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In El Paso, Texas, Democrat Mayor John Cook is literally doing whatever he can to cram his political preferences down the throats of El Pasoans who voted against him. His latest effort in this regard has been convening a grand jury in El Paso to possibly indict those who oppose his policies, based solely on their speech. It all began in 2010, when the City Council passed a measure granting taxpayer-paid benefits for same-sex couples. The citizens responded by passing a city-wide referendum overturning the measure. Not pleased that his policies were thwarted by the people, Cook went to the...

In a display of the arrogance of power for which the left have become so well known, Democrat El Paso Mayor John Cook decided not only to overrule the results of a 2010 ballot decision, he is hoping to jail those who dared circulate a recall petition in response to his contempt for the will of the voters. In 2009, Mayor Cook and a majority of the El Paso city council decided that health insurance benefits should be provided for unmarried and homosexual “partners” of city employees, at taxpayer expense of course. Church groups and others opposed to the decision...

EL PASO, TX — A critical opponent of drug law reform in Texas has been indicted on charges of trafficking 50 kilograms of marijuana and money laundering. El Paso County Commissioner Guillermo “Willie” Gandara Jr., 37, who is currently a Democratic candidate for the Texas legislature, along with Juan Canales, 50, were arrested late Wednesday night following a multi-agency investigation that included the DEA and FBI. A federal grand jury indictment charges the defendants with one count of conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute 50 kilograms or more of marijuana, and one count of possession with intent to distribute...

EL PASO, Texas -- Federal agents raided the home of El Paso County Commissioner Willie Gandara Jr. in Socorro Wednesday night. Gandara was taken into custody and charged with federal drug trafficking charges of possession of marijuana with intent to distribute and conspiracy. El Paso County Jail records show that he is being held without bond. The Drug Enforcement Administration, along with ICE, IRS, FBI, and state and local law enforcement personnel conducted the operation. Gandara, 37, is a candidate for State Representative District 75. He was elected to Commissioners Court in November 2008. Gandara's father, Willie Gandara Sr., was...

EL PASO, Texas (Reuters) - A woman pushing her child in a stroller in downtown El Paso, Texas, was struck by an assault rifle bullet fired from across the border in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, on Tuesday, mayor John Cook said. After Juarez police responded to a carjacking about half a mile from the border, a gunfight broke out between police and the carjackers, Cook said. A bullet -- a type used in assault weapons such as M16s -- penetrated and exited the woman's calf, he said. The unidentified woman, 48, who was shopping, was treated at a hospital and released...

Woman Was Pushing Child In A Carriage When She Was Hit EL PASO, Texas -- El Paso Police Chief Greg Allen said Tuesday afternoon that a bullet that punctured a woman's right calf in Downtown El Paso Tuesday morning is believed to have come from Mexico. Police said a 48-year-old woman was shopping on Overland near Oregon when her leg was hit by a bullet just after 11 a.m. Tuesday. A shootout happened at the same time in Juarez as when the woman was hit with the bullet. Guillen Middle School, Aoy Elementary and Hart Elementary were put on lockdown...

two cities that, while separated only by a narrow river, are rapidly growing further apart. Ciudad Juarez is undergoing wrenching change as dysfunctional state institutions confront powerful, hyper-violent criminal groups. El Paso has witnessed an unprecedented buildup of the U.S. government’s security and law enforcement apparatus. The flow of migrants from Mexico into the El Paso region has nearly ground to a halt due to greatly increased U.S. security-force presence, the poor U.S. economy, and the danger that organized-crime groups pose for migrants on the Mexican side of the border. The flow of drugs, meanwhile, continues at or near the...

“Mayor: Freedom of speech is over,” a story filed this morning by Bob Unruh on WorldNetDaily reports. A citizen attempting to address the El Paso City Council was given only 70 seconds to speak by Mayor John Cook when he abruptly cut her off, declaring: "Thank you, your time is over. If you can't remove yourself from the podium, I'll have you removed. Yeah. You can take your freedom of speech outside." This is spite of the fact that the First Amendment specifically articulates a right “to petition the government for a redress of grievances,” and all public officials, per...

