Costs, Risks of Halting Illegal Immigrants Debated : Border Patrol: More agents, new equipment will help. But will the results, social impact justify the money spent?

The outnumbered Border Patrol agents guarding the nation’s main gateway of illegal immigration say that they could stop unlawful crossing right here at the border--if the government would just provide the resources.

Joined by a rising number of sympathetic politicians, their call for bolstering border enforcement has gained unprecedented momentum since the patrol’s acclaimed September blockade in El Paso.

“With a sufficient show of force you can stop it,” said Agent Mike Hance, a veteran of the 14-mile San Diego-Tijuana strip where the patrol makes more than 500,000 arrests a year. “With enough manpower and technology, you can do it humanely and adequately.”

But can authorities really shut down the border in California and elsewhere? And what would be the costs?

Law enforcement experts acknowledge that complete control of the nearly 2,000-mile border between the United States and Mexico is impossible. The obstacles include the topography, the sheer length of the border and the profound economic disparities fueling immigration from Mexico and Central America.

Even a huge military effort--whether aimed at drugs or people--might fall short, and that kind of effort by a peacetime democratic society seems unlikely.

But it is also clear that much more can be done. On a typical day, only about 100 front-line border agents defend the narrow San Diego corridor that records about half the illegal crossings nationwide.

Although Border Patrol officials oppose an El Paso-type blockade in San Diego, they believe that with more agents, fences, lights and surveillance technology they could reduce crossing in San Diego substantially, redirecting the migratory flow to less populated areas where policing is easier.

This approach would reduce--not eliminate--illegal crossing. And the Border Patrol recognizes that there would be costs. Experts envision smugglers enriching themselves, frustrated immigrants attempting desperate new tactics, and violent confrontations.

The fundamental disagreement hinges on whether the results would justify the effort. Critics say the new efforts to block the border amount to a confrontational waste of money and energy that would have unintended social and economic costs, including damage to legal commerce and diplomatic relations.

“You are just rechanneling the flows,” said Wayne Cornelius, director of the Center for U.S.-Mexico Studies at UC San Diego. “What difference does it make if you push it to Texas and Arizona? It’s sort of like putting a boulder in a stream.”

Proponents say it is time to make a stand and they see the urgency of the discussion as a victory in itself. “The perception had been created that there is no way to get a handle on the border,” said Dan Stein of the Federation for American Immigration Reform. “It is total baloney.”

In El Paso, arrests plummeted in September when Chief Silvestre Reyes used overtime funds and agents from inland posts to saturate the north bank of the Rio Grande with a massive show of force.

Operation Blockade won praise because with little violence it seemed to stop illegal immigration before it occurred. But the Border Patrol was aided by a river that serves as a natural buffer and by the fact that commuters from Ciudad Juarez, mostly laborers, accounted for about half of the illegal crossings.

California politicians have urged a similar operation in San Diego. Border Patrol commanders in California oppose the idea because of differences in topography and immigrant population.

“I’d have to be almost in a riot-type situation,” Chief Agent Gustavo De La Vina said. “There are places on the fence where we’d be eyeball to eyeball. . . . There would be an explosion somewhere.”

Unlike Ciudad Juarez, most U.S.-bound immigrants in Tijuana have traveled from impoverished Mexican interior states at considerable expense. They are short on money and time. They are eager to reach Los Angeles and other job centers via Southern California’s network of freeways and rail lines, taking advantage of a continuous urban sprawl that exists nowhere else on the border.

The Border Patrol probably would not deter illegal crossing with a heightened presence alone--particularly in canyons that are notorious for rough terrain, rough smugglers and thugs.

“In the desperation to cross, if the traditional routes are blocked, perhaps some would commit violence against agents of the Border Patrol,” said Victor Clark Alfaro, who heads the Bi-National Center for Human Rights in Tijuana.

Instead of a blockade, border commanders in San Diego favor bolstering the current approach: arresting immigrants once they have entered U.S. territory.

The tone of the debate today sometimes suggests that illegal immigration has surged to the worst levels ever. But statistics show that the San Diego border has become more difficult to cross during the last several years because of expanded forces and fortifications, De La Vina said.

Ten-foot steel fences, some arrayed three-deep, have ended the chaotic days when groups breached a chain-link fence at will. In the mid-1980s, there was no fence along many stretches.

