Border Patrol Opposes Minutemen - insanity!

Since 05-13-06

One Reporter's Opinion: Border Patrol Opposes Minutemen
George Putnam

Friday, May 12, 2006

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2006/5/12/13729.shtml

It is this reporter's opinion that the American people owe a debt of gratitude to Sara Carter of the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin in Ontario, Calif. She is the brilliant young reporter who exposed the fact that our government told the Mexican government the activities and positions of the Minutemen and other patriotic groups monitoring the illegal invasion across our borders.

While the Minutemen civilian patrols are keeping an eye out for the illegal border crossers, one of our own government agencies, the U.S. Border Patrol, is keeping an eye on the Minutemen and telling the Mexican government where they are.

We have the documents – three of them – appearing on the Web site of the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations, which reads:

The U.S. Border Patrol is to notify the Mexican government as to the location of Minutemen and other civilian border patrol groups when they participate in apprehending illegal immigrants and if and when violence is used against border crossers.

The administration is on a collision course with a foreign government against American citizens trying to protect our country. As Pat Buchanan puts it, "It is one thing for the president to support open borders. It is quite another thing for the administration to aid and abet illegal aliens."

Hardly had Sara Carter released this bombshell than the U.S. Customs and Border Protection Agency refuted the Daily Bulletin. The agency stated, "Today's report by the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin that the U.S. is tipping Mexico to Minutemen patrols is inaccurate."

James Gilchrist and Chris Simcox, founders of the Minutemen, along with T.J. Bonner (President of the National Border Patrol Council) and Andy Ramirez (Friends of the Border Patrol) and a host of others say that the Carter story is only the tip of the iceberg.

Simcox says: "It is simply unbelievable that our own government agency is sending intelligence to another country – a nation where corruption runs rampant and the information could be getting into the hands of criminal cartels. They are basically endangering the lives of American people. It is the equivalent of giving the enemy your battle plan in the midst of a war."

Ramirez says that for safety reasons he does "not disclose vital information and yet there it is! Right on the Mexican government's Web site and our government gave it to them!"

A few of us in the media are enraged by this revelation. Lou Dobbs calls it more evidence of the absurdity of the policies the Bush administration and Congress are following on border security and illegal immigration. Michael Savage is equally shocked by Sara Carter's revelations. Doug McIntyre of KABC refers to it as "insanity!"

All of these individuals in the media and many more are deeply concerned, along with this reporter, that the Mexican government appears to be unduly influencing our enforcement policies. That is not a legitimate role for any foreign nation.

Last year, Border Patrol agents received an internal memo notifying all agents not to give credit to Minutemen or others who report sightings of illegal aliens. Said one agent, "We were told to list it as a citizen call and leave it at that. And many times we were told not to respond to Minutemen calls."

Connie Hair of the Media Minutemen Headquarters reports that Scott James, a former Tucson Border Patrol agent, resigned after eight years of service, citing a lack of support by the Department of Homeland Security. He said, "U.S. Border Patrol officials provided office space inside their headquarters to Mexican consulate officials, allowed the consulate to dictate the agent's activities and gave the consulate information as to ongoing investigations."

Throughout Mexican government reports, the Minutemen are referred to as "vigilantes," the same word used by our president to describe them. Meanwhile, Mexican consulates in the U.S. contact Border Patrol officials, seeking U.S. cooperation reporting instances of civilians monitoring the border. It's all there before your very eyes, in the documents of the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Relations Web site. The word is out:

Notify the Mexican government as to the location and activities of Minutemen and the other civilian border patrol groups when they participate in the apprehension of the illegals.

Reports obtained from the Mexican government include an August 2005 document titled "Third Report on the Activities of Vigilantes," posted on Mexico's Secretary of Foreign Relations Web site, suggesting U.S. officials were giving out more details than required by the Vienna Convention. Part of the information included reports on activities in the interior of the U.S. in Illinois, Nevada, Utah, Massachusetts and Tennessee.

Meanwhile, with all this evidence, the new statement by the Border Patrol officially denies any such cooperative activity with the Mexican government, giving no explanation as to why the U.S. Border Patrol initially confirmed its actions in the earlier report as a "COOPERATIVE AGREEMENT" with Mexico. Mexico's official perception of our civilian groups is that they are VIGILANTES.

Chris Simcox tells this reporter: "It now appears the U.S. government has taken steps to ensure that the open border status quo is maintained. Even if we take the latest statement from the Border Patrol denying involvement as truth, at best the report on the Mexican Consulate Web site exposes widespread espionage and systematic spying against free, law-abiding American citizens on the part of the Mexican government – with or without U.S. government assistance."

The White House obviously has another debacle on its hands – not from the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times or another major newspaper. It is a story by a fine young journalist writing in the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin – a newspaper previously unknown to most American readers. I believe Sara Carter deserves a Pulitzer Prize for her efforts.