Congressman Reyes Announces Support for Occupy Movement El Paso Democratic Congressman Silvestre Reyes released the following statement in support of the ongoing "Occupy Wall Street" movement, including the "Occupy El Paso" demonstrations: "Thousands of people around the world, in the United States, and here in El Paso are expressing growing frustration about the direction our country is headed. "We are living with the aftermath of failed policies pushed by the Bush White House and Congressional Republicans. From letting Wall Street investors have free rein, to an unnecessary war in Iraq, and the unwise tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, Republican...

EL PASO, Texas (AP) — El Paso's three largest school districts will be the first in Texas to explore ways to consolidate their security forces and hopefully cut their combined $15 million security budgets. A bill by state Rep. Joe Pickett, D-El Paso, requiring El Paso County school districts to look at consolidation options was passed this year at a time when the Texas Legislature was dealing with a $27 billion budget deficit. Public education funding was cut by about $4 billion. While the slash in funding forced layoffs and program cuts, the security budgets remained untouched. Pickett's bill has...

EL PASO — The federal government’s top border official, U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin, fought back this week against heightened criticism of President Obama’s border security policy, saying the present-day border is more secure than ever. At the same conference, U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-El Paso, responded to Gov. Rick Perry's bid for the White House by telling a reporter, “I have to go to the bathroom and throw up.” The congressman has long been a critic of what he says is Perry's misrepresentation of the border as a lawless territory. Bersin, a keynote speaker at the...

EL PASO - It's disgusting, unsanitary and it's going to leave you shaking your head. Migrant workers have turned a Downtown El Paso alley into a gigantic toilet. Human urine stains the walls and feces is piled up in an alley that's just blocks away from the Convention Center and other tourist hotspots. "If they don't let you go inside, you have to go anywhere. That's why El Paso is like that," Roberto Miranda said. Miranda is a migrant worker. He sleeps outside of the Farm Workers Center, like at-least one-hundred other people, and he waits for work in the...

EL PASO - It's disgusting, unsanitary and it's going to leave you shaking your head. Migrant workers have turned a Downtown El Paso alley into a gigantic toilet. Human urine stains the walls and feces is piled up in an alley that's just blocks away from the Convention Center and other tourist hotspots. "If they don't let you go inside, you have to go anywhere. That's why El Paso is like that," Roberto Miranda said. Miranda is a migrant worker. He sleeps outside of the Farm Workers Center, like at-least one-hundred other people, and he waits for work in the...

EL PASO, Texas -- Rep. Silvestre Reyes has released two strongly worded statements in the last four days that defend the safety reputations of cities along the U.S.-Mexico border. His first statement came Monday in response to a comment by Speaker of the House John Boehner, in which he said Congress needs to focus on border security and decreasing border violence before turning to immigration policy reform. Rep. Boehner's comments came as President Barack Obama has set his focus on reforming our nation's immigration system. The U.S. representative for El Paso said, "Speaker Boehner should focus on controlling the level...

Yesterday the President delivered his much-anticipated address on immigration at the Chamizal National Memorial Park, a landmark that commemorates the settlement of a century-old border dispute centered around the Rio Grande, which has traditionally served as the demarcation line between what is Mexico and what is the United States. Unfortunately, Barack Obama used the occasion to yet again smear honest opponents of his administration’s open borders policy, obfuscate what the White House has actually done to secure the border, ignore the catalog of horrors occurring in Ciudad Juarez-El Paso’s neighboring city across the border-and engage in boilerplate rhetoric intended to...

EL PASO - President Obama today said immigration reform is about nurturing talent for businesses and punishing those who have entered the United States illegally. But mostly immigration is about maintaining hope and realizing dreams, Obama told a sun-splashed crowd of more than 2,000 at the Chamizal National Memorial. He put a face on the controversial, divisive topic of immigration - a man named José Hernández, who did not learn to speak English until he was 12 years old. The son of itinerant farm workers, Hernández was born in California. But two of his siblings were born in Mexico, creating...

