in that group. they have received less public attention and we need to meet those students where they are and help them to develop a place in our public conversation where they feel more included. >> and sunday 4:00 p.m. eastern real america. the film drug abuse, meeting the challenge. >> anybody who says cocaine is not addictive is a lie. >> when you do cocaine you lie to yourself. >> it is not hip it is hype. anybody who tells you it is okay, is a liar. >> watch american history tv every weekend on c span 3. >> up next a forum on the u.s. mexico boarder and implications on the trump policy. the district is on the texas, mexico boarder one of the speakers of this event hosted by

the brookings institution. ♪

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i thank you for coming this morning to join us about a conversation about the wall border security and many issues such as immigration, the u.s. economy and security issues surrounding the wall. i want to thank our fantastic communications team for preparing the video you just saw

and also for the images that you will see. president trump started 2018 by again, renewing his calls for the wall on the u.s. southern border of mexico. this was one of the key campaign promises at the time calling for a structure running the entire length of the 20,000 mile u.s. mexico border. arguing that mexico will pay the price tag for the wall. recently, some of the administrations has changed including that the structure can look more like a fence. but are some indications that the president might prefer a see through structure and as well perhaps the barrier might not run the entire two thousand mile length you saw some of the very difficult terrain in the previous images and how difficult it is to do and it might replace the existing 700

mile face are some 200 mile extension at least in the initial 10 years. with the price tag that the administration estimates at 18 billion. vast differences in the price estimates and something we can talk about in the question and answer period, but it is probably a safe guess that 18 billion is the under estimate of the cost especially if one factors in the need for repairing the structure which is always the case. and it will also entice very difficult and highly problematic trade offs such as taking money from the coast guard for vital security elements. and the president -- once suggested that mexico will pay for rt border wall, which they will not. there is no way to make them pay for the wall and it is not feasible for the mexican government to agree to a

proposition especially in a presidential election year. fundamentally, the wall is not simply about the money being spent. it entails many costs that go far beyond a financial cost and it is not going to accomplish the promises that the president has made. it will not enhance security or stop contraband or people reaching the united states and it's not going to improve u.s. economic well being. while it will fail a great expense in the costs and trade cost. it comes with other problems such as hurting the lives of u.s. border communities. native american communities and damaging the environment. why will the wall not stop the flow of drugs? for the existing fence doesn't stop it, traffickers will go above, under and over it. they will use technology such as

drones to fly drugs over and build tunnels that go under the wall. even if the line border can be made more secure and the technologies were not available. traffickers will smuggle people as is already happening and traditionally the case going far down the u.s. coast far up the coast i should say. and crucially, drugs and contraband and people being smuggled into the united states will go through legal ports of entry which there are 52 already. the vast majority of the amount of drugs smuggled into the united states from mexico, that doesn't come by from mail comes through legal ports of entry. these ports of entries process millions of people cars, trucks, plan trains every week. not feasible to check all goods. even if improving the quality,

speed and efficiency of searches at ports of enthery. crucial, far more important than any physical structure of entry. why not enhance u.s. security from criminal groups. security at the end of the day is far more dependent on good cooperation with mexico. mexico turns more undocumented central americans unfortunate people who come to the united states then what is turned the u.s. on a mexico border. it is hard to achieve and long time many people will be attempting to cross into the united states. similarly, corporation, securities against drug trafficking groups, criminal groups, very much depends on the united states finally being able to build up good cooperation, intelligence sharing, ability to

mount joint coordinated actions and the capacity of the united states. law enforcement institutions to work with the colleagues in mexico to help reduce the corruption. all of that will be lost if the administration resorts to host style relations and environment with mexico. building up this cooperation took decades, it was difficult and there was some cold moments in the u.s./mexico relations and people worked hard to improve that wrop ration. that could easily be lost. far more important than security from trafficking is counter terrorism cooperation. something that the united states and mexico during those cold difficult times but also

involves, in fact, security capacity -- enhancing capacity of institutions such as u.s. coast guard. the far greater terrorist threat is not somebody crossing border from mexico but dangerous equipment reaching u.s. ports. yet, the president wants to take money away from the coast guard from other institutions such as border patrol and devote to physical structure. and significant element of border security. violent crime in the u.s. is not in any significant way linked to legal or illegal immigration into the united states although, the president trump repeatedly reigned against the crime in u.s. cities, other all u.s. violent crime has gone substantially down. we are far lower than at any

