U.S. Representative Paul Gosar visited the U.S.-Mexico border in Yuma on Tuesday. KAWC's Victor Calderón spoke with him about the rise in migrant apprehensions.
GOSAR:
Yuma's out here on its own, they're being overrun by immigrants coming into this country illegally, and we wanted to see the resources. What's transpiring at the local level and what can we do to help?
How do we get this on the radar screen for this administration who has said it's not a crisis and the vice president actually laughed at it yesterday. That's sad and so we wanted to see what the unaccompanied minors and families were, how they were being handled. So we came first hand to see this.
CALDERON:
So what did you see today at the border?
GOSAR:
So we saw actually this morning we went and saw numbers of people just coming across the river. A mother and son from El Salvador turned themselves in and we saw numbers of people getting ready to cross. Then we went to Border Patrol and we actually saw them where they take them into custody, where they inventory. We process them and then try to get them out to NGOs (non governmental organizations or non profit agencies), particularly family units, to get them out because of the time restraints, but to treat them fairly and we're finally finding out that most of these people are other than Mexican. There were lots of Cubans. There was Venezuelans this morning, so they're coming from all different places. So we wanted to see how that inventory was going and they are overwhelmed in the in the small area that the Yuma Sector is. And they're utilizing their resources as best they can.
CALDERON:
So I understand you've invited President Biden to come tour the border. What are you thoughts on what should be done?
GOSAR:
Well, the thing about it is we've got laws and we should be enforcing those laws instead of putting forward amnesty programs for folks that broke the law, there's a right way and there's a wrong way and so you can't say things and act a different way. Actions have consequences and so do words, and so this was self-created.
If they would have just gone on autopilot from the previous administration would be better situation and even Mexico is now starting to question that those protocols. So once again we've now allowed the cartels to have operational control of the border, they dictate who gets across that border now, not us, and now we're facilitating not only the drug trade, but the human smuggling trade, which is the human assets are for us to be backing, that is unconscionable- children, young girls, women, young boys- it's a sad atrocity without having to be faced with. We have to have a system of loss and we have to enforce that and so the catch and release doesn't work. You know the hold in Mexico (program) was a working facility working process and you know sometimes and particularly what we see with this administration, the hatred they had for the previous administration. They just did away without thinking and maybe we need to think about things before we actually do them. Think it out, you know? Yeah, everybody is a capable of some good suggestions and good policies, so we want to make sure that if people have a question that they have the ability to come here to see those assets being put to work and making sure that we're not empowering these cartels to misuse and misplace people in the human trafficking and drugs. I mean, you know, through this pandemic we've seen a number of suicides grow, overdoses grow, domestic violence grow and a lot of this is coming from our southern border in regards to the drugs, that human trafficking and whatnot. So we've got to get a better grip on this.