As a result of improvements, agents are catching more immigrants more often and apparently redirecting some to the east: arrests rose 30% in Arizona and Texas this year, compared to a 6% decline in the San Diego sector, which recorded 531,689 arrests. Authorities estimate that at least one illegal immigrant succeeds for every one arrested. Many are caught several times before making it north or giving up.

California’s economic slump has contributed to the decrease as well, experts say.

The Border Patrol’s objective is to force illegal immigrants toward more isolated regions such as Calexico and Yuma, Ariz. The topography of the Southwest boundary--deserts, mountains, the Rio Grande--funnels immigrants to about 10 corridors formed by contiguous border cities.

El Paso and San Diego combined account for 75% of the million-plus Border Patrol arrests a year, so establishing control of those two sectors would be significant. Arizona would bear the brunt of redirected migratory patterns, experts say.

But first, San Diego needs more agents, more technology and a redeployment of forces, law enforcement officials say. Here are some of the methods being proposed:

Expanded Forces

The San Diego sector has almost 1,000 agents. But as in most police agencies, the forces are spread among three shifts, special details, days off, checkpoints and non-border stations. There are 85 to 120 agents guarding the border at any time.

“I’m just an average (agent) sitting at my kitchen table with a calculator,” Hance said. “I figure you double the size. . . . It would have a deterrent effect. They’d say: ‘There’s too many of them.’ ”

Congress recently approved a $45-million funding package providing up to 600 new agents for the 4,100-agent Border Patrol, most going to San Diego. Chief De La Vina said that with 400 to 600 new agents and new equipment, his forces could catch up to 90% of illegal immigrants.

Although arrests would surge initially, they would presumably decline as crossing patterns were disrupted. In the best-case scenario, De La Vina said, arrests in the San Diego sector would drop from half a million to as low as 100,000 within two years, and only a small percentage of illegal immigrants would elude capture.

Technology

The Border Patrol plans to finish the last two miles of its 14-mile fencing project within six months. That includes an extension, begun last month, of the barrier across Imperial Beach, a longtime hot spot.

Agents also say they need more high-intensity lights of the type installed along the Tijuana River, as well as additional motion detection sensors and night-vision scopes. Improving the agency’s notoriously dilapidated vehicles is a priority, they said.

Officials hope to implement a system of television surveillance cameras similar to one that has existed for years in the El Paso sector. The camera system, designed to function with minimal light levels, would give agents in the field more mobility and flexibility.

Redeployment

The Border Patrol can deploy its forces more effectively, according to Atty. Gen. Janet Reno and other officials. During a recent visit, Reno said she is studying deployment patterns.

The El Paso experiment may exemplify a new approach: Chief Reyes shifted personnel away from interior operations, which he said fomented conflict and seemed inefficient.

Some politicians and immigration officers want the Border Patrol to eliminate stations in Northern California and at the San Diego sector’s freeway checkpoints, enabling the transfer of about 220 agents to the front line.

De La Vina said he has no plans to dismantle checkpoints near San Clemente and Temecula, but their role could diminish if border defenses improve.

The National Guard

Some politicians want the National Guard to augment the Border Patrol. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) recently pushed through legislation that would allow the Guard to work at the border.

Border Patrol commanders welcome the help but say they want the National Guard confined strictly to support roles.

“We are not at war with Mexico,” said Agent T.J. Bonner, president of the agents union. “I would not want them in direct contact with nationals of any country. They simply don’t have that training and expertise.”

New support personnel could free 60 to 70 agents who transport prisoners or perform other non-enforcement tasks.

If these measures are implemented effectively, officials predict that Mexican immigrants will try their luck elsewhere.

“I do not believe these people will stop,” De La Vina said. “They will shift rather than stop coming.”

History indicates that Tijuana’s hard-nosed, creative army of immigrant smugglers would probe new routes and strategies.

In early 1992 when the Border Patrol used a large number of agents in a “hold-the-line” exercise, smugglers led mass charges of immigrants through Mexican inspection lanes into southbound traffic on the San Diego Freeway. The harrowing scenes were televised widely; the Border Patrol warned that it would station agents on the freeway if necessary.

Mexican authorities, who rarely interfere with those trying to enter the United States, finally dispersed groups and arrested smugglers south of the port of entry.

In another example of adaptation, many boat smugglers in Ciudad Juarez have tried to circumvent the El Paso blockade of the Rio Grande by switching to arduous mountain trails. Their fees soared.

