like? Hop on the Border Bus Tour, and do your own fact finding about what it means to have a secure border. And in the video, the tour leader, Bob Feinman, tells us on the bus...

The latest addition to the Texas Highway Patrol fleet won’t actually be patrolling any highways. But it will be prowling the Texas-Mexico border. It’s not a “vehicle,” really – it’s a vessel: a 34-foot powerboat. And it’s armed to the teeth. The boat has six 30-caliber machine guns divided among four firing positions. And its defense is just as aggressive as its offense. “This front area here will be lined with bulletproof glass,” said state trooper Erik Burse as he gave FOX 26 News the grand tour. “The panels that we have on the side here will be bulletproof shields.”...

Something is really, really, really not right… The New York Times has a really bizarre story on the front page today. I will make some remarks about the story and then there is a link at the bottom for you to read the entire story. I don’t want to run wild with crazy conspiracy stories but there are some really peculiar parts of this New York Time story that warrants further investigation. First some bullet points: * Juan Jose Rojas Cardona (“Pepe” and hereinafter I will refer to him as that) lives in Mexico and is part of the casino...

Just as college Spring Breaks are about to begin, The U.S. State Department issued a new travel warning for Mexico yesterday. It’s a popular destination for underage college kids because in Mexico, if you are big enough to sit on a bar stool, then you are big enough to drink. The latest State Department warning cautions Americans about “Transnational Criminal Organizations,” in Mexico. That’s "Obama-Speak" meaning drug cartels that are in a violent civil war for control of drug trafficking to America. That civil war has been creeping across our own southern border under the watch of an oblivious administration....

by John HillStand With ArizonaMore than 10,000 people in 24 hours viewed our video "14 Illegals in 24 Seconds", showing illegal aliens - most with large backpacks - easily moving over terrain near Tucson, 30 miles North of the border. Floods of illegals crossing the Arizona desert occur continually, thanks to the failure of the Federal government to provide secure border fencing or adequate border patrol agent numbers. But what of the fencing that does exist in parts of Arizona? How well does that stop those determined to get in? Well this next video should give you a clue, and...

Some developing news in the case of Juan Jose Rojas Cardona, who is a fugitive on drug and fraud charges. In 2009 it was discovered that he was involved in a plot to assassinate a rival and bribe Mexican officials. This has gone public, as has his $200,000 in fundraising done for Barack Obama. Obama has now returned the money, but the scrutiny on Cardona continues. It now appears that Cardona's links to the organized crime world also ties him to the DEA, which ran Operation Fast and Furious. Cardona was allegedly involved with a top drug cartel across the...

A ruling that an activist's language skills are insufficient for a City Council seat unsettles border towns where Spanish is used in day-to-day life. An appeal is before the state Supreme Court. Reporting from San Luis, Ariz.— For almost a decade, Alejandrina Cabrera has had no trouble speaking her mind in this dusty Arizona border town. She's gone door to door campaigning for City Council candidates. She's addressed the City Council. She's even led two recall petitions against the mayor. But when she decided to run for San Luis City Council, she hit a surprising roadblock: her language. Like virtually...

You know the border is a place where drugs and illegal immigrants transit every day. But you have no idea how bad things really are.

Multi-agency effort yields indictment of five suspected human smugglersFive Los Angeles-area residents have been indicted for operating a human smuggling scheme that in many cases involved specially-built compartments under the hoods of cars. The operation relied largely on non-Spanish speaking African-Americans to transport loads of illegal aliens from the U.S.-Mexico border to the Los Angeles area. Four of the defendants, including the suspected ringleader of the scheme, Maria "Reyna" Lopez-Diaz, 60, of Compton, were taken into custody Thursday morning by agents from U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement's (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) and the U.S. Border Patrol. Sign up for...