President Will Arrive in El Paso at 12:45 p.m. Tuesday EL PASO- The White House has announced the President's itinerary for next week's trip to the Sun City. The President will arrive at Biggs Airfield on Fort Bliss at approximately 12:45 in the afternoon. From there, it's on to Chamizal National Memorial. The President will deliver his remarks about immigration in a 1:30 p.m. speech, presumably at the park's small stage. It's not known yet whether the event will be open to the public. The President is set to take off from Biggs Airfield aboard Air Force One just before...

UPDATE AND ACTION: El Paso police are refusing to release this child into the hands of those who are wanting to provide a proper burial. Police say that they are going to give the remain of the child to an environmental group to dispose of. Call the El Paso police department and demand justice for this child! This baby deserves to be treated with dignity and respect. Demand a proper burial for this tiny child! Please call 915-564-7000. UPDATE II: El Paso police are now saying that they will not be investigating this incident because the unborn child’s young age...

Body of Baby Victimized in Abortion Found in Clinic Parking Lot El Paso, TX -- Local pro-life advocates helping to offer women alternatives to abortion outside an abortion clinic in El Paso, Texas have found the body of an unborn child victimized by an abortion in the parking lot of the facility. http://www.lifenews.com/2011/04/22/body-of-baby-victimized-in-abortion-found-in-clinic-parking-lot/

Standing in the main foyer of Burges High School in El Paso, Texas, it's easy to think you had accidentally crossed the border into Mexico. Left and right, students are greeting each other in Spanish and kissing each other's cheeks, as they would in Mexico. Drug violence has forced thousands of Mexican families to seek refuge in the U.S. As a result, some students are entering U.S. classrooms along the Southwest border with traumas that schools have never seen before. And with so few people willing to talk about it, many aren't getting the help they need. In border cities,...

Julia Aguilera will graduate from Montwood Middle School this year with her whole life ahead of her. Before many students look at what options are available to them, the cartels can step in with the promise of quick, easy money through drug smuggling. Julia knows that's dangerous work. "People can get killed just by doing something you can get into trouble with," Aguilera said. And that's where "Operation Detour" comes in. David Zapp with the Border Patrol is trying to get to students like Julia before the cartels do. "Schools are calling us trying to get us to come out...

EL PASO, Texas -- After teaming up to survey 18,000 employers around the country, Forbes Magazine has named El Paso as one of its top five cities for 'finding a job this spring.' The survey's results weren't too surprising for Kaitlyn Urenda. "There's a lot of businesses opening up in little shopping centers like this," she said. Urenda is helping her aunt open a baseball-themed East side restaurant named "Xtra Innings." She said they had no trouble filling up staff positions. "We got a ton of calls," she said. "There are actually a lot of military families looking for jobs."...

The high crime rate in Ciudad Juárez has spurred many Mexican businessmen to transfer their business operations to El Paso, where there are already 100 new companies that have opened their doors in U.S. territory. Juárez, just across the Rio Grande from this Texas city, is Mexico's murder capital, where more than 8,000 people have died since early 2008 in drug-related mayhem. The Juárez business owners now in El Paso have created an organization, La Red (The Network), to provide logistical support so that Mexican exiles can begin their business activities anew. "We Mexican businessmen who invest in El Paso...

EL PASO, Texas -- A car lot in Juarez. That's where 15-year-olds Carlos Mario Gonzalez Bermudez and Juan Echeveeri Luna, both students in El Paso, were killed by gunmen there Saturday. Gonzalez Bermudez's mother told our news partners - channel 44 in Juarez - the teens were buying a set of car rims. At some point, gunmen looking for the owner, opened fire on him and the teens. Gonzalez Bermudez and his family had just moved to El Paso to get away from the violence. He was a sophomore at Cathedral. Echeveeri used to go there, but transferred to Radford.

EL PASO - The secretary of Homeland Security is in El Paso this morning. Secretary Janet Napolitano will speak at UTEP's Magoffin auditorium at 10:00 a.m. She's going to talk about the administration's plans to secure the border. Her speech is open to the public. We'll have a full report tnoight on NewsChannel 9 at 5.

AUSTIN — Illegal immigration isn't on the short list of issues Texas sheriffs gave this year's Legislature, but it could end up becoming a new priority for them. Texas has 254 sheriffs, and while opinions vary about whether illegal immigration should be their problem, some Republicans are pushing measures that won't give them a choice. More than a dozen bills targeting illegal immigration await the Legislature when it convenes Tuesday, when the GOP will enter with a historic conservative supermajority in the House. One bill would require police to ask drivers without identification if they're in the country legally. Another...

How can a comparatively poor, high-immigration town that sits across the border from super-violent Ciudad Juarez be one of the safest big cities in America? By conventional wisdom, El Paso, Texas should be one of the scariest cities in America. In 2007, the city's poverty rate was a shade over 27 percent, more than twice the national average. Median household income was $35,600, well below the national average of $48,000. El Paso is three-quarters Hispanic, and more than a quarter of its residents are foreign-born. Given that it's nearly impossible for low-skilled immigrants to work in the United States legitimately,...

Link only - Mexican unmanned drone crashes in backyard of El Paso home

SAN ISIDRO, Mexico -- An El Paso woman and a small child were shot in the Juarez Valley Wednesday morning. Three others in the same SUV were killed. Six Americans have been killed in our sister city in the past week. The shooting happened shortly after 11 a.m. in San Isidro -- across the border from Clint, Texas. According to Juarez media, the woman and small child were rushed to the Juarez General Hospital. U.S. Customs officials said the 61-year-old woman, who suffered gunshot wounds, was then taken to University Medical Center in El Paso. Juarez media report two vehicles...

Three people who were killed in Juarez over the weekend are believed to be El Paso residents. Mexican officials said a group of armed gunmen fired shots at the people as they sat in a late model BMW station wagon. The El Diario newspaper reports Juarez officials said the victims were 23, 15, and 26 years old. They are identified as Joanna Herrera, William Araiza Hildalgo and Luis Carlos Hidalgo. One teen, who was 14 years old, managed to jump in the back of the vehicle to escape injury, the paper reported. The attack occurred at Independence Boulevard and Juárez-Porvenir...

EL PASO- We first told you about it last night. A 25 year-old El Pasoan, brutally murdered in Juarez yesterday. Rasiel Ayala's family is speaking out exclusively to NewsChannel 9. NewsChannel 9's Matt Rivers spent hours with the family. Initial shock and disbelief has turned into overwhelming sadness today. Family members told me about a young man who's life was cut short. She refused to wash the blood off her hands. Rasiel Ayala's grandmother watched her grandson die, held his lifeless body, and brought back the hat he was killed in, spattered with his blood. Off camera, she told me...

EL PASO, Texas -- UTEP Students Launch "Mexodus" Project A team of student reporters from The University of Texas at El Paso will work with an experienced bilingual journalist to develop and publish a multimedia package of stories that examines the exodus of businesses and members of the middle class from Mexico due to increasing levels of crime and drug violence. The stories will appear on Borderzine.com. The project, called "Mexodus" and funded by a $25,000 grant from the Ethics and Excellence in Journalism Foundation, will examine the economic, academic and cultural impact of the growing migration from Mexico to...

Two Others Hospitalized MEXICO -- Authorities investigated a crime scene along the U.S.-Mexico border Thursday morning after shots were fired on the embankment on Mexico's side, near Paisano by Asarco. According to our partners at the El Paso Times, a Juarez traffic officer was ambushed and killed by an unknown shooter near the U.S. border. Roxana Monroyl, 33, was shot about 10:30 a.m., said Juarez city spokesman Jaime Torres. After she was shot, she called for help. Two other traffic officers arrived at the scene to assist her and were also shot, he said. Those officers were taken to a...