“The more we fortify, the more we increase their business,” said Cornelius of UC San Diego. “It would be enriching a binational mafia of people smugglers that has been roundly condemned by both governments.”

Immigrants who are accustomed to paying $300 to $400 for the Tijuana-Los Angeles journey could expect higher prices and greater hardships. Smugglers would shift to the mountains east of San Diego (a difficult route favored by drug-runners) and even attempt clandestine boat forays along the coast, experts said.

Critics say that a crackdown on illegal immigration would inevitably harm legal commerce as well.

After the blockade in El Paso, inspectors began scrutinizing pedestrians and cars more aggressively for fake documents, which deterred some workers, shoppers and tourists on both sides.

Angry political and business leaders in Ciudad Juarez declared an economic boycott of El Paso, where Mexicans represent a quarter of retail sales. Some Tijuana leaders are organizing a similar boycott to retaliate for what they perceive as a series of anti-Mexican affronts. They want Tijuana shoppers--60,000 of whom visit San Diego businesses each month--to stay home this weekend.

San Diego has the busiest border in the world, recording about 56 million legal crossings a year.

Of all U.S. border cities, the San Diego economy is the least connected to its Mexican counterpart, said Richard Sinkin, an international industrial consultant. But the slowdown of legal crossing caused by a border security increase would still be huge, he said. “Things that are going to hurt the Southern California economy are not in our best interest.”

Chief De La Vina disagrees. “You’ll probably see an increase in false documents, but I don’t perceive that it will be in large numbers,” he said. “You’re not gonna see the 2,000 that are on the fence tonight trying to get in through the port of entry. So I don’t see the impacts on the economy.”

With toughened border enforcement, Tijuana could be expected to face social problems from the city’s transient population of northbound migrants. Asked about repercussions in his state and in California, Baja California Gov. Ernesto Ruffo Appel said: “We have had a dynamic relation that has benefited both sides. . . . It’s obvious that (a crackdown) would affect us and them as well.”

While paying lip service to every nation’s right to guard its frontiers, top Mexican government officials, journalists and others have criticized Operation Blockade in El Paso relentlessly. In Tijuana, a major crackdown “will revive anti-North American sentiments that remain latent in many sectors of the population,” said Clark, the Tijuana activist. “These sentiments have deep historical roots.”

North of the border, advocates of immigration control see a border buildup as the first step. Their package of suggested initiatives includes employer sanctions, prosecution of illegal entrants and even “repatriation” plans, in which captured immigrants would be flown back to their home regions in Mexico’s interior.

“There is a game going on at the border,” said Stein, head of the Federation for American Immigration Reform. “And if the posture of the federal government changes and it becomes clear that we are serious about controlling the border, people’s behavior will be modified.”

Others say that unless socioeconomic changes transform both countries, migration will remain inexorable--and stopping it will remain a fanciful ambition.

“I don’t think it’s doable within our democratic society,” said sociologist Kitty Calavita of UC Irvine. “You could put a whole lot of agents and military equipment on the border and it would never be sufficient.”

Border Patrol officials agree that long-term solutions are vital.

“You need strong enforcement,” De La Vina said. “And you need . . . some kind of economic reform in Mexico, be it NAFTA or whatever. One thing alone is not going to work. It’s got to be a combination.”

The Great Divine Immigration in the ‘90s

Holding the Line

At the Border, Rules of the Game Have Changed

The debate over controlling the border focuses largely on a 14-mile stretch separating Tijuana and San Diego. Every day, thousands of determined illegal immigrants attempt to make it across. They confront 10-foot steel fences, high-tech detection devices, rugged terrain and an overwhelmed front-line force of about 100 Border Patrol agents. Very day, many immigrants succeed. Hundreds of others are caught by the Border Patrol and sent back to Tijuana, where they often try again. Unprecedented concern about illegal immigration has politicians calling for an effort to strengthen border defenses. Border Patrol forces and fortifications in San Diego have expanded in recent years. Combined with a slump in the California economy, the buildup resulted in a 6% decline in arrests in 1993. Here is a look at the 14-mile stretch, its hot spots, and measures that have been taken to stop the illegal influx.