In the calculus of cross-border human smuggling, Maria Lopez-Diaz allegedly concluded that black instead of brown equals green. The 60-year-old Compton, Calif., woman, prosecutors say, tried to cash in on racial profiling by operating a human smuggling ring that hired mostly African-American drivers who didn't speak a word of Spanish to ferry small groups of immigrants from Mexico to Los Angeles. >>SNIP<< charged the immigrants up to $4,000 a person for the ride north >>SNIP<< is estimated to have smuggled several dozen immigrants a month into Los Angeles, immigration authorities said.

One man is dead and another is wounded after the Mexican military allegedly shot them while they were fleeing into the United States. It all happened just east of Sullivan City late Thursday afternoon. Law enforcement officials told Action 4 News that the men are believed to have been involved in a gun battle south of the border in Diaz Ordaz, Tamaulipas. Mexican military officials did not cross into the United States during the incident but opened fire on the two men as they fled across the Rio Grande River. Law enforcement said a body was found on the American...

Michael A. Braun, the former intelligence chief for the DEA, testified this week at a hearing before the House Foreign Affairs Committee that "collaboration between Latin American drug cartels and groups such as Iran's Quds Force and the Islamic terror group Hezbollah is growing 'far faster than most policymakers in Washington, D.C., choose to admit'" as reported by Guy Taylor for The Washington Times. Many critics of the U.S. open border policy long have warned that Muslim terror groups may exploit the smuggling routes which have been established by the drug cartels in order to gain entry into the United...

Five people are charged in a plot to employ African Americans from Compton to avert suspicion when bringing illegal immigrants across the border. In the calculus of cross-border human smuggling, Maria Lopez-Diaz allegedly concluded that black instead of brown equals green. The 60-year-old Compton woman, prosecutors say, tried to cash in on racial profiling by operating a human smuggling ring that hired mostly African American drivers who didn't speak a word of Spanish to ferry small groups of immigrants from Mexico to Los Angeles. In the end, the venture failed. Authorities announced charges Thursday against Lopez-Diaz and four others, including...

So these TUSD [Tucson Unified School District] students that walked out of class to protest the end of MAS [Mexican American Studies] studies went to an event organized by UNIDOS and UA [University of Arizona] professors. TUSD Superintendent John Pedicone wrote a letter to the head of the UA MAS program, Dr. Tony Estrada, asking him to not have his professors encourage kids to cut class for free food, entertainment and MAS. Link to the letter: http://content.clearchannel.com/cc-common/mlib/667/01/667_1327931624.pdf

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico --Police in the Mexican border city of Ciudad Juarez are spending their time between shifts in heavily guarded hotels after a wave of killings targeting police. Eight officers were gunned down in January. Most were off duty. The murders are the latest challenge for police chief Julian Leyzaola as he works to restore law and order in Mexico’s murder capital. The U.S. government has provided $1.5 billion worth of aid to Mexico under the Merida initiative, including including training and equipment to help police fight violent drug cartels. Police officers in Juarez say they’re in a fight...

Several Mexican soldiers were killed when gunmen ambushed them Thursday afternoon in Reynosa, said sources outside law enforcement familiar with organized crime. The ambush came in response to heavy casualties the military inflicted on gunmen Thursday morning, the sources said. The clashes continued a violent week along the northern Tamaulipas border, which had experienced weeks of relative calm until a reported push by the Zetas drug cartel to take over Gulf Cartel territory in Reynosa and Matamoros. In Thursday’s clashes in Reynosa, roads were blockaded and gunbattles pitted the Mexican military against gunmen, and rival groups of gunmen against each...

LAS CRUCES — A jailed New Mexico gun store owner accused of selling weapons that made it into the hands of Mexican cartels says he is on a hunger strike. Ian Garland wrote in a letter to the Las Cruces Sun-News that he won’t eat until he is allowed visits from his lawyers and the media. “I have been in a 6-by-12 room for 316 days in maximum security for making legal and lawful sales to people who have lied to me, they even admitted they lied, so why am I here?” he wrote.

