Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said there are serious “mismatches” in U.S. immigration policy in terms of “our economic needs, our law enforcement needs and our values.”
“I think that, having dealt with border enforcement and immigration enforcement for the last 20 years, I can say it is time to look at the entire system,” she said on PBS last night, expressing optimism that immigration reform may come after the fiscal cliff is negotiated.
“As Congress begins to take this subject up — and we hope they will — we would be there to provide them real assistance and understanding what effects different provisions could have,” she said.
Napolitano brushed off arguments that the border should be secured before tackling immigration reform.
“We have more manpower, technology. We actually have air cover now across the entire Southwest border, things that we never had before,” she said. “…And, you know, you’re never going to seal that border. That’s not a possibility. But you can discuss border security and immigration reform simultaneously now. We don’t have to this kind of first this, then that. At this point, they actually go together.”
The secretary said they’ll need to watch to see if illegal immigration rebounds after the U.S. economy recovers.
“The Mexican economy is also coming back. That actually has been very helpful. And Mexico now is talking about having its own border patrol on their northern border. That would be very helpful,” she said.
“You have to have the right way for people to come in legally. You have to have the right balance for who can come in to work in — particularly in certain jobs where there’s a continued labor shortage,” Napolitano continued. “And when you do that, it allows us on the enforcement side to focus on those who have more nefarious purposes.”
She said that after President Obama’s re-election, there’s “a new willingness to take a look at this subject.”
“It’s always a tough subject. It has been historically,” Napolitano said. “But we’re at a period in our history where we have an opportunity to really create a 21st century immigration system that fosters legal crossing, legal workers, that then allows us on the enforcement side, as I mentioned, to really focus on those who are here that are dangers to public safety and others.”
And we’re never going to end murder, so let’s abolish the criminal justice system, the police and prison.
Of course when the Justice Department and Department of Homeland Despotism declare guns in the hands of civilians to be verboten, we’ll be expected to immediately and unconditionally comply with the “law”.
For those who do not know Fast and Furious goes thru Chicago. Chicago is the center of it all
U.S. Attorney’s Office claims author’s of Blagojevich book “Golden” lying
http://illinoispaytoplay.com/2012/12/10/u-s-attorneys-office-claims-authors-of-blagojevich-book-golden-lying/
Thanks to the current US free-fall into economic, social, political, and moral bankruptcy, as well as into socialist/pro-jihadi totalitarianism, we don’t have to worry about the continuing influx of normal, hard-working, job-seeking Mexican would-be immigrants. They are leaving in droves.
Of course, the continuing infiltration of non-Mexicans via our southern border – especially jihadis – is another matter entirely. Our Muslim president and our pro-Muslim Secretary of State have no objections to that whatsoever.
Secretary Napolitano betrays her motivation. “You are never going to seal that border” is a statment not an observation.
It is also a fact. The focus will always be on facilitation of trade, not on immigration enforcement. Business gets pretty irate at how long their drivers have to wait at border crossings, and most of the increase spending in CPB that DHS and the President brag about has been for increased bridges, lanes and inspectors. (That was also true during the Bush administration.)
We will never solve this problem until we are a serious as EVERY OTHER developed country about interior enforcement. You know deporting pregnant women when they show up for care. Deporting drivers pulled over by law enforcement. Allowing communities to ban day labor sites. And all those other things that raise the sector of “human rights violators” accusations from the activists. Canada manages to do it so I’m sure we could as well.
Oh, well, let’s just create more illegal Democrat voters then. Viva left/liberalism!
Oh well, mama Janet says its an impossible task then so be it. And the impossibility of the task has nothing to do with stripping funding and muscular tactics to seal the border….and pigs do fly. Nor does it have anything to do with a regime which wants illegals to run rampant over America to ensure its deconstruction, and to assure a voting base for generations! Of course not…and more pigs fly.
But mama Janet needs to know that there are still many patriotic Americans on the border states, plus ‘good ole boys’ in mid America who are sick and tired of the leadership’s lawless approach. As such, she should rethink her hands-in-the pocket attitude too.
Want proof of DHS’s intent – http://adinakutnicki.com/2012/10/08/the-politicizing-of-dhs-rendering-it-ineffective-a-danger-to-national-security-addendum-to-black-hawks-swirling-over-u-s-cities-commentary-by-adina-kutnicki/
IF Napolitano thinks the border cannot be sealed, she needs to step down. As Ronald Reagan had as a sign in the White House when he was President (A real president) It Can Be Done. Just look at what USSR did, splitting East and West Germany and the Slavic nations. It was improbable that someone could cross the border and the penalties were persuasive in keeping people from trying. We can have the same thing here, IF the politicians develop the backbone to do the right thing
It was once sealed and can be again, just like it is for every other country on earth. All it takes is the will and a presidential administration that isn’t obsessed with globalization and turning the Canada-US-Mexico land mass into the North American Union.
