The news out of the recent trilateral summit between Canada, Mexico
and the United States is that the Obama administration will wait until
2010 to tackle immigration reform. The justification Obama offered for
the delay is that his “plate is full” with more pressing issues: the
economy, health care, two wars and so on.
For those concerned with the ongoing border crisis in Southern
Arizona, the choice to delay reform is terrible news. As we speak, more
migrants have died in fiscal 2009 (161) in the Border Patrol’s Tucson
Sector than at the same point in 2008 (137), a particularly disturbing
fact given the overwhelming amount of anecdotal evidence that illegal
immigration is declining.
In early August, we learned that 209 Border Patrol agents were added
to the Tucson Sector under the ludicrously mistitled “Operation
Guardian.” What the Border Patrol would have you believe is that this
buildup will enable agents to carry out the mission of its mantra that
“a secure border is a safe border.” While this thesis may have been
tenable five years ago, it no longer holds water. Quite the opposite,
in fact, since there is a growing amount of empirical data suggesting
that migrant deaths in the Tucson Sector correlate with law enforcement
more than any other variable used in research and analysis.
If you press the Border Patrol, they will be unable to account for
increases in three separate but related statistical trends: The rate of
deaths is up; the risk of dying is up; and the average distance that
migrants die from the nearest road is up. With these trends in mind, we
should not be surprised that the number of deaths is up, too.
Nevertheless, let’s take each of them in turn.
The rate of migrant deaths in the Tucson Sector is increasing. This
might seem counterintuitive, given the overall decline in illegal
immigration, but the data clearly shows that death rates do not
correlate with border-crossing rates. While there is no means to
accurately measure illegal-immigration flows, the standard surrogate
historically has been apprehensions. According to the Border Patrol’s
own numbers, apprehensions dropped 35 percent between 2004 and 2008,
and this downward trajectory continues to date. During the same period,
however, the number of discovered bodies has always remained high,
fluctuating between 180 and 230. Because the number of deaths has
stayed more or less constant, the rate of deaths has increased relative
to apprehensions.
So what about the risk of dying? The Arizona Daily Star (see
“Death Count Rises With Border Restrictions,” May 17) calculates the
risk and rate of death similarly in that both are analyzed in terms of
apprehensions. But the truth is that risk is a more complicated
problem. The Daily Star claims that the risk of death is 17
times greater than it was in 1998, yet this number is based on
apprehensions alone, and is therefore mathematically indistinguishable
from the rate of deaths. There are other factors, however, that tell us
the risk of death is going up.
Between 2000 and 2008, the last full year of available data, the
average distance of deaths from the nearest road has grown from 3/4 of
a mile to a desperate 4 miles. The Border Patrol and humanitarian
groups like Humane Borders track the precise coordinates of each body
discovered in the desert. When the data are plotted on a map, they
reveal what should be clear to anyone who has read about the Border
Patrol’s interest in the utility of all terrain vehicles, horses and,
of course, more agents.
Each of these sets of statistics, taken together or individually,
does not imply a causal relationship with migrant deaths. The rate and
risk of migrant deaths could increase even if the number of deaths
decreases. Though risk is measured in terms of apprehensions alone,
other factors may contribute, such as the average distance of deaths
from the nearest road.
The bottom line: However you look at it, migrant deaths are up 18
percent from 2008, and the correlations with law enforcement are
strong. So 2009 looks to be another year for the books. We should not
be happy about a delay in immigration reform or about additional
agents, no matter how many.
Kent Walker is a freelance writer based in Tucson. He has been a
volunteer for Humane Borders since 2007.
This article appears in Aug 20-26, 2009.
No! More immigrants are going to die because they choose to do something they are not supposed to do.
I myself am not too concerned about deaths that occur during the commission of a felony. Particularly when that felony is so tainted with self-entitlement and utter disregard for fairness.
I am more concerned with Obama spending his time on issues related to those following the law. Once he gets us taken care of, then he can spend all the time he wants on foreigners.
Oh. Once we say, “It was a bad law, every one who broke it gets off scott free,” does the same apply for all those incarcerated for possession of marijuana?
No one should be incarcerated for possession of marijuana and no one should die because they committed the misdemeanor of not presenting themselves for inspection at a port of entry before entering the country. It is NOT a felony. It is not even a misdemeanor to be present in the U.S. without proper documentation. It is simply an administrative matter. Ask any immigration attorney. I have worked with hundreds of migrants over the past five years. I’ve traveled to visit their families in Mexico and seen how they live, talked to them about their hopes and dreams, consoled them, treated their injuries, helped them as best I could and in the process I learned from them. I’ve walked the same trails they walk through the deserts and mountains and I admire them for their courage and determination.
The migrants themselves do not feel any self-entitlement. They are simply desperate to feed and clothe their families. They feel the responsibility to find work to pay for medical care for their loved ones, pay for their children’s education, etc. ‘Americans’ as the people of the U.S. refer to themselves waste more food, more fuel, more of everything than any other people on the planet. The billions of dollars that we are wasting building fences and towers and paying thousands of Border Patrol agents to drive around in gas-guzzling off-road vehicles day and night or stand around talking at unconstitutional checkpoints, paying Wackenhut employees to sit around in idling, air conditioned buses, paying private military contractors to ‘guard’ so-called ‘security’ towers, paying CCA to imprison people who haven’t committed any crime, etc., etc. Those billions of dollars could have been and could be spent in helping Mexico and Central America build infrastructure, hospitals, schools, provide education to their children so that people would not be forced to emigrate to find work in meatpacking plants, on dairy farms, in hog confinement operations, in hotels, or in farm fields doing the work that ‘Americans’ STILL won’t do.
“Those billions of dollars could have been and could be spent in helping Mexico and Central America build infrastructure, hospitals, schools, provide education to their children”
Why isn’t Mexico building infrastructure? Wouldn’t that be a source of jobs in Mexico? Why isn’t Mexico building schools and hospitals? Wouldn’t that be a source of jobs in Mexico? Why aren’t the citizens of Mexico demanding and getting a government that is relatively free of corruption and providing for her people. Why should Americans spend billions of dollars on Mexico’s problems. Hell. we can’t afford our own!
Cactus-
Cross enough times and it real quick becomes a felony.
Breaking the law, when there is a legal alternative, to steal money, services, and jobs that belong to another country, and you don’t think they feel self-entitled? Trashing the environment in order to take what doesn’t belong to them and you don’t think they feel self entitled? Expecting me to learn their language in order to cater to their needs, and you don’t think they feel self entitled?
You’ve done too much work with them. You’ve come to feel their excuses and sob stories are truth.
Me, I’m all for loosening up immigration laws. Make them pay for the background check to make sure they aren’t criminals, make them learn English, and take all that come. Until then, it is against our nation’s highest laws. Break those laws, and you are spitting on my country. That is felonious, and that is self-entitlement.
The liberal mind set is always the same! Let this guest author pay the bills for these criminals! Make NO MISTAKE, they ARE breaking international laws by crossing the border! A better life, my butt! 30% of our prison population are illegal aliens! Deaths on the border? They all made a concious choice to illegally enter our country. They mad a concious choice to go into the desert. Oh well, NOT my problem! I have my own bills to pay!
By adding “more security”, the inevitable migration has moved farther from safety and deeper into the dangerous Sonoran desert. They are fleeing an economy worse than the USA and taking jobs most Americans won’t touch.
The Immigration reform should be one of the priorities in the congress. this matter is taking people’s life everyday and it is increasing. Humane borders are people who really care about life…we should support them!