Jorge Montiel fled to his hometown near Pachuca, Mexico, after he was alleged to have raped and murdered a Georgia housewife in October 2010. Federal agents tried to bring the international fugitive to justice, but something stood in the way: the cost. When the U.S. Justice Department called Forsyth County prosecutors to explain America's complex extradition process and to say the county would have to pay for translation and other fees, "the decision was made by Forsyth County to discontinue that effort," FBI spokesman Stephen Emmett told the Tribune. And with that, Montiel became just another of the thousands of...

SAN LUIS, Ariz. — When Alejandrina Cabrera speaks English, her face takes on an expression somewhere between deep discomfort and outright despair. Her tongue, which darts around her mouth in her native Spanish, slows to a crawl. “I speak little English,” she said in a hesitant and heavily accented interview in her lawyer’s office. “But my English is fine for San Luis.” Mrs. Cabrera may be able to get her point across in English, but whether she is proficient enough in the language to serve on the governing board of this bilingual border city has deeply divided the 25,000 residents....

MESA, Ariz. – Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer says President Obama complained to her about how she depicted him in her book. It happened when Obama landed in Air Force One Wednesday at Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport, where Brewer met him on the tarmac. Reporters observed the two leaders in intense conversation.

POOL REPORT President Obama arrived in Phoenix at 3:15 pm local time, finding the chilly weather of Iowa giving way to sunny skies and temperatures in the high 60s. He stepped off Air Force One at 3:28 pm and was greeted by Gov. Jan Brewer. She handed him a handwritten letter in an envelope and they spoke intensely for a few minutes. At one point, she pointed her finger at him. Afterwards, your pooler spoke with the governor. "He was a little disturbed about my book, Scorpions for Breakfast. I said to him that I have all the respect...

Wonder how the Mexican drug cartels smuggle $50 billion in product over the United States border each year? Much of it is waved through by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection. The so-called border security agency is issuing passes to daily commuters from Mexico into the United States which exempts them from vehicle checks at the crossing as reported by Emily Smith for CNN. Although the passes only are issued to those who pass "a rigorous background check" -- for whatever that's worth -- the drug cartels can either scrounge up a clean applicant as a cooperative front or plant...

It was a show of civil disobedience, and according to organizers of the event that was accomplished by holding multiple sit-ins that risked arrest and deportation.

LAREDO — A former hit man for the Zetas cartel calmly related to jurors his role in killings on both sides of the border, testifying Monday in the drug conspiracy trial of a man prosecutors say was also a hired killer. From the witness stand in U.S. District Judge Micaela Alvarez's courtroom here, Rosalio Reta pointed to Gerardo Castillo Chavez, 25, and identified him as a fellow Zeta. Pressing his fingertips together and speaking in a slow, soft voice, Reta, 22, told jurors that he had been in a team of hit men headed by Gabriel Cardona, an admitted Zeta...

To expedite his commute to the University of Texas at El Paso, where he studies music education, Andres received a special pass from U.S. Customs and Border Protection after passing a rigorous background check. Applicants have their fingerprints taken and must complete an in-person interview with a Customs and Border Protection officer. They cannot have any previous criminal history. The SENTRI (which stands for Secure Electronic Network for Travelers Rapid Inspection) pass allowed Andres to waive the standard vehicle check at the border crossing. Most of the time, the border guards just peered inside his vehicle and waved him through....

When burglar Kesler Dufrene became a twice-convicted felon in 2006, a Bradenton judge shipped him to prison for five years. And because of his convictions, an immigration judge ordered Dufrene deported to his native Haiti. That never happened. Instead, when Dufrene’s state prison term was up, Miami immigration authorities in October 2010 released him from custody. Two months later, North Miami police say, he slaughtered three people, including a 15-year-old girl in a murder case that remains as baffling today as it did the afternoon the bodies were discovered.