“…And, you know,
you’rewe’re never going to seal that border. That’s not a possibility…”Fixed that for ya Janet. I knew what you meant to say – sometimes things just come out wrong don’t they?
Two steel sheer walls, 18 ft in height, 18 ft in the ground, slanted 10 degrees towards Mexico, with ~ 30 feet in between them.
Fill in gap with motion detectors, and camera or drone patrols activated upon alert. Have a patrol station every ~40 miles with responders, and loud speakers announcing the illegality of the crossing.
If someone tries to make it over, they will have two walls to surmount, costing them between 5 and 20 minutes depending on the size of the group. Add to the the capability to easily follow them with drones, and you’d have 99% secure rate for individuals or small groups, and probably 70-90% for larger groups, depending on if you can reach them before they make it over.
Problem solved. Cost? Less than 20 billion for the entire stretch. Maybe $500,000/year to monitor every 20 miles (on average; higher cost at higher traffic). Add in maintenance, and factor in that this is government, and you’re looking at a cost of under $150million/year to secure a 2000mi border. New drones and monitoring technology, and fewer attempts over time should make it cheaper.
And just think, all those construction jobs, and then the permanent staffing of maybe 1000 people. Problem solved.
Then we can talk about amnesty and immigration streamlining. Until we seal the hemorrhage, talking about different policies to inflict on the patient and the law abiding is meaningless.
None of that would be necessary with an effective identification tool such as a national ID card, and effective sanctions on employers, schools and landlords who did business with illegals. Harsh as it sounds, it would be a more humane policy than allowing millions of illegals to live here — with their children — in the shadows without any access to law enforcement, public health services, etc. Most would go home and the rest could be found and deported.
the alternative is capitulation, which I fear we are perilously close to.
Then we could talk about a guest worker program and decide how many immigrants from Latin America might be optimal based on America’s needs, not the choice of somebody else.
Normally I’d agree. But with debatable levels of compliance, “sanctuary cities” and other things, I just don’t think an internal immune system will accomplish the job as effectively as a physical stop at the source.
Granted I’d much rather both options implemented to their optimal combination,I just don’t know if ID would be enough. Fake ID’s, passports, Social Security cards are not as hard to come by as I would like, and you would create a 30million person market for that. And all their fake ID has to do is hold out until anchor babies or some “publicly affirmed statute” like 5 or 10 years go by. Deporting is always going to involve the complaints of “morality”, baseless as they are. Its not a publicly good fight to have to constantly have. Easier to keep out than to deport.
Any politician involved in a “sanctuary city” declaration should be arrested and charged with treason against the United States. They are effectively declaring secession.
Your fencing scheme; one very similar and more high tech, has been reviewed and even tested (though not on the border) and will not work under experienced senarios. It was also proven to be very high maintenance not withstanding initial construction and replacement costs. Also, there are many rugged, deep, narrow and wide canyon areas in which it is not feasible.
From normal foot crossing you can make it tough and possibly seal the border down to very small numbers but sealing it from criminal enterpise is impossible.
The best solution is ZERO tolerance for illegal immigrants found inside our borders and those who hire them.
What Janet should also be asked is “how are Americans going to continue to have any type of viable health care system when Obamacare has to provide services for not only the 30,000,000 Americans who are now going to be part of this Obamacare health care system + the 12,000,000 current illegals (or more that Obama and the Dems what to legalize) + the millions more who will be allowed to enter the USA legally via “family reunification” once the 12,000,000 (or more) get amnesty.”
To my way of thinking, we are facing some 65,000,000 or more individuals who will, within a couple of years, be entitled to Obamacare courtesy of this tide of amnesties. Folks, if you think we’ve got problems now, just wait–rationing will be the least of our problems!
A national ID kkkard, even “Secure ID” is capitulation to the power-mad federal thugs.
“Oh, geee, we could never actually do the jobs the constitution requires of us. But we are extremely eager to do these other things it does not permit” Soclialist Insecurity, issuing ever more scrip (and now e-scrip), barring personal arms from flights, gropings, X-rays, surveillance systems along streets and highways, digitizing and govrnment access to everyone’s financial and medical records, regulating Hemingway’s cats in Key West as “interstate commerce”, FCOL.
