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Amid all of the xenophobia and nativism surrounding the immigration debate, there is a real security concern. In the language of the bureaucracy, the problem is referred to as the "OTMs," or Other Than Mexicans. Thousands of non-Mexicans are caught crossing the United States border every year. They cannot be sent back to Mexico, but must be deported to their home country. Until recently, most were given a deportation hearing date and then simply released. Not surprisingly, few showed up for their scheduled appearances. Beginning last year, however, most who are caught are put into detention. They are then put...

COLUMBUS, N.M. - On Sept. 5, a man calling himself Miguel Alfonso Salinas was apprehended off a deserted highway near the U.S.-Mexico border. The tinted windows on Alfonso Salinas' vehicle aroused the suspicion of Border Patrol agents patrolling a dark and desolate stretch of Highway 9, which runs parallel to the border and is the site of large numbers of illegal crossings. The agents discovered three Mexican migrants in the vehicle with Alfonso Salinas. But what they discovered several days later made a far greater impression. Alfonso Salinas was not who he seemed, according to U.S. Department of Justice and...

Are Middle Eastern terrorists posing as Mexican immigrants? Click to watch video A warning from some Texas congressmen: Middle Eastern terrorists may be trying to pose as Mexican immigrants. But is it a warning based on fact or politics? Some people in Houston are worried about the message. You couldn’t miss it during the election. Texas politicians saying the border needed protection, not just to stop undocumented workers, but terrorists. A month before the election, Mike McCaul, a congressman from a district northwest of Houston, released a report (snip) The FBI director has confirmed that there’s Middle Easterners with known...

*** NOTE*** Take your blood pressure medication before viewing this report... McCaul Releases Report on Border Violence (Tuesday, October 17, 2006) Today, U.S. Rep. Michael McCaul (TX), Chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security Subcommittee on Investigations, released a report on border violence in the Southwest. The report examines the alarming rise in the level of criminal cartel activity, including drug and human smuggling, along the Texas-Mexico border and its effects on Federal, State and local law enforcement agencies. The report also looks at what steps are being taken to counter the threat, and the significance of these issues pertaining...

Several legal advocacy groups asked a judge to order the immediate release of four immigrants who have been detained for months or years without receiving a hearing on why they're being held so long. The motion filed Friday in federal court in Los Angeles asks U.S. District Judge Terry Hatter to release the detainees under conditions of supervision or grant them hearings. The move followed a class-action lawsuit filed Sept. 25 on behalf of six detainees by the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, the ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project and the Stanford Law School Immigrants' Rights Clinic. Two detainees...

While the White House argues with the Heritage Foundation over how many new immigrants will be minted by the administration’s immigration plan, and Congress debates how many miles of fencing they should fund along the Mexican border, no on is paying attention to the real immigration scandal. If left unattended, this one could cost the lives of millions of Americans, not just their livelihoods. Even as we speak, tens of thousands of illegals from terrorist-sponsoring states are roaming the streets of America, according to a stunning new report from the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General. Although the...

After all the legislative hash that the Republican Congress has made of immigration policy, the worst is yet to come. Any workable compromise that a bipartisan mix of senators may manage this week must, perforce, run into negotiations with House obstructionists. And none are more hard-core than Speaker Dennis Hastert. He stands waiting with his triumphalist decree that no bill, even one fairly balancing border protection and enlightened naturalization law, can be put to a vote unless a majority of his Republican caucus — not some larger majority of, yes, the people's House — agree to it. "The job of...

Iraqis entered the Valley illegally Monday, May 01, 2006 Posted: 06:57 PM Three Iraqis slipped into the US over the weekend HARLINGEN – NEWSCHANNEL 5 is tracking information on three Iraqis who slipped into the Valley over the weekend. We’re told the men are each in their early 20s. They were caught near the Los Indios International Bridge near Harlingen on Saturday. FBI agents say the men claim to be Christians who are afraid they will face persecution if they are returned to Iraq. Before they were caught at the border, the men were arrested in Mexico carrying Greek passports....