point since 1991 with the exception of 2015 when three cities experienced significant spikes in homicides, driving homicides increased in the entire homicide inkrecreases in the entire coun, baltmore, chicago and washington, d.c. washington, d.c., has since improve and chicago he has slightly improved and baltimore this year has the highest per capita murder rate than it has in a long time. but for those cities, whether it is documented or the undocumented immigrants that drove the violent crime, but rather what the three cities have in common is the duration, and the equality and the declining population, and high poverty and employment rates well above the national average and very historically troubled relations be between the residents and the police. and these conditions are conducive to the rise in crime can, and there is no evidence whatsoever that undocumented

residents account for significant amount of crime, violent crime in the united states. in fact, the vast majority of the criminology studies show that most homicides and violent crime in the u.s. at several times the rate is perpetrated by native-born americans. instead, it is the anti-community police ing thinge trump administration is promoting, attacking sanctuary cities such as new york have far low lower homicide rates than many nonsanctuary cities and other law bra lawbreakers such as sheriff arpaio, and addition a ally for -- additionally having police enforcement to hupt dont down

undocument undocumented residents. there is powerful and consistent evidence across the united states and many countries that if people are questioning the crime and they start to stop report reporting crimes. and so the rates that president trump reports are likely to worsen in the united states. why will the wall not help the u.s. economy or the u.s. workers? yes, there is some evidence that immigration has some negative effect on a small segment of the u.s. population and namely high school dropouts and prior immigrants. they often compete for the very same jobs as low skilled jobs as the newest immigrants that arrive. however, the right response for

those small segments of population that are negatively affected in terms of the employment is to of course help them with the vocation canal training with providing them with the medical inions and other xcapacity to locate jobs that are more productive and more rewarding. to a large extent, undocumented workers work the unpleasant jobs that native-born workers not willing to perform. in agriculture, seafood processing factories, landscapings or taking care of the elderly are or the terminally are ill, and psychologically demanding jobs as well as hard physical jobs, and these economic sectors will be hurt by mass deportation, and also, the quality of life in the u.s., and the quality of the u.s. society is going to be affected. crucially, however, immigrant workers have a very important net positive effect on the economy. the native-bosh population is

declining both in numbers and p productivity, and at the same time the long jef the ti is increasing. what it of course means is that immigrants and therriir childre will account for the vast majority of the future and account for the labor force growth unless the president gets his way and significantly reduces legal migration. in that case, however, there is going to with be very significant burdens in terms of the expansive benefits such as medicare and social security. essentially, immigrants now we need them to pay for the benefits so that we, you, and i in the future can enjoy them having paid for them. in fact, undocumented workers contribute to social security even toe they m-- even though tt be able to draw the benefits of those payments in the future. and now, nafta ii recently under negotiation, and the president

has been repeatedly threatened to withdraw from it has not subsided a huge amount of u.s. jobs. yes, it has caused some dislocation, and forced some work workers to find other job, but it a has created many others. the estimates vary, but as many as 5 million jobs depend on nf h ka. crucially, however, nafta not only creates new jobs, but it also enables the communications of the integrated volume production lines across mexico, united states and canada which makes the u.s. companies more competitive and that creates jobs, but it also allows for the importation of the cheaper goods. if nafta ended, some of the most disadvantaged u.s. citizens, those who voted for president trump, the lower-middle-class white families will pay the greatest burden for an end to

nafta because of the variety of the consumer goods will become far more expensive. in certain segments of the economy, such as manufacturing and farming would be particularly badly hurt, and car manufacturers and farming today are crucial dependents on the exports to mexico and canada. but there are other costs that we often don't hear very much about, and that is for example native communities that you saw pictures beforehand. there are 26 recognized native communities in the u.s., and to the indigenous people in mexico who live along the border. the wall, and the existing fence cuts through their tribal homelands and separates the relatives and separates them from the sacred sites, and it is going to damage the natural environment which is very much part of their heritage.