Deploy the active duty military along the borders and let them have discretion to shoot invaders. Take well-known investigative measures to detect and secure convictions against employers of illegal aliens. Recognize that the 14th amendment has nothing to do with tourists, and certainly not with anchor-baby tourists. Do it consistently and conscientiously.
But, of course, that’s one thing JN would never do, and Lindsay Grahamnesty, Chuck Schumer, Nasty Pelosi, Zoe Lofgren, John McCain et al. would all throw tantrums if the worker-bees actually did their jobs. They already penalize visa application inspectors who question contradictory info on the applications, and reward the rubber-stampers.
A half mile wide fenced off well marked no-mans-land with 300 to 500 million land mines would do the trick too, and probably a lot more cheaply. The real problem is that your solution is about as likely to happen as mine because the politicians don’t want to seal the border. If some omnipotent being came down and offered to close the border for free the Democrats and some Republicans would still say no. This is part of a larger long term project to replace the American electorate with one that’ll consistently vote for leftists and be easier overall to control. They like the idea of illegal immigrants voting in American elections, because they vote for handouts, and the whole “social justice” crowd loves the idea of making the suburbs pay for ever expanding benefits for as many of the “global poor” as they can.
It’s democracy in reverse. Usually the people elect the politicians, but subtly over the course of decades the politicians have been “electing” a new people, one more toward their liking and more amenable to their preferred policies.
Make that no-man’s land with parallel patrol roads, UAVs, and MetalStorm devices. They call them “area interdiction” systems.
We don’t really want or need to “seal” the borders; just control them to the extent of blocking people who have not been investigated and found not likely to initiate force or fraud from wreaking havoc. That’s why we have “ports” — places where people who measure up can enter and leave in a supervised, reasonably controlled manner. “Seal” is a lobbying/propaganda term, intended to make the ignorant rustics and PBS/CPB pseudo-intellectuals think you sound “extreme”.
Land mines.
Korean border is pretty secure and land mines don’t sleep or get bribed.
We don’t have the will to seal the border.
Napolitano should be fired! If her department can’t protect America’s boarders then get someone else in that position. Bet if her and Congress had to live along the Mexican boarder it would be closed in a heartbeat. What a real idiot
If DHS can’t secure the border then why do they exist? It’s not enough to fire Napolitano. Scrap the entire department.
I listened to that interview. It is quite clear that as long as this Administration holds power, America is never going to seal that border. This is a classic case of Washington D.C. over riding the clear will of the American people.
A minority of well connected people prefer 11+ million illegal immigrants in this country; it is not in their interests to enforce the law. The law has been ignored for so long that we have an entire sub population of illegal immigrants, several generations of people who know no other home country. The only real control is that our unemployed work force is being to look like Mexico’s. The illegal immigration population is shrinking as unemployed folks go back home.
Secretary Napolitano is correct, the problem requires multidimensional legislative action, but it will never occur as long as she holds power. She is not trust worthy, the most current in a long line of untrustworthy immigration officials.
obama’s best suggestion so far, even in jest, was the moat with alligators
Democrats won’t seal it, neither will Republicans.
Right. It’s win-win for both of them. One party gets cheap (and illegal) labor and the other gets cheap (and illegal) votes.
How are we to process this vocal, abrupt, and definitive abandonment of responsibility?
She can’t see a way/or ways clear to get it done, so that is all there is ?
I see it now,… it is all so clear to me…….all I’ve ever had to do is say ‘it just can’t happen’ and “VOILA”,… incredibly, it won’t.
Kick that Sad Sack of Bilge out, on her self-admittedly useless keister.
I’ll have refuse truck waiting and the waste drums open for filling……….
This ‘loose stool’ is the best and brightest Barry could come up with ?
Napolitano’s statement is definitely more about intent/will than practical reality.
Although nothing is admitedly 100%…even the Berlin Wall failed that test…stemming the flood to a trickle in practical terms is more than possible…without that much improvement.
Federal Agencies banning vehicles in much of the border area is also not helpful….making horseback border patrol the only option is not an unintended consequence IMHO.
Minefields may even become politically possible….if the will to seal the border is there.
Since she’s admitting she can’t do her job, the only honorable thing to do is to resign.
There is a better chance for a balanced Federal budget next year.
Honorable???
– or perhaps someone who can do it will be found.
head line: not with janet taking orders from obama .
Close the biggest leak, close the next biggest leak, rinse repeat. Play whack-a-leak and plug-um and the border will be 99% closed, ‘course you have to want to.
Three words: Nerve gas mines.