Former Tucson sector Border Patrol agent Scott James says he caught his fair share of illegal immigrants from countries other than Mexico during his years of service with the agency. Not that it really mattered, he added. James, who resigned from the Border Patrol two months ago, said his job, like those of his colleagues, was little more than a sham. Enforcing the law was the last thing the Department of Homeland Security wanted, he said. Some illegal immigrants apprehended on the border are from Pakistan, Iraq, China and other countries considered by the Department of Homeland Security to be...

Two immigrants are now the legal owners of a Douglas-area ranch seized from an anti-immigrant activist. Documents granting the 70-acre ranch once owned by Casey Nethercott to Fatima del Socorro Leiva Medina and Edwin Alfredo Mancia Gonzales were signed by a Cochise County judge on Monday. Nethercott is serving a five-year prison term in Texas stemming from a 2003 incident on a Texas ranch where he confronted Leiva and Mancia and was accused of pistol-whipping them. He was acquitted of assault but convicted of being a felon in possession of a firearm. Nethercott was a member of the group Ranch...

Why hasn't the President given in to our (conservatives') demands for a border solution? It is going to hamstring his presidency and our country! http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/tribune-review/opinion/columnists/zito/s_417921.html

WASHINGTON - The Department of Homeland Security wants to end the special immigration status that has allowed some 300,000 illegal Salvadoran, Honduran and Nicaraguan migrants to remain in this country, many of them in Florida, Bush administration officials say. But the final decision on the Temporary Protected Status for the three nations, which would force those migrants to return home or remain here illegally and risk deportation, still is under intense debate within the administration, the officials add.

He denies it all now. It is unclear why he would have asserted it all in this phone call, however, if it were not true. Of course, there could be any number of reasons. But this case bears monitoring. "Infiltration from the south feared: Terrorist smuggling denied by admitted drug runner," from The Brownsville Herald, with thanks to Richard: Officials are pointing to records in a South Texas drug case with alleged terrorist ties that they say underscores the lack of preparedness here. The attorney for a jailed Gulf Cartel member cited in the incident, however, says his client was...

EAGLE PASS, TX (AP) - Illegal immigrants crossing part of the Texas-Mexico border will be detained and deported now that officials are cracking down on a "catch-and-release" policy that was meant to save jail space but ended up being a free pass into the country. The catch-and-release method drew up to 150 non-Mexican immigrants near Eagle Pass each day last year, many actually hoping to get caught because the policy allowed them stay in the U.S. if they promised to appear in court after 30 days. Some 90 percent failed to show. The policy didn't apply to Mexicans because immigration...

At least 51 people who crossed the border illegally have been arrested on suspicion of terrorism since such tracking began 14 months ago, according to figures released to Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., by the Department of Homeland Security. Tancredo, a leading congressional advocate of immigration reform, says the figures document the national security risk the nation's porous borders pose on the eve of Congress' first attempt in nearly a decade to rewrite immigration law. Since October 2004, the Joint Terrorism Task Forces have kept track of arrested terrorist suspects who are in the U.S. illegally. The JTTF document released to...

House Republicans are poised this week to pass one of the toughest border security proposals in more than a decade, cracking down on illegal immigrants and their employers and rejecting President Bush's call for a comprehensive bill that would let millions of undocumented immigrants work legally in the United States. The measure would, for the first time, make it a federal crime to live in the United States illegally, transforming millions of immigrants in this country into felons ineligible for converting to any legal status in the United States. Currently, living in this country without a visa, work permit, green...

Last month, when President Bush was promoting what he called a "comprehensive strategy" on border security to prevent "people from coming here in the first place," few Americans had any doubt to whom the president was referring: undocumented Mexicans. Ignored in the rhetoric, as well as in U.S. policy, is a far more complex reality -- that the southern border is no longer just a border with Mexico. It is a global frontier that has become a conduit for illegal immigrants from all over the world.