the border of the areas of big bend where you saw images of and so-called sky islands in new mexico area are some of the greatest biodiversity places in the united states with perhaps hundreds of species of animals endangered. the wall this does not affect the u.s.-border communities and the border physical environment, and it has deep reach into the united states. there's not simply about the physical structure, but about the very nature of society that the united states want to the live in. the wall as the president embraces it with his at a tacks on muslims and other communities with his resentment towards nafta ist n not simply about creating a structure, but the barriers and divisions in one's mind and developing politics of the exclusion of others, bigotry, which is the very

opposite of the american creed. [ applause ] >> if i might ask you to join me ton the podium. will you do the introduction and introduce yourself. >> well, thank you so much for being here today, and we are hoping that it is an exciting panel, and certainly timely, and it has with been in the news all week long. it will probably be in the news as the debate gets going on all of the different bills for the d a aca fix, so a lot of things that are intertwined here. we are hoping that we will shed some light on the deeper issues that are underlying the

discussion over the border wall or the border security, and then we want to hear from you guys what your concerns are, what your questions are, and hopefully the congressman will be able to shed some light into the behind the scenes that is going on. he was at the white house with 24, 25 other lawmakers and meeting with president trump talking about budget talks to avert a government shutdown, finding a common ground to provide relief or legalization for dreamers as well as also strengthening border security. so we are hoping that you take away a lot of important ideas and thoughts about what is going on, on the hill and at the white house and most importantly along the border. so thank you and let's get it going.

so i thought that we would begin with the discussion can just basically by explaining what is going on in terms of things like the definition, vanda and you talked about the border security, and you understand something very differently than the president apparently does in terms of what does border security do. so i thought that we would begin by just getting to definitions. so, we are going to talk about all of the issues that you raised in your essay, and right now. we talk about, you know, what problem is really is the wall really trying to solve if border crossings are down, if drug traffickers will evade author i ti -- authorities trying to get the drugs n and imminent domain, and 90 losses to your count, and the evolving nature of the

threats to the u.s. ur security like terrorism and drug trafficking. so first of all, the definitions. what does the president mean by the wall, and how do you achieve operational control of the border, and is $18 billion enough? what is the actual price tag when you get done with the maintenance and the repairs and so forth. >> well, thank you. i will let you, congressman, speak about what what the president means by the wall, because you were most recently with him. my view has changed in the opening remarks that for the long time in the first year, he appeared to be insisting on a brick and cement structure, and some movement now that he prefers some see-through structure. the administration as far as i know has never specified what

constitutes security. and specifically with the border as the people coming to the u.s. on visas for example, and also cooperation with the countries that could be sources of dangerous sources to the united states and cooperation to neighbors. i spoke about the necessary cooperation of mexico, and the fact that a lot of the control takes place on actually the mexi mexico, and central american border. i spoke about the long term u.s./mexico counter terrorism that survived a very, very difficult relationship, but the intelligence sharing information and being able to apprehend potentially suspicious or dangerous individual far away from the border and territory. so a all of the border security

takes place very far away from the border. and the physical structure on the border, itself, it is merely very temporary delayt at best for any flows of dangerous contraband or people. >> first of all, thank you so much for allowing know with be here with -- allowing me to be with you all. and we want to point out somebody in the audience that the ambassador is back there, anthony wayne, and i say this, because i learned a lot from him when he was the mexican ambassador, and let me talk about some of the points. when we met with the president, i told the president to use a football analogy about the border. if you use football as an analogy, are you going to play defense on the 1 yard line which we call the u.s./mexico body rd

and we spent roughly $18 billion currently, and the president wants to add $18 billion. and so keep in mind that right now we spend $18 billion. >> that is cpb? >> it is i.c.e., cpb and everything together. now, if you want to the play defense and offense also, you are to go, and you have seen football as an analogy, you can see playing on the 20 yard line instead of the 1 yard line, and that is what you said, you expand the perimeter, and that is working where the country s can help you. i was reminded, and this is maybe what looks familiar the southern border strategy that mexico has with guatemala, because if you are trying to keep things from coming in, you use the 20-yard and the 1 yard