THE PROBLEM

The proximity of suburban San Diego to the international boundary provides illegal immigrants access to transportation--freeways, taxis, a trolley line north to downtown--and to safehouses run by smugglers. After crossing, migrants have traditionally headed for Interstate 5, where the Border Patrol refrains from pursuit for safety reasons. Border-crossers use the freeway to rendezvous with smugglers or continue north. The completion of a three-mile fence on the I-5 median this year reduced the risky practice of waling north on the freeway.

Imperial Beach Border Patrol Area

Goat Canyon--This natural break in rugged terrain serves as a gateway north for crossing groups, which gather along International Highway in Tijuana. Border Patrol agents generally set up at vantage points away from the fence and wait for illegal immigrants to emerge from the steep, brush-covered slopes.

Spooners Mesa--A plateau above Smuggler’s Canyon. Many hopeful crossers and peddlers gather on the Mexican side waiting for the chance to cross the border.

Chula Vista Border Patrol Area

San Ysidro Port of Entry--This is the busiest and largest international crossing in the world. The San Ysidro and Otay Mesa ports of entry handle a combined total of about 56 million legal crossings a year. Illegal immigrants sometimes scale walls here or run brazenly through the Mexican and U.S. inspection lanes into traffic on the 1-5 freeway.

Brown Field Border Patrol Area

The Soccer Field--Until the late 1980s, this was the most crowded, popular corridor for illegal crossers. It was christened the “soccer field” because migrants sometimes played soccer here before heading north. Since the construction of a fence, crossing activity has shifted west of the San Ysidro Port of Entry.

Tin Can Hill--The eastern section of the San Diego border traditionally records fewer illegal crossings than other areas, though arrests rose this year. The open, undeveloped land on the U.S. side makes detection and policing easier. The area has been known primarily for drive-through drug smuggling attempts.

Freeway checkpoints near San Clemente and Temecula create a second line of defense.

Crossing Ground

Nearly half of all illegal immigrants arrested at the U.S.-Mexico border are apprehended along the 14-mile stretch at San Diego.

Hot Spots on the Border

Border Patrol deployments and topography channel smugglers and immigrants to a handful of corridors. As fortifications improve, crossers probe new spots. Authorities have built a 10-foot steel fence along most of the 14 miles. The strategy is to push the migratory flow into unpopulated, sparsely developed land where policing is easier and, ultimately, east of San Diego into the mountains and deserts. The following are currently the busiest crossing zones.

1. The Beach--Imperial Beach at Border Field State Park is a longtime gathering place for illegal crossers and the vendors who cater to them. Until recently, the border here was an imaginary line in the sand. But U.S. authorities began construction in October of a 10-foot-tall barrier of steel pilings that will extend across the beach and about 340 feet into the water. The pilings will be driven about 20 feet into the ocean floor.

2. Smuggler’s Canyon--The border fence remains incomplete along a dry stream bed in the canyon floor. Brush provides natural cover. Border Patrol agents use off-road vehicles extensively here.

3. Gravel Pit--A large bowl-shaped area. A culvert on the Mexican side serves as a convenient door into the U.S. A high point above the pit gives smugglers an unobstructed view of movement by the Border Patrol. Smugglers sometimes direct the flow of traffic from this vantage point.

4. Tijuana River--Until recently, this mile-long stretch had been the most active and chaotic section of the line. Its proximity to San Ysidro and the freeway has led to the presence of large groups of immigrants who sometimes attempt to rush by Border Patrol agents. There have also been numerous crimes, fights, rock-throwing assaults, alleged civil-rights violations and crowds have declined during the past two years in part because of increased cooperation with Mexican authorities.

A. This the only section of the border where fences are arrayed two and three deep/

B. High-intensity lights illuminate the riverbed for about two miles.

C. The ground north of the fence has been lined with 12-foot metal sheets to deter tunneling.

THE DETERRENTS

Front Line Technology--Some of the equipment used by the Border Patrol:

Portable Lights--Used to illuminate rugged crossing corridors.

Collapsible pole can be extended up to 20 feet high.

Generator

Seismic Monitors--Alert the patrol’s San Diego communications center to movement and size of immigrant groups. About a foot tall, the monitors are buried in the ground and can easily be dug up and repositioned.

Patrol Strength

Nearly 80% of Border Patrol officers in San Diego work out of three stations. The rest work at inland stations. About 100 agents patrol the international border at any given time.

Source: U.S. Border Patrol