EL PASO, Texas -- It's a grizzly Ciudad Juarez murder with a startling El Paso connection. Mexican authorities discovered a severed head on top of the trunk of an abandoned blue Hyundai Wednesday afternoon. That car, which was stolen two weeks ago in Juarez, has Texas license plates and is registered to two people who live in El Paso. ABC-7 spoke with the car owner's daughter at the family's home. They did not want to be identified. "They left us without a car just to kill somebody," she said. The daughter said she had gone to Juarez with her mother...

The White House says Gov. Rick Perry was offered but declined to meet with Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano and a top adviser to President Barack Obama on border issues. The Democratic president on Tuesday spent more than an hour in El Paso to thank Fort Bliss troops for their service in Iraq, then headed back to Washington. Perry spokeswoman Katherine Cesinger on Monday said the GOP governor had sought to meet with Obama during the Texas trip, but aides said the president would not be available. White House spokeswoman Moira Mack says Perry declined a meeting with Napolitano...

EL PASO - Virtually every law enforcement agency on both sides of the border is meeting in El Paso today to address a mutual concern: Border threats. An exercise is designed to evaluate international, inter-agency, and intra-agency communication and emergency response capabilities. The exercise is being held from 11:30 a.m. to noon at the El Paso Border Patrol Station at 9201 Gateway. Participating agencies include the U.S. Border Patrol, Customs and Border Protection, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the El Paso Police Department, the El Paso Fire Department, the Red Cross, Emergency Medical Services, and parallel...

By Ben Swann - Main Anchor Tuesday, August 24, 2010 - 10:45pm The body of a federal police agent was found dismembered in Juarez, Tuesday. The agent was found just a few feet from the border between Juarez and El Paso. The man's body had been found dismembered with body parts spread out across street. His head was left on top of a Nissan Xterra.

The first bullets struck El Paso's city hall at the end of a work day. The next ones hit a university building and closed a major highway. Shootouts in the drug war along the U.S.-Mexico border are sending bullets whizzing across the Rio Grande into one of the nation's safest cities, where authorities worry it's only a matter of time before someone gets hurt or killed. At least eight bullets have been fired into El Paso in the last few weeks from the rising violence in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, one of the world's most dangerous places. And all American police...

EL PASO - It seems spillover violence has hit the UTEP campus. At least one of the bullets from yesterday's shootout has been found in a university building tonight. We're told the bullet struck the South door of Bell Hall, went through the glass panel and was found embedded in an office doorframe. Police believe it happened during the gunbattle in Juarez last night that caused police to shut down Paisano Dr. from Executive to Downtown. A second bullet from last nights shootout in Juarez may have struck an El Paso car. We first showed you this car last night,...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico – A gunbattle erupted between Mexican police and gunmen near the Rio Grande on Saturday, killing one person and prompting U.S. authorities to close a highway that runs along the border in El Paso, Texas. There were no reports of bullets crossing into the U.S. side, El Paso police Detective Mike Baranyay said. The gunmen attacked a municipal police patrol on a boulevard in Ciudad Juarez next to the border river, said Ramon Salinas, a spokesman for Mexico's federal police. The fighting escalated when federal police rushed to help, he said. One gunman was killed and three...

A "major gunbattle" between drug traffickers and Mexican federal police broke out Saturday evening in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, just 30 yards from the U.S. border at El Paso, Texas, causing U.S. authorities to cordon off a section of the city, according to a U.S. Border Patrol spokesman.

A Ft. Bliss soldier recently back from Iraq is recovering after reportedly being savagely beaten by prison gang members. That soldier may have a broken neck after being jumped at a northeast El Paso bar. According to the police report obtained by Newschannel 9, the soldier, was attacked while celebrating his anniversary with his wife. Family members also say it was members of a prison gang who attacked him. The soldier and his wife were reportedly dancing on the dance floor when those gang members grabbed him, dragged outside and beat him repeatedly in front of the building. According to...

