Cochise County Sheriff Dannels testified before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs “Securing the Southwest Border: Perspectives from Beyond the Beltway” hearing on Tuesday.
Dannels, was joined by Chris Cabrera, Border Patrol Agent and representative of the National Border Patrol Council; and Warren Buffett’s brother Howard G. Buffett, Chairman and CEO of the Howard G. Buffett Foundation. Buffet is a large landowner in Cochise County.
The witnesses testified that land management laws prevent Border Patrol agents from routinely patrolling large swaths of federal land. Drug cartels and human smugglers continue to exploit these laws by crossing the U.S. border illegally through federal lands and harming Arizona’s national parks and protected areas, according to witnesses.
“Our local efforts have proven to be beneficial in bringing over-due solutions to an unsecure border that has become a discretionary program by those federally elected leaders and policy makers that have been entrusted to protect our freedoms and liberties,” said Dannels in a prepared statement. “As a Sheriff elected by the good people of my county, my biggest fear is another loss of life to one of my citizens and/or law enforcement officers/agents contributed to a border that is NOT secure. One would hope that securing our border doesn’t come without a price tag and/or political posturing, but the priority of safeguarding Americans that so many heroic Americans have already have paid the ultimate price for.”
Dannels told the Committee, “Cochise County and other counties along the border have become VIP attractions, venues for those seeking to make a difference or promising change only to become another faded high-hope…”
“We can secure our border by addressing the key practical challenges, including increasing enforcement capacity, furthering cooperation with Mexico, improving coordination among local, state and federal agencies, including local communities. On the policy front, we must strive for zero tolerance. All of these efforts should not get sidetracked by the important but separate considerations of immigration reform and Central American economic development initiatives,” testified Buffett.
“Agents who repeatedly report groups larger than 20 face retribution. Management will either take them out of the field and assign them to processing detainees at the station or assign them to a fixed position in low volume areas as punishment,” said Border Patrol agent Chris Cabrera. “Needless to say agents got the message and now stay below this 20 person threshold no matter the actual size of the group.”
Cabrera, vice president of the National Border Patrol Council (NBPC) Local 3307, alleged that the Obama administration is manipulating border security data in an effort to mislead the public. Cabrera advised lawmakers that the 6 out 10 illegal entrants, successfully cross the southwest border and make their way into the United States without interference.
“Ask any line agent in the field and he or she will tell you that at best we apprehend 35-40 percent of the illegal immigrants attempting to cross,” claimed Cabrera. “This number is even lower for drug smugglers who are much more adept at eluding capture.”
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