Rep. Sue Myrick (R-N.C.) let slip a bombshell disclosure at a news conference today to announce a bill targeting states that allow illegal aliens to get drivers licenses. During the Q&A with reporters, Myrick gave as a reason for proposing the bill the recent capture of three al Qaeda terrorists at the U.S.-Mexico border. A check of Google News turned up no references to this incident, yet Myrick stated this was a 'given fact.' No reporter asked her about this revelation, but it was noted at the end of a Charlotte Observer article by Tim Funk. Two Representatives from North...

Alexander Enrique Hernandez arrived in San Angelo this week with a phone number and a court date he probably will not keep. The 20-year-old El Salvador native slipped across the U.S.-Mexican border near Eagle Pass on Monday. Almost immediately, an agent with the U.S. Border Patrol arrested him, just another face among the 150 illegal aliens caught each day by the department's Del Rio sector. Instead of processing him on the border, however, agents shipped him to San Angelo, served him paperwork telling him to be in a federal immigration court next month, and dropped him off at the Concho...

— Carlos Lopez was watching a television documentary of the Brazilian rainforest at home one day and it made him open his eyes. He watched the show about how the burning of the rainforest would lead to economic disaster. Then, economic disaster would lead to immigration and with his job as a U.S. Border Patrol agent, it donned on him that he better get to learning Portuguese, fast. “I am self-taught, I studied for a few years and then I gave up,” said Lopez from the U.S. Border Patrol Fort Brown station. “Then seven or eight years passed, and I...

Mexico Now Top Supplier Of U.S. Drugs Mexican drug traffickers have shoved aside their counterparts in Colombia to take control of the $4 billion illegal drug trade in the United States. Mexican drug traffickers have pushed aside their Colombian counterparts and now dominate the U.S. market in the biggest reorganization of the trade since the rise of the Colombian cartels in the 1980s, U.S. officials say. Mexican groups now are behind much of the cocaine, heroin, marijuana and methamphetamine on U.S. streets, the officials say, with Mexican law enforcement agencies viewed as either too weak or too corrupt to stop...

Those coming from Brazil, Central America, and 'countries of concern' could hit 150,000 this year. HOUSTON - After decades of attempting to dam the flow of Mexican immigrants crossing into the United States illegally, federal agents say a new crisis is emerging along the southern border and they are helpless to stop it. Non-Mexicans are spilling over the border in record numbers - some from countries with terrorist ties - and most are set free soon after being captured. Already this year, the number of non-Mexican apprehensions has far outpaced last year's total in just eight months. And while they...

Schumer,Clinton,Biden, Kerry :Never Mind Security - We Want Pork !! A bill that would have added more Border Patrol agents to help stem the flood of illegal immigrants that nearly engulfs Texas,Arizona,New Mexico,Nevada, and California was defeated today,when Democratic Senators Schumer,Clinton,Biden, and Kerry launched a floor fight against it-and Republicans who favor “open borders” joined them. The bill would have-among other things-provided additional detention facilities for “OTMs”. OTM stands for illegal aliens who are Other Than Mexican. Undocumented Mexicans are shipped back to their homeland when caught; but, because of a lack of detention space, and because of the difficulties...

HARLINGEN, Texas -- Several times a day, a chain-link gate rolls open and dozens of undocumented immigrants stroll out of the U.S. Border Patrol station here, blinking into the hot Texas sun as they look for taxis to the bus station and a ticket out of town. Each holds a piece of paper that Spanish-speakers call a "permiso" --permission, courtesy of the U.S. government, to roam the country freely. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, more than 118,000 undocumented migrants who were caught after sneaking over the nation's borders have walked right out of custody with a permiso in...

So far this fiscal year, the Border Patrol has apprehended almost 100,000 undocumented migrants from countries other than Mexico, commonly called OTMs, says a report in GovExec.com. The number of OTMs is projected to reach about 150,000 by the end of this fiscal year, which is a 200 percent increase compared to fiscal 2004, according to the Border Patrol. Concerns about OTMs from special interest countries - such as Iraq, Syria and Iran - were highlighted in Capitol Hill testimony in February by former Homeland Security Deputy Secretary James Loy: "Recent information from ongoing investigations, detentions and emerging threat streams...

