Border Patrol to Illegals: Don’t Get Caught

The Obama government and its media puppets celebrate the decline in border apprehension numbers from 2014 to 2015 as a sign of “success,” while they are silent on the Border Patrol policies that deliberately discourage Border Patrol officers from apprehending border jumpers.

Those anti-enforcement policies are numerous, but some are downright unbelievable.

• Would you believe the government’s Customs and Border Patrol official agency website has a section devoted to telling illegal border crossers how to avoid capture?
• Would you believe that website also advises illegal aliens how to file a complaint against the Border Patrol or its sister agency, Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), if they were apprehended in violation of the published rules of engagement?

Well, both are true: If Border Patrol and ICE agents don’t follow the published rules scrupulously, they can be reprimanded and the illegal aliens released. Maybe you didn’t know that illegal border crossers have rights, and Border Patrol agents can be punished for insensitivity to those rights.

To be fair, it is true that the castration of the enforcement missions of the Border Patrol and ICE began under the Bush Administration, but Obama’s bureaucrats have expanded those policies to make a total mockery of border security. Not surprisingly, these policies have led to low morale and one of the highest turnover rates in the federal government.

In fact, according to the head of the union representing ICE agents nationwide, that enforcement agency’s employee morale ranks dead last. It’s 314th out of 314 federal agencies surveyed by the Office of Personnel Management. What more damning indictment could there be of a failed agency?

The federal government’s advice to illegal aliens seeking to avoid capture is found on the CPB website under the title, CBP Sensitive Locations Policy, and ICE has a similar policy document. Both Border Patrol and ICE personnel are warned to take the policies seriously. The Border Patrol website can be found here.

These federal policy documents identify dozens of “Sensitive Locations” where enforcement actions against illegal aliens are prohibited, both in the border regions and the interior of the country.

• Schools, pre-schools, licensed daycare, elementary and secondary schools, school bus stops, plus colleges and universities.
• Scholastic or education-related events and assemblies.
• Bus stops, train depots, and airports.
• Hospitals, medical care facilities, doctors’ offices.
• Places of worship, such as churches, synagogues, temples and mosques.
• Religious or civil ceremonies, such as funerals and weddings.
• Public demonstrations, including parades, demonstrations, marches and rallies.

But not to worry: these officially designated “safe places” do not apply in the “immediate vicinity” of the international border. But even there, Border Patrol agents are admonished to “exercise good judgment and common sense while taking appropriate action.” In other words, don’t be too aggressive in chasing down border jumpers or you may be in trouble.

Persons reading these online policy guidelines are further advised to report suspected violations by calling the Civil Liberties Division of the ICE Office of Diversity and Civil Rights. Or, they can file a complaint (“or compliment”) by telephone at the CPB Information Center at 1-877-227-5511. The CPB Information Center will also happily connect you with a foreign consulate. And, needless to add, all of this information is available in Spanish.

Even the official government statistics for border apprehensions have become increasingly unreliable. For decades the number of apprehensions was in two parts, Mexican nationals and “Other Than Mexican,” commonly called “OTMs.”

Apprehensions are still reported by country of origin, but under Obama’s rules, the term “OTM” has been abolished. You now have to make that calculation for yourself.

Why the newly creative typology? The Obama administration is trying to hide or at least obscure the fact that the percentage of apprehensions of Other-than-Mexican border invaders has been increasing under his anti-enforcement policies.

• Obama’s Homeland Security department has made it more difficult for journalists or concerned citizens to follow the trends in apprehensions of illegal entrants from Muslim nations of North Africa and the Middle East.
• Obama’s changes in how apprehensions are classified also helps obscure the number of individuals apprehended from countries with terrorist cells. Prior to Obama, those apprehensions from “Special Interest Countries,” were identified and reported as a separate number.
• But under Obama’s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, while the number of nations with ISIS and al-Qaeda cells has actually grown, the State Department has abolished the “SIC List” as a tool of analysis– which means the Border Patrol no longer can use it to count and report those apprehensions. Does that make you feel safer?

And to top it all off, Obama’s Border Patrol has officially abandoned the use of the “Gotaway” number in weekly and quarterly reports of apprehensions. For decades, the Border Patrol routinely compiled and reported the Gotaway number as a supplement to the number of actual apprehensions.

• Border Patrol agents knew and openly admitted that the number of illegal border crossers apprehended was only a fraction of the number of border jumpers.
• Veterans and CBP retirees remember when that Gotaway number was three to four times the official apprehension number.
• The nonpartisan Congressional Research Service recently calculated the Gotaway number to be at least 1.5. Translated, that means the number of successful illegal entries is at least 150 percent above the number apprehended by the Border Patrol.

None of this is ever reported by the lapdog mainstream media, who are happy to echo the Obama administration claim that since official apprehension numbers are declining, border security is no longer a problem. Meanwhile, the number of Algerians, Libyans, Syrians and Somalis crossing our southwest border continues to rise.