Posted on 12/13/2007 6:14:49 AM PST by 3AngelaD
The Department of Homeland Security's chief medical officer yesterday acknowledged errors in the federal government's failure to stop a Mexican businessman infected with multiple-drug-resistant tuberculosis from entering the United States 21 times over seven weeks in April and May. ...Jeffrey W. Runge, DHS's acting assistant secretary for health affairs, said he and the agency's deputy secretary at the time, Michael P. Jackson, wanted to revoke the border-crossing card of Amado Isidro Armendariz Amaya after learning on April 30 about his situation...But Martin Cetron, director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's quarantine division, objected that doing so would drive patients in Mexican border areas with similar conditions underground...
Armendariz, a Ciudad Juarez resident...turned in his border card on May 31 only after he was confronted by his physician at a Juarez clinic run by Texas's health department....
Runge acknowledged that it took until June 1 for DHS's Transportation Security Administration to be notified and until the following week for federal officials to place Armendariz's name on a no-fly list...DHS officials initially said that the U.S. Customs and Border Protection bureau did not catch Armendariz on his frequent travels because he provided a false name. But Senate aides said that U.S. authorities failed despite knowing Armendariz's birth date and all his names but his first. An alert to stop Armendariz was entered into a U.S. border-control computer system on April 16, but the day and month of his birth were transposed when given to the CBP. The date was corrected on April 20, but his two last names were then transposed...It is not clear why the CBP did not catch Armendariz anyway, since the use of paternal surnames before maternal surnames is a common practice in Spanish and automated name-checking systems can detect such variations....
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The elephant in the room are those “visitors” we don’t know about. Homeland Security has quickly become an oxymoron.
You really believe it was an error?
Having read the entire story, yes, I think it was a series of stupid errors. In this case it was TB, but the guy has a border crossing card, which means he could be crossing freely every day and carrying all kinds of bad stuff, like a suitcase nuke, for instance. There are more than a half-million Mexicans with these border crossing cards in Chihuahua {Ciudad Juarez-El Paso} alone.
Map is not accurate, they found over a hundred and fifty people that tested positive in one chicken plant in Greenville SC this year, does your chicken taste better?
Homeland Security is very insecure.
In a word, yes. Our government obviously subordinates OUR interests and well being to THEIR interests and well being, in this situation and countless others. We are second-class citizens in our own damn country, and I, for one, don’t like it.
There is something strange about this story. So, the DHS wants to revoke the guys visa, but the the guy from the center for disease control says no because it will drive others underground. Wasn’t this guy underground already? I mean, he was using multiple false names. How much more underground could he get?
What was his business, smuggling?
He wasn’t using false names. DHS kept getting his name and date of birth wrong. Data entry error from what I gather. He had a valid border crossing card, and kept using it after he knew he had a very nasty form of TB, and WE couldn’t get it together to stop him. But I have HUGE problem with a guy from the Texas State Department of Health calling the tune on this and overriding DHS’ decision to revoke his border crossing card. As to the legitimacy of his business, I have no idea, but no one attempted to stop him for criminal reasons, it was that he has TB.
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