line where we spent so much money on the u.s. border. and if you are able to do that this and mentioned it also that mexico at times has stopped more people and deported more people than what the u.s. border patrol. so if they will play matador, and a bullfighter and say, ole, and just go f that means that all of the people trying to come in, are going to be over here at the border patrol. remember that some of the people coming in at the border, some of them will come through and some in between and some will try to evade and some will not evade, because they will come in and s say credible fear or asylum or some of the legal forces they can, and so not all of them are go ing to try to evade. so you have to understand what you are going to stop? >> and congressman, how much money has the u.s. devoted to

the southern mexico/u.s. strategy? >> keep in mind that people talk about foreign aid, and when i talked about that, we added $80 million to help mexico and the southern border, and they actually did a e pretty good job. and remember, $80 million compared to $18 billion and so we have to know what to work with. but if you are going to look at the budget, but i don't want to get into foreign aid, but there are clubs that get foreign aid. israel gets more, $3.18 billion plus, and pakistan which is rolled back by the president, and egypt at one time you had iraq and now it is afghanistan and jordan. so you have about five countries that are what i called the $1 billion club.

but in our own backyard before we did the plan, we were giving mexico about $36 million. and now it is a little bit over $100 million. it does not make sense that we should, and if we are going to secure ourselves, work with mexico and scentral america and one of the things that we did for example when we had the unaccompanied kids we worked with the appropriations to put $750 million to help the the central american countries for prosperity and security and build up the countries and less folks will have to come in, because we are securing the countries. unfortunately the present administration with all due respect, they don't look at that. they want to play the 1 yard line defense and not look at it. but i will say this about mexico. if mexico placed a matador position, and that is, okay, you want to get rid of nafta, you all are trying to put up a wall

and attack us, and u call u us rapists and murderers and all of that, look at what mexico does. besides the southern border, which we can help and domoshgs the visa system that mexico has set up, and imagine one day that the mexicans say, hey, let the north koreans come in on vacation from acapulco or let iran send all of the folks over here, so they will keep away the folks that we don't want in the u.s. so the visa system helps us. and the law enforcement people, the i.c.e. and dea and the other officers there are there working with us, and the mexicans should i say so that they will do a lot of security, and so when we talk about the nafta, and i know that we are talking about the border, but nafta, and those countries help us with security. the last point i want to make is that if you are talking to some of the central american countries or talk to our own officials here, and in the past,

people said that the only people coming in were mexicans. everything was mexican, but looking at it, it is almost the u.n. if you are looking at the people coming in without mentioning country, and i can give you k countries across the world now coming in through that and that is why we have to work with mexico and work with other countries and central america to make sure that we extend our security and not at the 1 yard line, but do the prescreening and the other work that we do. that is where the administration comes in, and i brought it up to the president, and what did he say? well, people want money, and we don't need to give them money. that is our money. and so we have to make people understand what are you trying to stop? if you want to top people coming into the united states and keep in mind that if you built the most beautiful wall according to the president, 40% of the people here without documents are through a legal permit or visa, overstay. visa overstays, so you can build

a wall, and some are going to be coming in by ship, bridge, and overhead by plane. so a wall is not going to be stopping them. if you want to stop the drug, look at the latest dea report. where are they coming from in land? ports of entry. i represent laredo, texas, and that is the largest port in the land and after l.a., total trade is laredo, and little town of 250,000, and we handle most of the trade coming in mexico through that landport. and we have been trying to get more money into port, but most of the money is going between the port, because most of my colleagues that don't understand the border want to put it in border patrol which i support the border patrol, the men and women in green who want to add the wall and the national guard. that is basically the solution, but if you are looking at it, you have to have the men and women in blue u which are the

cpb officers, because that is where the contraband is coming in. so you have to know what you are trying to do. if you don't know what you are trying to stop or how it is coming n and i have not touched the water, because the drug dealers, and they are not backwards type ts of individual but they are rather sophisticated or i should say they are sophisticated and they hire people who are sophisticated, and they will use drones to do certain things. they will use the catapults that you talked about and use submarines to bring in drug, and speedboats and other things. they will adjust. in the 1980s when miami vice, and remember miami vice, where were the drugs coming in? they were coming in through florida and those areas. the u.s. put a lot of pressure, and some of us used to say, hey, it is like you push a balloon in

