Homework Responses Wk 5 & 1

Discuss the actions that prompted the "border control offensive" and made the issue of illegal immigration a priority along the SW border and contrast this with the northern border. (Consider this in light of the activities since 2017).

Border control offensive came about after 9/11 occurred and its focus was to prevent terrorist from entering the United States. Then following this was the enforcement of illegal immigration. The southwest border has approximately 30 times more border patrol agents then that of the northern border, which has shed light that the northern border is more vulnerable to terrorism or immigration.

Regarding border enforcement, describe who is the enemy and discuss any public health and safety concerns.

Initially the deemed enemy was that of terrorists or anyone intending to harm those within the United States, over time this has evolved into not only to disrupt terrorism, but to enforce our borders, particularly, in regards to our southern border from immigration.

Another enemy would be border or immigration agents that take bribes or those that use excessive force and abuse their power when patrolling the border.  

A big issue with border enforcement is how rough the border patrol (BP) agents can get with migrants and this results in the migrants being injured or sometimes even killed. At times BP agents will keep migrants from receiving volunteer or humanitarian assistance by arresting them. At times migrants aren’t even required to give consent and are searched by medical personnel, even though BP doesn’t have a court mandated document (warrant). In addition to the above there are various laws or violations occurring when it comes to those seeking asylum or policies that are implemented by hospitals (Hampton, 2019).

Are the concerns the same on both the southwest and northern borders?

The concerns on the southwest border took the priority for quite some time, but because the southwest border has become increasingly more difficult to cross more people are utilizing the northern border. The population of Mexicans that crossed from the northern border has increased greatly over the past several years, along with other nationalities as well.

In June 2018 DHS announced a strategy to update border security on the northern border. DHS states it will review and update the Northern Border Strategy (NBS) every 5 years (DHS Announces Strengthened Northern Border Strategy, 2018).

 

· Athena

DHS Announces Strengthened Northern Border Strategy. Department of Homeland Security. (2018, June 12). https://www.dhs.gov/news/2018/06/12/dhs-announces-strengthened-northern-border-strategy.

Hampton, K. (2019, August 7). Zero Protection: How U.S. Border Enforcement Harms Migrant Safety and Health. Physicians for Human Rights. https://phr.org/our-work/resources/zero-protection-how-u-s-border-enforcement-harms-migrant-safety-and-health/.