WESLACO - Three people from Afghanistan are in Border Patrol custody in the Valley. Border Patrol acknowledges they apprehended the three Afghanis in the Valley. They were found in two different groups. One was found south of Mission by the river. The other two were found in a stash house north of Moorefield Road. Samuel Freeman, a political science professor at the University of Texas Pan American and expert on U.S. foreign policy, says it's unusual for Afghanis to show up in the Rio Grande Valley. Freeman says the three could be drug runners. He says there's a huge pipeline...

by John HillStand with Arizona The border is "safer than ever". So says DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano. Again and again. Barack Obama has mocked those who say the border is unsafe: "Maybe they'll need a moat. Maybe they'll want alligators in the moat. They'll never be satisfied." But for Texas ranchers in the Rio Grande Valley, the border has never been more dangerous. And they are stocking up with the hardware to do the job that the Feds refuse to do - AK47 rifles to defend their property and lives from border violence. Barbed wire fencing doesn't keep illegal aliens...

The U.S. Border Patrol Friday announced it is building an outpost in New Mexico's Bootheel, one of the last unguarded regions between the United States and Mexico. It's an unforgiving terrain where Geronimo made his last stand. Today, it remains largely isolated with no cell service, few unpaved roads but growing lawlessness as drug dealers and human smugglers increasingly look for alternatives to more traveled routes. There are tales of drug traffickers breaking into homes and high speed chases that sometimes force school buses off dirt roads. One rancher even stumbled upon 19 lost and starving Chinese immigrants who had...

STARR COUNTY - Valley ranchers say they are arming themselves with high-powered rifles to protect their property. Ranchers say handguns aren't enough anymore. They need more firepower. An AK-47 semiautomatic assault rifle holds 30 rounds. It protects this ranch in Starr County, hundreds of acres. "It does have fire power and it's reliable," says the rancher. Barbed wire fencing doesn't keep illegal immigrants off the property anymore. This rancher doesn't care about the illegals. He worries about the smugglers protecting their loads. "I don't think they would have any conscience of taking someone's life," the rancher says. He saw that...

The U.S.-Mexico border is the most deadly region in the world due to turf wars between drug cartels, and the number of gangland deaths in just Chihuahua -- the Mexican state below TX and NM -- "during the first nine months of 2011 exceed the number of Afghan civilians killed in roughly the same period in all of war-torn Afghanistan" as reported by Edwin Mora for CNS News. Ironically, more than 200 people on both sides of the border, including U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, have been murdered by guns supplied to the Mexican drug cartels by the United...

PHOENIX - With many of those crossing the border illegally shifting to remote areas in response to stepped-up enforcement, the trash they leave behind is becoming tougher - and riskier - to clean up, a state agency director told lawmakers Thursday. "These are dangerous areas," Henry Darwin of the Arizona Department of Environmental Quality told the Senate Border Security, Federalism and States Sovereignty Committee. "These are known areas of illegal immigration, illegal drug trafficking." He called trash along the border "a fairly significant issue" that has persisted even as illegal border crossings have declined slightly. Showing pictures of trash-strewn landscapes,...

Imagine that your son has a habit of sprinkling copious amounts of bird seed and setting up impromptu birdbaths in your yard. You then notice that your property is starting to seem like an aviary, and, as beautiful as the birds are, they’re becoming bothersome. So you approach your husband and ask him to remedy the problem. He then promises to build a scarecrow, but doesn’t complete the job. And, when the situation persists and you again ask him to help, he simply scratches his head and replies, “You know, it’s just not realistic to remove all these birds from...

Three beheadings in two different states and they happened here in the United States, not Mexico. "It would lead me to believe the message wanted to be sent. This is one of the ways they do it in Mexico, Colombia and other places," says Jordan. Jordan says the cartels are getting bolder in carrying out their beheadings across the border. He says we only used to see these crimes in Mexico. "They don't have any borders," says Jordan. More than 600 miles from the border, a 19-year-old human trafficking victim was found beheaded in Oklahoma. Carina Saunders was stuffed into...