After Iranian agents smuggle a few kilos of weapons grade U235 across the border, assemble it into a crude gun-type weapon in the basement of a rented Los Angeles home, and then set it off, I wonder what their stance on the wisdom of open borders will be then?
what happens when our cities go up in a mushroom cloud?
its amazing something similar (or worse) hasn’t already happened. iranians look just like mexicans running across the desert carrying bombs. of course, based on past disasters ( F & F , benghazi) resulting in American deaths, if something like a big bomb went off in say l.a., it would probably take the msm a couple days to pick it up, once everybody had their story straight. all the records about anything/anybody close will be destroyed, people involved promoted and transferred to artic circle. some mouthpiece would eventually be out front explaining how it was workplace violence, caused by riots of immigrants on u-tube rightly wanting to have our guns taken away. (notice the typ. idiot logic?)
the chicago way doesn’t want the border secured. they also don’t want legalized mary ju wana. a calm border w/o illegal drugs/immigrants/terrorists coming across isn’t how they roll. illegal makes a lot mo $$$ sucka. an exploded nuke only gives obiwon an excuse to declare martial law = end of America. win + win for them.
She calls it “our values” but what it is, is cowardly lack of will. And to be blunt of White will.
A fully armed SWAT team will break down your door and shoot American citizens to death in their own home if the government thinks they have illegal drugs, but God forbid that anything like a gun or the threat of using one should be engaged to defend a country’s borders from million and millions of foreign invaders. That would be against “our values.”
And you know why. If they were Afrikaaners instead of Mexicans, there’d have been a wall with guns up in twenty minutes. James Burnham put it all in a pathetic nutshell: The Liberal is always morally disarmed in the presence of anyone he deems less well off than himself.
Drop the stupid white power BS, moby.
Thanks for your incisively intelligent and thoughtful reply. Certainly changed my mind. Love, Moby.
(1) End the notion that merely being born in the US makes you a citizen.
(2) End the notion of allowing the parents of “anchor babies” as having a right to reside in the country.
(3) Make applying for or receiving benefits if you are in this country illegally a crime, punishable by long time at hard labor.
(4) End the right of anybody who is illegally in this country to sue anybody for anything, and make it a complete defense to any criminal prosecution that the “victim” was an illegal alien.
The problem will end, and quickly.
Reforming our nations immigration philosophy and laws providing for ‘closed borders’ should be given far more consideration. If such new policies/laws were adopted, tied to economic trade and government subsides along with stiff fines to those governments for each illegal entry, things would change pretty fast. They migh then cooperate with protecting their sides of the border.
Most of the world see and understands America as having open borders given our virtually non existance response. I supose that comes from the Cuban policy of ‘make it to our shore’ and you’re safe from prosecution and deportation.
Why don’t we fire upon border invaders, like they Mexicans do on the Guatemalan border? Isn’t that what it means to secure a border? Repel or kill the invaders?
Also, by eliminating the illegal economy, perhaps we can retrain Americans who live on gov’t assistance do take over the low paying labor jobs dominated by illegals?
I think we need to just put up razor wire fence about 300 feet North and completely along the southern board, and at the boarder, buring Invisble Dog Fence completely along the boarder. Then build Prisons between the razor fence and about 50 feet from the boarder, place another invisible fence. In this Invisible Fenced in area, we could have free roaming (agressive) drug dogs. Just north of the Drug Dog area, all those folks that are killing and doing things that have them in closed Federal prisions we could build Prision Barracks… if the want to go south and make it through the drug dog area, then they are free to live outside of the USA. If not, they all live in what ever environment that they can manage from South of the Prison Fence until they finish their sentence. But I doubt too many will be attempting to come North, making an attempt to get thru both an agressive drug dog area, and 200 feet of free roaming prision…. and if they do, they get a free pass into that same prision area….
Oh pure unadulterated BS. There’s already a comprehensive immigration law politically negotiated covering the who, when, where, why, and covering how many immigrants to legally immigrate each year: but both parties have violated enforcing those laws and failed to control the border that could be locked down like any other border.
Nah, you’re all over thinking this too much. Simple solution really, just have a volunteer militia that camps along the border with night vision goggles and a sniper rifle and take “pot shots!” Pretty soon they’ll get the hint and won’t even venture close to the border. Won’t take long, week, maybe two and they’ll back off.
Janet is a flag holder for the agenda of changing the facts on the ground. With the 20-30 million illegal alien invasion into these United States, the CFR North American Union is almost a done deal. Throw in 16 trillion plus in debt to the CHICOMMS, Muslims helping to change the American culture, and the flag holders keeping the border open to the flood, and region 1 of the WTO is almost here.
The Lesbos running Homeland Security couldnt organize border security if they tried. Not gonna happen. And they most assuredly arent even going to try.