and it is going to be coming over here, and sure enough, it started to come over the southern border. so they will be adjust, because they are sophisticated organizations. >> on that point, vanda, can you talk about the fact that the president is a successful businessman, and that siz background and at times criticized for trying to run the country like the businesses, so when you are talking about an $18 billion initial investment, because the cost is much higher when we are done with this, and so what kind of return is he getting for the $18 billion border wall? >> well, maria, it is clear by now that both the congressman and i believe that he is getting very poor return on the investment, and the you said appropriately that $18 billion is the initial cost to build the structure, and a big ironic part is that it is meant to replace about 700 miles of the existing

structure that is there in the first place, but of course, it requires repairs. we are not fully clear what is going to be on the wall. the physical structure itself is the least important element, but what is far more important in terms of reducing the amount of time that people or goods have to cross the border is the sensors along the border and the lights and what sophistication are there is going to be in terms of the radar signaling intelligence and other sensor element of security that are far more crucial again than just the physical 18-foot or the 30-foot structure. in fact, there is rather disstressing evidence that the white shouse planning to reuse the sensor technology platform elements of the security and to

put more money into the physical structure and so once again -- >> is that because the budget for the fiscal year 2019, there is apparently a memo out there where the white house officias s were saying, let's take down funding for those areas and increase it for the border wall? >> yes, indeed. there have been other reports about some of the budgetary trades that are being made. i alluded to shortchanging the coast guard and to relocating the money from the coast guard to the wall again. i think it is extraordinary poor choice in terms of far greater danger s dangers to the country's security namely terrorism and threat. and the threat of some major terrorist activity and in a place like boston the or new york and it is far more significant or baltimore is far

more significant than the land dry crossings or the crossings of the immigrants on the border. my take is that we are taking the least effective element of border counter terrorism and homeland security and giving it tremendous amount of money that amounts to often a waste of money. >> and vonda, and also, the congressman, and he won, and he campaign and won on the pledge to build the wall, and have mexico pay for it. obviously, he did not have things go well. he did not invite the mexican president over to the white house, and things went downhill from there. and he laid back from that pledge, but he brought it up again this week. he again said, oh, and by the way, mexico will pay for it somehow. if we know that realistically

mexico is not going to pay for the wall, why does he keep bringing it up in the rhetoric tool box? >> well, obviously, he believs s that there is a way to persuade congress and taxpayers to lay out those extraordinary expenses for the wall that somehow, it will be coming back in the future future. it is not going to come back from mexico in the future. the president has previously spoken about seizing for example remittances that go to mexico and central america that is neither legally or forensically at all easy to do. it is very difficult to do and arguably, it cannot be done if there were were a xcapacity to distort money from undocumented workers. but if somehow, you could go through the enormous enterprise of trying to sort the

remittances from the undocumented people that would be counter productive in terms of the security in the united states and in terms of the president's own objectives such as to limit immigration, legal and illegal into the united states. for mexico, remittances are the third most important source of revenue, and in central mexico, it is even more important of the social revenue, and in countries, it amounts to one-third of the gdp, and reduction of the remittances would mean far greater impoverishment, and more opportunities for the criminal gangs as well as the drug organizations to terrorize people. so if in year one we stopped the remittances in and year two through five, we can expect a far greater number of people trying to make it into the

united states. >> and vonda, share with us what are the major differences of what happened in 2006 when president bush signed into law the secure fence act. i have in my notes here that 26 democratic senators voted for it including then senator obama, senator clinton and joe biden and schumer. what are the the big differences of what happened then and the kind of the debate now over the border wall? >> there are some difference, and of course, there are some similarities and one that is potentially emerging surprisingly this week. part tof the fence activity of the george w. bush adm administration was that there would be comprehensive immigration control, and securing the bord er to reduce the flows of the immigrants across the border would be the

first step to allow the bipartisan work in the congress to achieve a immigration report. that didn't happen. and the obama administration had a replay, and though it did not build a new force on the border, it invested substantially in bringing remote technology such as virtual enhancements to the division parts of the border. it was not as come pprehensive envisioned in the original plan, but nonetheless a lot of technological assets, and disability assets that allow for more rapid response put at the border at the time, and the obama administration engaged in the deportation of a number of people from the united states. >> 3 million. >> and for a while, president obama was called the deporter in chief. for the last two years of the administrations, most of the people who were deported were either voluntarily transported

