Obama to send 1,200 troops to US-Mexico border
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WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama will send 1,200 National Guard troops to boost security along the U.S.-Mexico border, officials said Tuesday, pre-empting Republican plans to try to force votes on such a deployment.
Obama will also request $500 million for border protection and law enforcement activities, according to lawmakers and administration officials. The moves come as chances for action on comprehensive immigration reform, Obama's long-stated goal, look increasingly small in this election year. But Obama is under pressure to do something with the issue front and center after Arizona's passage of a tough crackdown law.
The National Guard troops will work on intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance support, analysis and training, and support efforts to block drug trafficking. They will temporarily supplement border patrol agents until Customs and Border Protection can recruit and train additional officers and agents to serve on the border, an administration official said.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity ahead of a public announcement, disclosed the plans shortly after Obama met at the Capitol with Republican senators who pressed him on immigration issues including the question of sending National Guard troops to the border.
Arizona Republican Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl have been urging such a move, and Republicans planned to try to require it as an amendment to a pending war spending bill.
In a speech Tuesday on the Senate floor, McCain said the situation on the U.S.-Mexico border has "greatly deteriorated." He called for 6,000 National Guard troops to be sent, and he asked for $250 million more to pay for them.
"I appreciate the additional 1,200 being sent ... as well as an additional $500 million, but it's simply not enough," McCain said.
Democrats were considering countering McCain's amendment with a proposal of their own after disclosure of the White House plans.
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., said that the administration would announce the deployments late in the day Tuesday. But the White House wasn't expected to formally send the spending request to Capitol Hill until after the Memorial Day recess, said Kenneth Baer, spokesman for the White House Office of Management and Budget.
Homeland Security and Pentagon officials have been jousting over the possible National Guard deployment for the better part of a year. Pentagon officials worried about perceptions that the U.S. was militarizing the border and did not want Guard troops to perform law enforcement duties.
In 2006, President George W. Bush sent thousands of troops to the border to perform support duties that tie up immigration agents. But that program has since ended, and politicians in border states have called for troops to be sent there to curb human and drug smuggling and to deal with Mexico's drug violence that has been spilling over into the United States.
More than 20,000 Border Patrol agents are deployed now, mostly along the Southern border.
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McCain requested 6,000
McCain requested 6,000
He gets a fifth. and not a 40
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This should be fun!
Hate to break it to you, T, but they're not going there to shoot Mexicans with their 50 cals.
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What will they do if they find somebody that ALREADY crossed the border illegally? Send them along to Homeland Security who won't (necessarily) act upon these folks.
I'm not sure this is worth the $500M. Toothless reaction to a festering situation, IMHO.
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Hate to break it to you, T, but they're not going there to shoot Mexicans with their 50 cals.
I agree....at $20 bucks a round...at least for us mortals, they will use their hand guns.
Long overdue move.
I have felt for some time that each state should have a 2-3 NG units deployed on the souther border on 90 day deployments....stick 8000-10,000 troops down there and the illegals will dry up.
1,200 isn't enough to cover the nearly 2000 mile border...though there are good entry points and places people will dry up if they try to cross there....McCains 6000 seems more workable.
Seal up the areas that aren't 60 miles treks across Mexican/USA desert land.
I don't see it as sending people on death marches......just don't march.
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Hate to break it to you, T, but they're not going there to shoot Mexicans with their 50 cals.
Maybe mortar fire and landmines will work?
Wimpy heck, dont you know how to have a laugh? -
I know. Shooting unarmed people in the desert. Hysterical.
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I know. Shooting unarmed people in the desert. Hysterical.
I know. Shooting unarmed people in the desert. Hysterical.
Maybe you will do better if we dont ask and you dont tell.
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I know. Shooting unarmed people in the desert. Hysterical.
I know. Shooting unarmed people in the desert. Hysterical.
unarmed? what machine guns don't count?
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That shows you how little Heck understands about reality.
"shooting UNARMED..."
How many times have the rest of us read or heard what is going
on with the drug trade? and armed escorts traveling with illegals
to the border?
Heck, that was one of the most uncalled for and unjustified whacks
at somebody's cred you've ever taken.
And that is really saying something, since it's nearly? all you do on this board.
i don't get why Bush didn't order that wall slammed up (except everybody around him
was pleading with him not to do it since the lying sleazy dirty libs would seize on it,
and use "racism" as a political wedge)...
but Obama refusing to enforce the law? And now, his dirty regime is
lying about the Arizona law, and this token too small a number of troops
is to try to yank the rug out from under Arizona, and save his popularity. again.
Not workin. His popularity just plummeted to 44 percent.
("yeah, but Cal, Obama's approval rating is 100% in Soros' and the ACP's offices !)
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oh.....no !
Those 1200 Guard troops sent to Arizona?
They will NOT BE USED TO STEM ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION.
They will be used to stop only DRUGS AND ARMS from crossing the border.
What a corrupt move to stem the valid criticism of his regime by Obamao.
Really not good, really, really bad:
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=CN...;show_article=1
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