Reporters: Sheryl Kornman and Forrest Carr
TUCSON (KGUN9-TV/AP) - Arizona's congressional delegation is batting .000 in efforts to obtain more funding for border security. The latest setback prompted blistering criticism from U.S. Rep Gabrielle Giffords.
On Thursday night the U.S. Senate approved a war funding bill setting aside nearly $60 billion in funds for President Obama's troop surge in Afghanistan. But it stripped out nearly $20 billion in domestic spending that had been added by the House. $700 million of that money would have paid for additional Border Patrol agents, surveillance technology and assistance to local law enforcement agencies.
Here is what the House version of the bill would have provided:
-$208.4 million for 1,200 additional Border Patrol agents to be deployed between ports of entry along the Southwest border
-$201 million for Justice Department programs and the temporary deployment of personnel to high-crime areas (including adding seven Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Gunrunner Teams; five FBI Hybrid Task Forces; additional Drug Enforcement Administration agents; more than 20 deputy U.S. marshals; additional attorneys including more than 30 prosecutors and immigration judges; and additional detention and incarceration costs for criminal aliens and provide funding to support Mexican law enforcement operations)
-$136 million to add 500 additional officers at ports of entry along the Southwest Border and deploy additional canine teams
-$50 million for Operation Stonegarden grants to support local law enforcement activities on the border
-$35.5 million for improved tactical communications on the Southwest border, three permanent Border Patrol forward operating bases and a surge in investigations designed to prevent corruption among CBP officers and agents
-$32 million to procure two additional CBP unmanned aerial detection systems
-$30 million to hire additional Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents
Rep. Giffords helped lead House efforts to provide that funding. On Friday her office released a statement blasting the Senate for removing the money. "Southern Arizonans should be appalled that the United States Senate said ‘no' to supporting the troops on the border," Giffords, said ‘no' to protecting the ranchers in my district who are threatened daily, and said ‘no' to increasing border patrol agents who would help stop the flow of drugs and illegal immigrants into our country."
In the statement Giffords accused senators of turning their backs on Arizonans who've repeatedly demanded stronger border protection. "This is the kind of Washington gridlock that Americans are sick of."
The $701 million for border security was included in the Fiscal Year 2010 Supplemental Appropriations Bill, which the House approved July 2 by a 239-to-182 vote.
Giffords said the Senate vote threatens the Guard deployment that President Obama recently ordered. "Guard troops are scheduled to be deployed to the border starting on Aug. 1," Giffords said. "But this long-overdue deployment was not to take place in a vacuum, and the success of their mission now is in doubt."
Giffords noted in her statement that National Guard troops were intended as a bridge until additional agents from the Border Patrol are hired, trained and in place. The Senate action Thursday removes funding for those additional agents.
The additional funding for border security had been added to the bill after Giffords secured the support of 50 of her colleagues to request that House appropriations leaders approve the additional money.
Giffords said she sought the additional funding following increased violence in Mexico and because agents in the Tucson sector of the Border Patrol apprehend 47 percent of the illegal immigrants in the entire country. The Tucson Sector also is responsible for almost 50 percent of the drug seizures in the entire Border Patrol nationwide. Last year, agents in the Tucson Sector seized more than 1.2 million pounds of marijuana.
"The drug cartels have become more brazen than ever," Giffords said, "and it is commonplace to see heavily armed drug runners coming across ranch land and into the communities of Southern Arizona," Giffords said.
This fear was increased by the murder of one of Giffords' constituents, fifth-generation rancher Rob Krentz, who was killed March 27 in Southeastern Arizona.
On Friday afternoon Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick (D-Arizona), who Arizona's only member on the House Committee on Homeland Security, also released a statement criticizing the Senate vote. "Is it any wonder why Arizonans are so fed up with Washington on border security?" Kirkpatrick asked. She had harsh words for the Senate. "Now, instead of joining the House in increasing the commitment to better protect border communities, the Senate is actually standing in our way."
Although the national media have intensely covered the uproar over Arizona's immigration crackdown, the border security component of Thursday night's senate vote garnered little national attention. Many of the national media reports KGUN9 News monitored on Friday made only brief mentions of the border security component of the Senate vote, or failed to mention it at all.
This is not the first setback for border security efforts. In May Senator John McCain told KGUN9 News that he would attempt to work around President Obama by pushing an appropriation for 6,000 National Guard troops to the border. In late May, U.S. News and World Report reported that the request had failed.