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Phoenix, Arizona – Shortly after Vicente Fox and George W. Bush became presidents of their countries, they met in Mexico
for the first time on February 16, 2001. Back then, both presidents appeared ready and willing to work together in terms of
a new expanded, friendly partnership.
During that meeting, the Mexican president openly talked about his bold, long-term vision for what seemed a new era for
both countries. He envisioned a North American Common Market, a free movement of labor, and even the possibility of a
single currency. Bush offered his own vision in terms of more concrete, shorter-term objectives: to come up with answers
for complex and complicated issues such as unauthorized immigration and drug trafficking.
Six months later, when both presidents met more formally on September 5, President Fox came to Washington having at
the top of his agenda a comprehensive amnesty for the millions of Mexicans living without documents in the United States.
President Bush responded to this proposal by saying that a new immigration agreement was unlikely. While he opposed
the idea of a full blown amnesty, Bush considered the expansion of a temporary worker program, which eventually would
have allowed Mexicans living without legal status to begin a process toward permanent legal residency.
Fox and Bush also discussed anti-drug trafficking measures and a border-control program. In this topic, Bush made clear
since their first meeting that he did not believe in an open-border concept –as Fox wished– but in protecting the border
instead. Less than a week later after their September’s meeting, the terrorist attacks of September 11 stalled the bilateral
talks among Mexico and the United States, and eventually made it more difficult to achieve the plans they had envisioned
for each country; some of the proposed objectives never came to materialize during the Bush administration.
For the United States, the crucial priority after September 11 revolved around broadening the scope of security and
defense mechanisms of the country. The issue of border safety with Mexico came to be seen under a very different and
stricter perspective. On March 12, 2002, President Bush created the Department of Homeland Security (DHS,) a new
cabinet department, with the assigned responsibility of protecting the U.S. territory from terrorist attacks, and to respond to
natural disasters. In contrast with the Department of Defense –in charge of military actions abroad–DHS was established
to operate in a civilian context to protect the United States within, at and beyond its borders.
Eight years after the first Fox-Bush meeting, the issue of border security with Mexico, and not the immigration issue, has
become once again a top priority in President Obama’s domestic security agenda. This time, the main concern is not
Islamist terrorists, but the alarming increase of violence related to the drug wars and cartels in Mexico. Even before
Obama took oath as President, former Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff stated on January 8, 2009, that the
United States had developed plans for a “surge” of civilian and perhaps even military law enforcement should the
bloodshed spread across the border.
In a telephone interview with The New York Times, Chertoff said, “We completed a contingency plan for border violence, so
if we did get a significant spillover, we have a surge — if I may use that word — capability to bring in not only our own
assets but even to work with the Defense Department.”
The Washington Post on March 22 published that “President Obama is finalizing plans to move federal agents, equipment
and other resources to the border with Mexico to support Mexican President Felipe Calderón's campaign against violent
drug cartels, according to U.S. security officials.”
According to the Post, as early as this week officials with the Obama administration may announce plans for “a crackdown
on the supply of weapons and cash moving from the United States into Mexico that helps sustain that country’s narco-
traffickers.”
Such announcement, The Post adds, may have been planned to coincide with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s
scheduled trip to Mexico this Wednesday, March 25. Two other key cabinet members, Attorney General Eric H. Holder, and
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, are scheduled to visit Mexico next week.
The alarming levels of drug-trafficking related violence in the country of Mexico prompted Mexican officials to reinforce
military presence along the border. On March 1 of this year, about 2,000 soldiers arrived at Ciudad Juarez, in the northern
state of Chihuahua. Juarez is located across El Paso, Texas; both cities share the U.S.-Mexico border. Mexican officials
have recognized that local law-enforcement agencies have become too small to combat the growing criminal activity. In
addition to a higher military presence, troops have been assigned to take control of police functions, perform street
patrols, and set up highway checkpoints.
Ciudad Juarez has been particularly racked with drug-trafficking violence. Members of rival drug cartels have been
disputing this zone, one of the most strategic corridors for drug smuggling into the United States. Reportedly, just in
February 250 people were killed in Juarez in drug-trafficking related incidents. During 2008, this city had about 1,600
killings. Unofficial tallies put the number of killings in the country at more than 6,000 during the same year.
The escalation in violence is the result of Mexico’s government aggressive offensive against powerful drug cartels. Since
he took office, President Felipe Calderon has employed both the army and federal police to fight against drug-trafficking
organizations in Mexico. As part of this unprecedented crackdown, the Calderon administration’s efforts have deployed
45,000 soldiers and 5,000 police officers throughout the nation. As Mexico’s government actions have triggered an
upsurge in shootouts between soldiers and traffickers, they have also sparked off a brutal counter-offensive from drug
cartels, which has in turn generated the current bloody fighting.
As the Obama administration steps in to deploy federal agents and equipment along the border, the main concern of the
United States is based on the spillover of the drug wars in Mexico. Cities of border-adjacent states in the U.S. have been
witnessing some of the effects of drug cartels’ criminal activities, as the violence has crossed over in various ways, and as
drug gang members operate in the United States at different levels.
However, not only cities near the border experience the effects of the drug-trafficking spillover. The New York Times
reported on March 22, that “law enforcement authorities say they believe traffickers distributing the cartels’ marijuana,
cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine and other drugs are responsible for a rash of shootings in Vancouver, British
Columbia, kidnappings in Phoenix, (Arizona,) brutal assaults in Birmingham, Alabama, and much more.”
A Justice Department quoted by the Times establishes that drug-trafficking organizations based in Mexico have large
networks in the United States. They coordinate the distribution of drugs in 230 cities identified by law enforcement officials.
Among them are Anchorage, Atlanta, Boston and Billings, Montana. “Mexican cartels and their affiliates maintain drug
distribution networks or supply drugs to distributors,” on U.S. soil.
In Phoenix, Arizona, spillover violence was to blame for 700 kidnappings between 2007 and 2008. Sam Quinones, an
author and journalist with the Los Angeles Times, in his article titled Phoenix, kidnap-for-ransom capital, writes that “More
ransom kidnappings happen here (Phoenix) than in any other town in America, according to local and federal law
enforcement authorities. Most every victim and suspect is connected to the drug-smuggling world, usually tracing back to
the western Mexican state of Sinaloa, Phoenix police report… Arizona has become the new drug gateway into the United
States. Roughly half of all marijuana seized along the U.S.-Mexico border was taken on the state's 370-mile border with
Mexico.”
Copyright © 2009 Hispanic Institute of Social Issues
Grassroots Journalism
www.barriozona.com
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War against drug trafficking, cartels’ violence in Mexico to bring federal agents, equipment to border.
By Eduardo Barraza
BARRIOZONA
March 23, 2009
Border Security, Not Immigration,
On Top of Obama’s Agenda