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 Editorials | May 2005 
Border Shutdown Urged — In Mexico
 Hernán Rozemberg - Express-News
| | A sign warning drivers about pedestrians running across the highway is posted by the side of the highway at the US-Mexican border near San Diego. The United States announced it would tighten its borders by requiring US citizens, Canadians, Mexicans and Bermudans to show passports to enter this country. (Photo: Hector Mata/AFP) |
Fed up with perennial claims that his government has done nothing to prevent the growing count of migrants dying during illegal crossings, a Mexican senator has come up with a controversial solution more commonly heard north of the border — shut it down.
Citing national security interests, Héctor Osuna, a senator from President Vicente Fox's National Action Party, wants to dispatch federal, state and local law enforcement officers to the border to impede migrants from crossing into the United States illegally.
His bill is meant solely to curb the rising migrant death toll, which reached a record-high of 369 last year, he said. Only a far-reaching immigration pact between Fox and President Bush could solve the immigration dilemma, he noted.
"I'm a border man; I've personally seen how dangerous it is out there," Osuna, a Tijuana mayor in the 1990s, said by phone from his Mexico City office. "We need to convince people once and for all to stop leading themselves to their own death."
The idea sparked national controversy in Mexico. Fellow senators accused him of stomping on the Mexican Constitution, and migrant advocates likened him to xenophobic U.S. activists.
Though Osuna received enough support for his bill to clear a committee recently, he was pressured by the government to quickly withdraw it with a promise to tone it down.
At first, Osuna wanted to use the Mexican Army to permanently seal the entire border. But after being told to revise the bill, he dropped that idea and narrowed the scope to temporarily closing the most dangerous "death corridors," such as the Sonoran Desert along the Arizona border.
Despite opposition, he said he remains optimistic his idea will gain momentum and become law this year. He said he'd leave operational aspects to law enforcement agencies, but would not want migrants to be physically confronted — just transported to nearby shelters.
"It's not about making arrests or physically restraining people. It's about telling them: Another day, another place," Osuna said.
The brunt of the logistics would fall on the country's immigration agency, the National Immigration Institute. Spokesman Mauricio Juárez said the agency would have no comment unless the bill becomes law.
Critics have derided the idea on political and legal grounds. Besides being outright discriminatory, opponents argue, it would violate Mexicans' constitutional right of unrestricted movement throughout the country.
Sin Fronteras, a nonprofit migrant advocacy group in Mexico City, said it would force a change in the migration flow, in turn making crossers more dependent than ever on ruthless smugglers.
"He wants the Mexican government to do the (U.S.) Border Patrol's dirty work," said Arturo Solís, director of the Center for Border Studies and Promotion of Human Rights in Reynosa, across the border from McAllen.
Osuna dismisses critics, saying if they took a closer look at the law, they'd know the government already has the authority to shut down the border — in fact, all ports of entry — in the name of national security.
The border clampdown would be on a similar legal footing to the government's restriction of movement in response to an environmental disaster, such as a volcanic eruption, Osuna said.
Though odds may be against it becoming law, a few of his colleagues have come out in support of the proposal.
Constitutional critics have it wrong, said Sen. Jeffrey Jones, from the border state of Chihuahua and chairman of the border affairs committee, because officers wouldn't stop Mexicans from freely moving about the country — just from illegally crossing into the United States.
"This is not the real answer to solving the immigration crisis, but it makes a lot of sense as a temporary solution," Jones said.
While both the White House and State Department declined to comment on Osuna's proposed law, a Homeland Security agency happily welcomed it.
Salvador Zamora, spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection, the Border Patrol's parent agency, said the project would be "a huge step forward" in saving lives.
U.S. anti-immigrant groups were pleasantly surprised to hear about it, praising Osuna but skeptical that he could garner enough support to pass it.
Still, the mere fact that he dared put his career and reputation on the line for an effective Mexican border policy is nearly a miracle in itself, said John Hernández, founder of Texans for Immigration Reform and Americans for Zero Immigration, both based in Houston.
"He's a genius as far as I'm concerned," Hernández said. "Maybe it'll finally make the Mexican people realize that they need to stay home."
Osuna's idea may sound practical in theory, but it would be quite problematic in practice, one border analyst concluded.
Besides the operation's huge financial undertaking, officers would face a logistical nightmare by having to detain and transport thousands of would-be crossers, said Jon Amastae, director of the Center for Inter-American and Border Studies at the University of Texas-El Paso.
Still, Osuna already can claim one victory — he has created a national debate directly challenging his country's constitution. |
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