or those people who were caught close to the border within a short amount of time and the people who in fact had criminal records, and the vast ma jjorit of the deportees in the last two years. but, this, both the deportation, and the virtual border of the obama administration was to pave the ground for bipartisan support for the comprehensive immigration reform. and once again, just like george w. bush administration, that fell through. >> it is perfect for the next set of questions that i had. congress m congressman, we are are talking about two sets of deadlines coming up. we have the january 19th deadline when government will run out of money, and congress needs to either do a another c.r., continuous resolution, or find a longer-term budget deal to avert a government shutdown. and we have the march 5th, deadline that president trump is

imposing on congress to find a daca fix. so we have two things going on, but we throw in the mix the ruling from the ninth circuit where it is saying that it is illegal to stop the daca program, and these kids need to continue to renewing the permits while the litigation is sorted out in the court system. talk about how that affects the time lines that we are dealing with on the hill. >> well, first of all, i sit on the homeland appropriation, and the defense appropriations, and so we work a whole year on getting the budget. most of the work is done already. we are waiting for the republican friends to work out a deal for top numbers. and that is basically adding one new dollars for defense and we want one dollar for nondefense appropriations. and the last numbers that we

saw, republicans wanted to have $54 billion new for defense and $57 billion for nondefense which is including everybody else except for the defense, and so we are trying to get that up so we can do that. there was a proposal yesterday of a two-year deal which is the way we ought the do it because once you get the top numbers, our work is done, and we have to increase certain things, but what is making it a little different this time, and i don't like the c.r.s and if there is any government employees here, nobody likes the c.r.s, because that means that we have not done our job. the reason that we have not done our job is that for some reason our friend s has have not given that number, and part of it is that they were busy with the tax bills and i thought that we were going to be getting the number, and then our job is going to be done quick, but what is complicating it this time is that everybody is trying to use the leverage.

and the leverage is daca. and the democrats say, hey, we won't give you the 60 vote, because the republicans have 51 votes in the senate, and they need nine democrats to get up to the 60. so we won't do that unless we use daca. so what is complicating it is that the democrats are trying to use the spending bill as leverage even though the march 5th deadline is over here. >> and what i am hearing the democrats saying is that the republicans may not feel a sense of urgency, but there are a lot of kids that are already losing the permits, and some 122 dre dreamers are losing the permits on a daily basis. so for them, obviously, it is a big deal, because they are losing job, and they are losing homes, and they are at risk for deportation. and so, for them, for the advocacy community, there is a sense of urgency, and so they are saying that the democrats need to use their leverage, and

like you said, it is through the budget process, because the republicans are demanding that this is dealt with separately, but if it is, then there is little chance of getting a real daca fix. >> i'm one of the democrat, and i will say this, and i support the daca and i have been supporting it for a long time but i won't shutdown the government for one issue. the republicans did it over health care and you remember it some years ago and that is wrong. we don't need to -- i won't support a shutdown of the government over a single issue. even though i emphasized that daca is very important, but we need to use that leverage to get the job done. the issue here is can we get to the principles, and i will talk about what happened at the white house. we said we will talk about four things. one is daca and this is on top that we have to get the top numbers, because we have to get the top number, and once we get

that, you will see that the work going to be done quickly, because it is done last year. daca and so i remember that the republicans kept saying the wall and i said, no it is the border of security. and they agreed. i will get into the definition which you started off with. and the other is chain migration, and it is -- is that chain migration changes to only daca or chain migration to everybody in the public. >> and you just have be clear, the conservatives are using the rhetoric of chain migration to really talk about, you know, family reunification visas established in 1965. and now they are saying it is being abused and stop it at some point, because we need to have a bet er control of who gets into the country. so it is important to understand what we are meaning by that. >> and the chain migration, basically, one person comes in, and do they bring the immediate

families or are they bringing a their everybody else. it is how far do you go on beyond, because one person can bring in more than one individual, and it goes on a long time. some of us are saying -- >> what is the current law saying right now as or immediate family or the extended family? >> it is that one person can bring in more than the immediate family, and that person who comes in later, and does it take a long time? yes. and to finish my thought, the third thing with chain migration, the fourth thing was diversity. the lottery things. some of us feel that we need to look at the security a little bit more, and keep in mind that the lottery has become an issue that is are very important to not only the hispanic caucus, but the black caucus, because the last time that we looked at the numbers, 41% of the