Bayview detention facility said to be nearing full capacity BROWNSVILLE TX.— Jorge Enrique Vasquez Carrasco didn’t expect jail time or to be deported when he got caught illegally entering the United States. The 18-year-old Honduran man expected the same treatment as thousands of other undocumented immigrants who have been set free after receiving a notice to appear in court. According to federal figures, almost 88 percent of immigrants who receive those notices never appear in court and stay illegally in the United States. But U.S. Magistrate Judge Felix Recio made a statement Thursday to Vasquez and six other Central Americans...

Non-Mexican immigrants swamp Texas border city Mon May 30, 2005 06:34 PM ET By Tim Gaynor EAGLE PASS, Texas (Reuters) - The number of illegal immigrants from Central America and Brazil caught crossing into this Texas border city jumped threefold in the past year as they rush to exploit a legal loophole, U.S. authorities said. The U.S. Border Patrol has nabbed 15,195 non-Mexican migrants crossing over the Rio Bravo around Eagle Pass in the past eight months, a rise of almost 240 percent on the same period last year, officials said on Monday. Agents say what they call "OTMs" --...

INVASION USA Homeland Security bill lets illegals go free Without more detention facilities, 'other-than-Mexicans' must be released Posted: May 22, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com The president of a labor organization representing Border Patrol employees and a Texas congressman are criticizing the House's recently passed Homeland Security bill for failing to fund construction of new detention facilities to hold illegal border-crossers from countries other than Mexico, resulting in their automatic release pending a later hearing date. HR 1817, the Department of Homeland Security authorization bill passed last Wednesday by the House, approved adding 2,000 new Border Patrol agents,...

Published: 02.22.2005 Border-watch group: All talk? Plan for action against entrants may be just hype By Michael Marizco ARIZONA DAILY STAR   Civilian border-watch groups:  >> Minuteman Project: The organization is supposed to patrol the Cochise County border with hundreds of protesters beginning April 1.   >> Civil Homeland Defense: The Tombstone-based group began after founder Chris Simcox launched a "call to arms" in October 2002. The group patrols the border, and leaders say they apprehend illegal entrants and turn them over to the U.S. Border Patrol.   >> American Border Patrol: The border-watch group uses its Border Hawk,...

After nearly a year in operation, the United States is pulling its Unmanned Aerial Vehicles off the Arizona border, grounding the drone planes to weigh their effectiveness. The two UAVs - RQ-5 Hunters made by Northrop Grumman Corp that can fly up to 100 mph for half a day - cost $1 million apiece and were introduced into the Arizona desert in October, said Mario Villarreal, U.S. Border Patrol spokesman in Washington, D.C. The two Hunter planes succeeded two Israeli-made Hermes 450s that cost about $2 million each and helped nab 965 illegal entrants and about 850 pounds of marijuana,...

One would think that "standing up for a stronger, more secure nation" would also include protecting our borders against the massive onslaught of illegal aliens and tons of illegal drugs entering with near impunity. Unfortunately, that is not the case at all. The federal government talks of terrorism. Well, when American citizens are not able to walk the streets of major cities because gangs of illegal aliens, not police, control those streets, we class that as terrorism. That came about, of course, because of the negligence of the central government. Our country's borders have major holes through which thousands of...

To make matters worse, the Department of Homeland Security is so hopelessly overstretched that it has taken to releasing what it calls OTMs (Other Than Mexicans) because it cannot house them until it arranges for deportation hearings. We have heard from border patrol agents that they're being told to let people who look like they're from East Africa and the Middle East go because they say their name is Juan Pablo Garcia from Guatemala -- except that they don't speak a word of Spanish," she said. This is a very sensitive time. People on both sides have reasons not to...

ABP Hawkeye finds Brazilian International Driver's License One Day After IssuanceSierra Vista, Arizona (ABP) July 11 -- An American Border Patrol "Hawkeye" found the Brazilian International Drivers License (at left) in a backpack near Moson Rd. and Highway 90 east of Sierra Vista, Arizona. It had been issued the previous day.