Cornyn calls for greater expenditures along the border

HIDALGO — A $600 million border security measure will fund the hiring of hundreds of new federal agents is not enough to secure the Southwest border, U.S. Sen. John Cornyn said at a U.S. port of entry as he called for additional investments in manpower, infrastructure and technology.

Signed by President Barack Obama on Aug. 14, the bill will pay for 1,000 new U.S. Border Patrol agents, about 250 more Customs and Border Protection officers to monitor the land ports, and two unmanned surveillance aircraft.

But Cornyn said the funding is far short of the $2 billion in border security spending his office called for in response, and the bill failed to address significant needs in bringing decades-old ports up to new standards.

“All you have to do is look around these ports of entry and the infrastructure needs and the inadequacy of the numbers of personnel to see it’s not enough,” Cornyn said at the Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge as a line of cars passed south into Mexico. “$600 million is a step in the right direction, but it’s not nearly enough.”

Cornyn toured the U.S. port of entry in Hidalgo following a roundtable discussion with members of the Texas Border Coalition on the need to improve the port’s outdated infrastructure and increase the number of customs agents who check inbound and outbound traffic.

Comprised of border mayors, county executives and local economic development officials, the coalition advocates on behalf of communities along the Texas-Mexico border on issues such as education, security and transportation that affect the quality of life in the region.

As Cornyn held a news conference surrounded by nearly two dozen federal and local law enforcement officers, the line of cars headed south into Mexico proceeded mostly unchecked by federal agents.

The Washington Post reported this week that less than 1 percent of cash receipts from illicit activities are caught by U.S. or Mexican authorities before it reaches the traffickers.

Cornyn said the United States needs to do a better job of stopping the bulk cash from human smuggling and drug trafficking activities that passes through U.S. ports.

Adequate personnel and technology at the land ports will help prevent some cash from reaching its source and should be used in tandem with efforts to stop the anonymous wire transfers that are also used by the cartels, he said.

But Hidalgo Mayor John David Franz, the chair of the Texas Border Coalition, said outdated U.S. facilities for inspecting northbound traffic were also a “vulnerable point,” allowing contraband to pass through undetected.

Federal agencies have reported a 70 percent success rate in stopping drugs that cross the border in the vast spaces between the ports, Franz said. But at the ports themselves, authorities estimate only 30 percent of the smuggled drugs are found.

“It makes you wonder how much is getting through,” Franz said in reference to a 100-pound seizure at the Hidalgo port this week. “We need to give them the tools to do a better job of securing the border.”

The Texas Border Coalition maintains that outmoded strategies and tactics cannot be used to secure the ports of entry.

The U.S. Government Accountability Office — a nonpartisan congressional agency that audits federal programs — recommends that land ports be strengthened with $6 billion to bring infrastructure up to requirements and the hiring of 5,000 additional frontline customs inspectors.

The $600 million border security bill that passed includes funding for 250 customs agents, not even enough to give each of the nation’s 300 border ports an additional officer, said Monica Weisberg-Stewart, the chair of the coalition’s border security committee.

Cornyn’s own $2 billion border security bill would have doubled the number of additional CBP agents to 500. Cornyn’s version of the bill — which he proposed to pay for using unspent economic stimulus dollars — also included $550 million for equipment and technology and $300 million for local law enforcement agencies.

Cornyn said the $600 million version amounted to a “fig leaf” to show the federal government was doing something about the border. He called the final bill inadequate compared to his own.

 “It was defeated by those who basically think the border is a local problem,” Cornyn said of his own proposal. “It’s not.”

The senator also took an aerial tour of Hidalgo County’s levee systems to see how they held up to Hurricane Alex. He said the federal government needs to reimburse the county for the $82 million in local bond money it spent on improving the levees and constructing the levee-wall barrier.

County Judge Rene Ramirez likewise pointed out that the county needs that reimbursement to continue the work included in its drainage improvement plan.

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Jared Janes covers Hidalgo County government, Edinburg and general assignments for The Monitor.