According to a report in the Daily Rash, during his appearance on CBS This Morning Joe Biden told Gayle King the Department of Homeland Security “is crawling with lesbians.” http://www.thedailyrash.com/biden-says-department-of-homeland-security-crawling-with-lesbians
No Janet Incompentano we”re never going to seal that border. The Soviets always had a few holes in the Berlin Wall too, but they had a twenty mile wall. We’ve got a two thousand mile sieve. Don’t you think we should be building a wall instead of punching bigger holes in our sieve with things like advertising in Mexico how to get government benefits in the United States.
Oh, Janet. How’s about we try? Just for giggles. Seeing as how NO ONE’S ever really tried, how do you know it can’t be sealed?
From what I understand there’s more jobs in Mexico than here so now would be a good time to crank up some shovel ready jobs and build a wall along most of the border.
You don’t have to SEAL the border Janet, just make it a little less leaky than it currently is. Which is a flood when the economy is going.
Why do we hire people for government who then tell us they can’t do the job?
Obama; can’t fix DC
Janet; can’t stop illegals
Panetta: can’t get any intelligence
Clinton: can’t find any allies
The list goes ON.
The 1986 “one time only” amnesty for illegal aliens came about as part of a deal including immigration enforcement both internally and at our borders. The libs walked away from that “bargain” high-fiving each other and smirking about the stupid conservatives.
Never again.
Before Ms Incompetano says “no” to closing the border, she should give it a try. Who knows, maybe we could keep, say, 90-95% of ILLEGAL ALIENS from entering the country.
There would be more jobs for legal Americans, and less of a drain on the entitlement programs.
Napolitano knows nothing but what is shoved in from of him, at the end of his newspaper spoon.
His think is meaningless. First, you inconvenience those crossing illegally that you catch. You offer them no help no comfort no nothing: let them die on their own. The rest, you shove to the other side and leave.
The next step is to not allow them work, and more importantly deny them all social services, and use those trammels to catch them. Think of them as pigeons: you feed them they come.
Remind our unemployed that illegals are eating their lunch: I think the Blacks are catching on, but slowly.
Again Nappy is complete right, his solutions irrelevant.
It is because of people in the administration (like Napolitano) that we need a new Secretary of Homeland Security; a secretary, who along with the president
would order troops home from the Middle East and elsewhere to secure our
Southern Borders. And the troops would be authorized to arrest and deport
illegals immediately. Illegal immigration is illegal.
Let’s stop mamby pambying around and really stop any more illegals from
entering America, uninvited and unwanted and at a huge monetary expense.
And there are now ‘rumors’ that an inordinate number of Iranian terorists
(see WND website) have been entering America via the Southern borders.
We need a new government that cares about the security of this country.
We need a new president……soon.
Good luck, America.
She misspoke…she meant to say
“I WILL NEVER, EVER SEAL THAT BORDER.
“My job is to insure that it stays open and we are overwhelmed by illegal aliens.”
So far she is doing a damn good job at that!
(It’s also known as TREASON!)
The real mystery is why Americans continue to pay taxes to a government that is working every day AGAINST THEM!!! They are using our own money to destroy our country.
….And the Mexicans keep coming……………This is Not immigration, This is Evacuation…of the American People.
http://www.sgvtribune.com/news/ci_22158851/25-suspected-illegal-immigrants-detained-after-panga-lands
I actually agree with her, in many ways the border is not sealable.
To seal the border would involve searching every vehicle that crosses the border. Currently, there are border waits in the San Diego area that are hours long. The types of searches that would be required to seal the border would increase that wait by hours and hours.
The terrain the is along our border with Mexico also prevents it from being totally sealed. I have been within a mile of the border in San Diego county if not closer. The hills, ravines, water courses, and canyons in that area make it very easy to move unnoticed.
The only way to seal the border would be to burn all the plants down along the border, totally flatten the 1800ish miles with bulldozers, and build an 1800ish mile wall/fence.
It just isn’t practical. What really needs to be done is fixing the laws that give reason for people to cross the border. Things like citizenship for children, and under the table jobs give to much reasons for people to come here.
I will make this claim. If terrorist come across the border and kill many people Americans WILL come for Nappy. The borders can be sealed if only this progressive marxist socialist so-called President quits spending money we don’t have on trivial things and puts the money into our security by sealing the borders. That would be money spent Americans could back. It WILL take the military to protect her if anything catastrophic happens
Typical of the titmice in DC who think sealing the border must be done with a physical barrier. Pray the next 4 years pass quickly!
It is way past time for Americans to wake up to the fact that ‘Law and Order’ is only a TV show.