lotteries were coming in from countries in africa, and the black caucus has come in and said, oh, this is something that we have big interest in. we saw a vote some years ago when this came up. so i bring up the issues, the four issue, and okay, those four issues. yesterday when i talked to my republican friends, they said, oh, by the way, we need to talk aboutb this, this, this. so they brought in -- >> the securing america -- >> they were bringing in 24 issue, and i said, i thought that there were four. they said well, the border security covers kate's law and -- so now it is not border issues, but other issues. >> that bill is only one of many on the hill, and that one in particular, the democrats and the advocacy groups are s are s it is a non-starter, because there are so many poisonb pills

that the immigrant community and others will not accept for the protection for the dreamers. that is a 24-point plan are, - 24-point plan and it is a nativist position. >> and with all due respect, the left says that all we want is a clean daca bilks and that is it. >> you don't agree that is possible? >> well, let me finish. it is not going to the happen. it is not going to happen. first of all, the republicans control the senate, the house and the white house. if you count to 218, there are not 218 democrats in the house. we have to get away, because daca by itself is not going to happen. but on the other side, you are the people on the right who don't want to see daca and they want to add all of ttoof the pos that you talked about. at the end of the day, we worked out something and the far left

and the far right are not going to be happy, and it depends upon the people in the middle, democrats can and republicans to put something forward to work it. on top of that, and if i can finish more, because it is getting a lit areal complicated, but it is not only daca and we have to come up with the top numbers and we have to deal with dac, and what is going to happen is that we will do a c rshr to mid-february is what i think. i don't like it, but it is practically going to happen. and what happens in march? it is another big issue that we have to tie in. anybody know? debt ceiling. so somehow, we are going to be trying to put all of the things together to address those issues whether together or separately, but i just want to give you the inside perspective and appropriations looking at appropriation, and top numbers and daca and looking at a it as leverage on the spending bill,

and the spending bill coming in. >> and on that note, we want to toss it out to you for questions or comments. there are a lot of things going on behind the scenes of course. so we will take a like a first round of questions. >> thank you. ha thank you, congressman. thank you, panel. regarding the 20-yard strategy. which i think many of us could endorse, so many of the central american migrants make it through mexico on the railroads and so i know that it is an issue that has been discuss ed between the u.s. government and the railroads as to how to ensure that they don't hitchhike on the train, because it is the major as i understand it, and i could be wrong, the major artery to get them to the u.s. border.

could you perhaps discuss that? >> anthony, and let me step down. anthony, it was called the beast. it was a train coming in from central america and it is the beast and they would jump in, and a lot of times the folks would fall off or loose legs fall off and people get killed. so there was a strategy to try to keep those people from coming in, but keep in mind, if you look at it, the drug cart els are going to be in drug cartels or selling drugs or human trafficking or smuggling. whatever makes money for them, they control the routes. by controlling the routes, that means that i have the area greased. that is that they are going to have officials that are turning their heads and they are going to be running routes. they can do it. think about this.

when the cubans were coming in, and different issue, and i was in central america, and i said, how did you, how are you here in costa rica and we were in costa rica k and we went to cuba and a then ecuador and then colombia and then panama and then ended up, and this is when nicaragua said no more. i said, where are you going and i knew answer already, and they said, laredo, texas, and i said, how did you pick la ray doeshgs and if y-- pick laredo, if you coming are from cuba? and again, there is a smuggling and a way to get over here. the smugglers are able to move people and drugs around. if you think of the unaccompanied kids, how do the unaccompanied kids all of the sudden go to south texas? it is because they control the routes. so maybe it is the rails or the other ways of moving the people

over here, and i say it because we have to understand what we are trying to do, and the administration, and they have are a lot of people who understand it, but certain voices are winning in the white house, and this is the thing is that they just don't understand. for example, they say that the border is violent and all of this. if you are looking at the latest fbi statistics and i do it every year to show you. if you are looking at for example murder rates and you mentioned this which is very good. the annual national murder rate in the u.s. is 5.3 murders per 100,000. 5.3. if you are looking at el paso, brownsville and laredo and that area, none of them have that number. they are below. so i said, what is the most dangerous thing of being on the