Although the Obama Administration cynically insists for political gain that there is no evidence of drug cartel spillover violence from Mexico into the United States a former DEA supervisor begs to differ, and he insists that their most gruesome tactics including beheadings are occurring on American soil. Former DEA supervisor Phil Jordan says three beheadings in the last year -- two in Arizona and one in Oklahoma -- "have cartel written all over them" as reported by KRGV: "'One is too many; two is too many. Three should send an alarm,' says Jordan." In October 2010 the U.S. Department of...

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said her agency is working with Mexican officials on the threat posed by individuals from countries with terrorist links or “special interest aliens.’ Napolitano’s remarks came during a panel discussion on Tuesday in Washington, D.C., about the global role of DHS in the ongoing effort to fight terrorist threats to the United States, including efforts to stop threats abroad before they arrive at U.S. airports or seaports. CNSNews.com asked the secretary about the threat posed by individuals linked to terrorist groups in countries like Somalia and Yemen that might

Three beheadings in two different states and they happened here in the United States, not Mexico. Former DEA supervisor Phil Jordan says all three beheadings have cartel written all over them. They happened in Arizona and Oklahoma in the past year. A murder mystery is now unraveling on a stretch of North Reservation Road in Tucson, Ariz. County workers found a headless man lying on the side of the road Jan. 6. The man's hands and feet were reportedly missing, too. "It would lead me to believe the message wanted to be sent. This is one of the ways they...

The corpses continue to pile up in apparently God-forsaken Mexico where turf wars among drug cartels have resulted in 47,515 killings since December 2006 as reported by The Telegraph. And out of the human carnage the Forbes-listed billionaire Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman, the head of the Sinaloa cartel, has emerged as "the world's most powerful drug trafficker" according to the U.S. Treasury Department which finally got around to blacklisting his associates under the Drug Kingping Act "which prohibits people in the U.S. from conducting businesses with them and freezes their U.S. assets" as reported by MSNBC. El Chapo's product rots...

(CNN) -- Almost 13,000 people were killed in Mexico by suspected drug violence in the first three quarters of 2011, the country's federal attorney general's office said Wednesday. The figure was the first official tally given by the government for 2011. The exact number -- 12,903 -- corresponds to the deaths reported by state authorities to the federal government that they believe were the result of intercartel rivalry. The figure covers January to September of last year and is not broken down into categories such as how many victims were civilians, how many were innocent bystanders or how many were...

The Matamoros office of the National Chamber of Commerce of Mexico has issued, for the second time, an advisory for travel to South Texas, particularly Brownsville. “It is because of the violent event that happened this past Sunday at Sunrise Mall, where a shooting took place, as well as many other events of extreme violence taking place in the (Rio Grande) Valley,” the statement from the chamber said. It said it was issuing the alert for businessmen and Mexican nationals and stated that people “should take maximum precaution and avoid as much as possible being out late at night.” Roberto...

MEXICO CITY — As gangster wars rampage along the Gulf Coast and northeast Mexico, federal officials have poured in thousands more troops — an emergency move punctuated by Wednesday's slaughter of least 31 inmates in a prison gang riot. With the region looming as this winter's primary battleground in Mexico's criminal wars, some 13,000 army soldiers, plus several thousand more marines and quasi-military federal police now patrol Tamaulipas state, which borders Texas from Laredo to the Gulf. Bloody riot The inmates were killed as members of rival gangs butchered one another inside a state prison in Altamira, an industrial port...

Arpaio is challenging the Obama administration’s Department of Justice to present evidence to back its charge that his office is discriminating against Hispanics. “Prove it,” Arpaio said in remarks directed at Holder in an interview with WND. “If Eric Holder has evidence that the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office has engaged in systematic violations of the civil rights of Hispanic, then show me the evidence,” Arpaio said. Arpaio contends that the 22-page complaint the Department of Justice released Dec. 15 against his office was nothing more than anecdotal and didn’t prove there are systematic sheriff’s department policies aimed at depriving Hispanics...