EL PASO - The 7th annual border security conference is set for El Paso on August 12th and 13th. It is titled "Re-envisioning the Border Community to Foster a U.S.-Mexico Partnership for Prosperity, Progress and Socio-Economic Development." High ranking leaders at the conference will include Office of National Drug Control Policy Director Gil Kerlikowske, Customs and Border Protection Commissioner Alan Bersin, U.S. Ambassador Carlos Pascual and Mexican Ambassador Arturo Sarukhan. The even is free and open to everyone.

CBP Agents Performing Southbound Inspections Spot Vehicle Heading Toward Them What started as an overnight crash in El Paso ended with shots fired on an international bridge. Shortly before 1 a.m. Sunday, El Paso Police say a Chevy Suburban crashed into another vehicle at Castner and Lee Trevino in the Lower Valley, with the driver of the Suburban then taking off. A police sergeant chased the driver for a short time until they got near the Zaragoza bridge. At that point, the sergeant watched the SUV driver try to make his way into Mexico. ABC-7 has learned U.S. Customs and...

Inmate escaped using the garbage disposal system EL PASO, Texas -- U.S. Marshals confirmed to ABC-7 Friday afternoon that a body found in a Sunland Park, N.M. landfill was that of a federal inmate who escaped the El Paso jail earlier in the day. Carlos Roberto Medina-Bailon, 30, of Delicias, Mexico, is believed to have escaped the El Paso County Detention Facility between 4:30 a.m. and 6:30 a.m. Friday by using the garbage disposal system and crushed by the garbage truck compactor. Video: videoEscaped Jailed Inmate's Body Found in Landfill He was working as a trusty in the kitchen downstairs...

EL PASO, Texas -- U.S. Marshals confirmed to ABC-7 Friday afternoon that a body found in a Sunland Park, N.M. landfill was that of a federal inmate who escaped the El Paso jail earlier in the day. Carlos Roberto Medina-Bailon, 30, of Delicias, Mexico, is believed to have escaped the El Paso County Detention Facility between 4:30 a.m. and 6:30 a.m. Friday by using the garbage disposal system.

EL PASO, Texas -- A federal inmate escaped the El Paso County Detention Facility Downtown Friday morning by using the garbage disposal system, El Paso County Sheriff Richard Wiles said. Carlos Roberto Medina-Bailon, 30, of Delicias Mexico, escaped sometime between 4:30 a.m.-6:30 am. He was working as a trustee in the kitchen downstairs in jail, helping to prepare breakfast. Wiles said Medina-Bailon escaped by using the garbage disposal system and then hid in a dumpster before sneaking out when the garbage was picked up. It is unknown at this time if he had help in the escape. Medina-Bailon is 5-foot-8,...

Violence spilling on to U.S. soil from the border of Mexico was a major reason for tougher immigration laws in Arizona. Now - with seven stray bullets striking the El Paso City Hall from the Mexican town of Juarez, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott has written a letter to President Barack Obama demanding "action." LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - There were no injuries in the shootings, and was the likely result of Mexico's warring drug cartels. Abbott's letter, reprinted in the El Paso Times, read in part: "The time for talk has passed. The time for action is now....

El Paso, TX -- El Paso Police officials say stray gunfire from a deadly attack in Juarez may have been the cause of the City Hall building in Downtown El Paso being hit by seven gunshots at about 5 p.m. Tuesday. One of those gunshots pierced through a ninth floor window of the office of Assistant City Manager Pat Adauto. The north and south stucco walls of City Hall were struck by an additional six rounds at varying heights on the walls. No one was injured by any of the bullets. Police said El Paso City Hall does not appear...

McALLEN, Texas — Local leaders from El Paso and Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, called for residents on both sides of the Rio Grande to allow the FBI to finish its investigation into last week's shooting of a 15-year-old Mexican by a Border Patrol agent. El Paso Mayor John Cook said Tuesday that his meeting with Juarez Mayor Jose Reyes Ferriz a day earlier was aimed at finding ways to prevent another serious incident. "We specifically avoided talking about the particular issue that started all of this," Cook said. On June 7, a Border Patrol agent was trying to arrest illegal immigrants...