The U.S. / Mexico border which runs along nearly 380 miles of southern Arizona is not secure, despite what Vice President Kamala Harris says.
That is the consensus of numerous local, county, and state officials whose reactions to Harris’ Meet The Press interview last Sunday run the gamut from disappointment to confusion to disgust.
The Vice President’s comments were further ridiculed this week after a video went viral showing dozens of undocumented immigrants entering the U.S. through uncontrolled Cocopah tribal lands near Yuma. Some of the migrants chose not to turn themselves into federal officials, instead disappearing into the desert.
During a visit earlier this month to Yuma County, Gov. Doug Ducey checked on the temporary “border barrier” he had constructed this summer using state-owned shipping containers. The new barrier provides improved operational control by shutting down several routes that drug smugglers and border crossers were using, according to the governor.
However, Ducey’s office is aware Cocopah tribal officials are displeased with the temporary barrier. Part of that displeasure stems from the fact it appears two of the shipping containers sit on a few feet of tribal land.
The governor noted during his recent visit that ensuring border security requires the help of “everyone,” but he did not comment on the difficulties faced by law enforcement officers when drug smugglers and migrants utilize tribal lands.
Some lawmakers and law enforcers tell the Arizona Daily Independent that tribal officials appear more concerned about the fact of the border barrier than they are with the hundreds of people who use that wide open area of land to enter the U.S.
Another video released after the Vice President’s statement that the southwest border is “secure” shows several illegal border crossers dressed in camouflaged clothing being lowered over a border wall near the city of Bisbee in Cochise County. They then run away from U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) cameras.
The video also captured Ducey’s attention, who called out the Biden administration for not doing enough to support the overwhelmed federal agents “who put their lives on the line everyday to keep our communities safe.”
This is why it’s so important to strategically maximize our resources. Arizona is filling gaps along our southern border and making it harder to get into the U.S. illegally. 1/ https://t.co/AQu44JYeWE
— Doug Ducey (@DougDucey) September 13, 2022
Like Ducey, the National Border Patrol Council has not held back with its disgust over the Vice President’s comment, going so far as to say the White House tells lies. The NBPC serves as the union for USBP agents.
We tell you the border is out of control. It is.
We tell you the WH lies. Yes, they flat-out lie.
We tell you that we don't have the manpower to patrol the border effectively. We really don't.
Open border mob: "OMG, I saw agents eating lunch. They don't work hard enough."
— Border Patrol Union – NBPC (@BPUnion) September 13, 2022
The union also took to calling Harris “the Bagdad Bob” of the Biden Administration, a reference to the former Iraqi Minister of Information who told easily disproved lies the early days of the Iraq War.
She is the Baghdad Bob of the Biden Admin. Each lie gets progressively more outrageous and ignores all photographic evidence and first hand eyewitness accounts to the contrary.
It’s straight up propaganda. https://t.co/7qonSdJ1N1
— Border Patrol Union – NBPC (@BPUnion) September 14, 2022
That NBPC tweet came the same day Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels told KFYI’s James T. Harris that the Vice President’s claim of the border being secure is disingenuous.
“This is ridiculous to be saying this to the American people when our border is being flooded by drugs, fentanyl, human smuggling, and trafficking of children,” Dannels said Tuesday. “It just amazes me that they’re ignoring this problem.”
Dannels, who is president of the Arizona Sheriffs’ Association (ASA), has frequently called the challenged faced along the border “a crisis.” He has spent the week hosting dozens of sheriffs from across the country, giving them an up-close tour of the wide open gaps in the border wall.
“They can’t believe how bad it is,” Dannels told Harris.
One person who did not take part in the border tour is President Joe Biden, who Dannels says was invited to meet with the sheriffs but never responded.
Earlier this month, Dannels co-signed a Sept. 6 letter the ASA sent Biden expressing “No Confidence” in former Tucson Police Chief and current U.S. Customs and Border Protections (CBP) Commissioner Chris Magnus.
The ASA as well as the National Sheriffs’ Association announced last year the groups could not support Magnus for the position due in part to concerns with his lack of any federal law enforcement experience. And several months later, those concerns that Magnus was not up to the job have come true, the ASA told Biden in their recent letter.
“Since Commissioner Magnus was appointed nearly nine months ago, we have continued to see an influx of illegal immigrants and illicit drugs cross our southern border,” according to the letter. “What we have not seen in an increased partnership from the federal government including CBP to assist local law enforcement in preventing this activity.”
The ASA letter was released just days before Harris made her “secure” border comments.
Last fall the Western States Sheriffs’ Association issued a similar “no confidence” letter to Biden concerning U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas.