Patterico's Pontifications

5/27/2008

Enforcement Works? Get Outta Here!

Filed under: General,Immigration — Patterico @ 7:15 am



Who’d a thunk it:

Many in Congress are counting on border walls to discourage illegal immigration and dope smuggling from Mexico. Here in Del Rio, authorities are using jail cells instead.

The ever-expanding Val Verde County jail is filled with would-be yardmen and maids, immigrants awaiting deportation. They’ve been caught in a law enforcement dragnet known as “Operation Streamline,” a zero-tolerance program that began here and has since spread both east and west along the Mexican border.

There’s plenty of grumbling in the story about the cost, but it does appear to work:

[S]upporters say the approach is reducing crime and discouraging immigrants from trying to cross into the United States. The number of illegal immigrants caught in the Border Patrol’s Del Rio Sector is at its lowest level since the early 1970s.

“Enforcement works,” said Val Verde County Sheriff D’Wayne Jernigan. “We’re definitely seeing a reduction in crime throughout the border area and a reduction in the number of aliens running loose in our community.”

I love this part:

The new approach is aimed at ending the controversial “catch and release” practice. For years, thousands of undocumented foreigners apprehended along the border were released for lack of jail space and given a notice to appear in court. Most simply vanished into the underground economy.

Instead, the buzz phrase is “catch and detain,” meaning virtually everybody who gets caught is sent to federal court or returned home immediately.

Catch and detain. What a concept!

DRJ wrote about this back in January. Glad to see it’s still being done somewhere.

17 Responses to “Enforcement Works? Get Outta Here!”

  1. JUDICIAL WATCH is helping to close down places where illegal aleins gather and wait to be hired and arizona sheriff JOE ARPIO is helping to curb illegal imagration as well

    krazy kagu (6bcfe9) — 5/27/2008 @ 8:26 am

  2. *sniffles*

    I miss DRJ…

    Scott Jacobs (fa5e57) — 5/27/2008 @ 8:37 am

  3. I guess I’m behind the curve. What happened to DRJ???

    PCD (5c49b0) — 5/27/2008 @ 8:38 am

  4. Misunderstanding, hurt feelings, and she decided it was time to make good her what, 2 months process of “leaving”. I dont’ think she’s even posted as a commentor…

    FWIW, DRJ, I wanted the 2 month process to take forever. I liked your posts. Please come back! We’ll make Patterico take you back!

    Mommy, Daddy, it scares us when you fight! 🙂

    Scott Jacobs (fa5e57) — 5/27/2008 @ 8:42 am

  5. Scott, is DRJ writing or posting anywhere else? She was very good.

    PCD (5c49b0) — 5/27/2008 @ 9:02 am

  6. DRJ is sorely missed.

    Pablo (99243e) — 5/27/2008 @ 9:05 am

  7. PCD, I don’t believe so…

    Though she should be…

    Though I still say she should be posting here…

    Scott Jacobs (fa5e57) — 5/27/2008 @ 9:10 am

  8. She is commenting at Beldar’s. Not that any of you cannibals deserve her.

    nk (a415e7) — 5/27/2008 @ 9:40 am

  9. Is Sheriff D’Wayne any relation to Sheriff Joe?

    We need to find the mold, and get more of them – particularly here in SoCal.

    Another Drew (8018ee) — 5/27/2008 @ 9:46 am

  10. Count me in on the “we miss DRJ” crowd.

    Joe M. (5d215f) — 5/27/2008 @ 9:48 am

  11. AD,

    SoCal is so screwed up by the quota politics of the Democrats that Sheriff Joe would be too busy.

    I remember when there was a string of staffers doing the perp walk out of the “Santa Ana Register”.

    PCD (5c49b0) — 5/27/2008 @ 10:25 am

  12. This is good news.

    Hope they keep it up!

    Foxfier (15ac79) — 5/27/2008 @ 12:14 pm

  13. finally, a government agency doing something i approve my taxes being spent on….

    too bad it’ll never happen here in LA.

    redc1c4 (37a701) — 5/27/2008 @ 12:45 pm

  14. I also miss DRJ.

    Old Coot (935203) — 5/27/2008 @ 1:02 pm

  15. If only we could get all of the enforcement agents to enforce…

    Pat R. (9828c0) — 5/27/2008 @ 3:28 pm

  16. I live in Del Rio and it drives me crazy that Streamline doesn’t get tons of press.

    The bad news from Laredo used to get lots of press, and how are things there now that Operation Streamline is going?

    The other day I started searching for stories about how it’s going in Tucson, where it started at the beginning of this year. Found some stories about how it was overwhelming the system at the beginning…then it went quiet.

    While Del Rio Sector apprehensions dropped 67 percent about two years after Operation Streamline was introduced there, they’ve gone down just 14 percent in the heavily crossed Tucson area.

    Hmmm. It just started in Tucson in January and this article says that they are limiting the number of people they arrest!
    http://www.azstarnet.com/sn/byauthor/221983

    So that doesn’t seem like a fair comparison.

    MamaAJ (788539) — 5/27/2008 @ 7:35 pm

  17. I’ve quoted you and linked to you here: http://consul-at-arms.blogspot.com/2008/06/re-enforcement-works-get-outta-here.html

    Consul-At-Arms (f4574f) — 6/2/2008 @ 2:01 pm


Powered by WordPress.

Page loaded in: 0.0707 secs.