Speech #830189473

President. I turn to my specific amendment. I am proposing that the Congress appropriate an additional $61/2 million for enforcement of our immigration laws along our northern and southern borders. I point out that under the new program. along the Arizona and California border. the Attorney General has had to mobilize threefourths of all the border patrol officers available in the entire United States. It is necessary to put 747 border patrol officers on this section of our border in order to hold the tide against the wetbacks at this one section. But this is only one section of our wideflung border. The Congress has made no provision to increase the size of the border patrol over that of last year. I understand that it is the plan of the Immigration and Naturalization Service to make this temporary program on the ArizonaCalifornia border a permanent program. Such a plan will require a sizable increase in the amount appropriated to the border patrol and other related services of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. I propose. Mr. President. that we make now this appropriation for the increased border patrol service. I feel that we should at least double the strength of the entire border patrol. It is clear to all of us that we cannot permit border patrol officers to be taken from their regular posts in order to police merely the ArizonaCaliforniaMexican border. What is needed. Mr. President. is a fullscale increase in the permanent size of the border patrol along the entire border. That is the only way of controlling the flood of illegal immigration. My amendment is written in such a manner as to provide that this increase in funds shall be utilized solely to police the Mexican and Canadian borders against illegal entrants. A vote against this amendment would not be a vote for economy. The loss to the communities of the Southwest in terms of taxable income. and the loss. in terms of security of the United States. evident in our unpoliced borders. is many times greater every year than the $6 million I am proposing to have expended for border security. This is not an idle gesture. Mr.