border is when i leave laredo, texas, i fly to washington, d.c., and washington, d.c., has more murders than my hometown of laredo, and if you are looking at the violent crimes which is rapes and assaults and that, and the national crime rate, you will find it at the border lower than the national crime rate. so there are a number of fallacies, and people are saying, the wall, the wall, and it is a winning argument for the president president. it is a winning argument, but it does not make sense. it not a memo they put out, but the budget request where they took money from the national guard to go over there to build the wall which is the most ineffective way of ogetting there. and i will finish up -- >> well, what you are saying is that you trying to find the middle ground to make it a win-win for everyone to address

the concerns about the border security, and address the needs of the dreamers and even down the road, because the president also seems to be i saying, we will get to a comprehensive immigration reform in a second phase down the road, and obviously a lot of the the conservatives didn't take that too well, and there were really nasty comments on twitter against that. so i want to get to another question before we are done. >> thank you so much. great presentation. you mentioned, congressman, that mexico has the ability to be the matador at the southern border and they are not doing it, because they are so dependent on nafta talks, et cetera. that doesn't change. my real question is for both of you on the panel, how important are the mexican elections for the future of this this relat n relationsh relationship, does it matter who is going to be the mexican

president? >> it does. it duchltz for some of us working with mexico. for many of us mexico for a very nationalistic country, and they are very proud. at the same time, they have a relationship with the u.s. we want to be neighbors fwaushgt sim time, they have not forgotten that the u.s. -- we want to be neighbor, but to them, they have not forgotten that the u.s. took 55% of their territory. so imagine if a country took 55% of your territory, you would remember that as if it happened yesterday. so in the '70s and the '80s and the '90s we have been working to get mexico closer to us, and we have gotten them there, and then the president comes many and starts to push mexico away. nafta is very important to us, and security is very important, and they worked with ounce those issues on that, the and 40% of everything that we export as a country, and 40% of everything that we export goes to land america, and mexico, and central

and south america. and 40%, but we don't treat them as neighbors. if you are looking at the world, there are some countries that don't have very friendly neighbors. we as the united states are blessed to have canada and mexico as neighbors. we should take advantage of that and what i said is that when some people see russia as a friend, and mexico as the enemy, that world has been turned upside down. >> and one last question, because we are running out of time time. >> i work for the ritter foundation, and we cover things like land rights, and vulnerable people, and trafficking and such. so i want to ask you about the wall, but also the threat of the wall. if you could address a little bit how that has had the impact or what sort of impact it has had on the life along the

border, and the working condition, and the labor conditions among both the people with documents and the people who don't have documents who are frighten ed about the situation >> vonda? >> yes, it is not just the wall, but the broad are rhetoric of the trump administration. and so it is not just the latino community, but it is the muslim residents which has created a significant atmosphere of fear and for many people terror. we saw it immediately in the houston hurricane di ssaster whe the people not only undocumented workers, but the people who had families who were undocumented, but they were afraid to come to the shelters. despite the efforts of the local officials to encourage them to come to the shelters, so it is an immediate situation, and the people were putting themselves in diariesk because of the fear of deportation, and of course,

we spoke about the dreamers and the psychology that is difficult for them. i mentioned in the remarks that crossing the border is a method of daily life for the communities and with the economy of the particularly smaller u.s. cities and towns and not as large as laredo or el paso, but the smaller ones along the border depending upon in fact people from mexico coming there to buy the goods on the daily basis, and are also people of the united states going to places like juarez and tijuana. >> and vonda, we are talking about a vitalal and dynamic border community of some 12 million people, correct? >> on the u.s. side. you can extend it on the mexico, it is going to be a larger community. in fact, and, there is also the notion i think that is very antiquated that the community is people within 100 miles in each

dr direction. the real the ti today of course is that many people have families as far as michigan and wisconsin and very deep into the united states. so the notion of the border being separate of the rest of the body of the united states fundamentally does not hold true. so, yes, there are significant impacts, but in the negative impacts. i want to go back to the point that congressman cuellar and i were making in multiple ways to think about the border and the border security to think about the safety of the body of the united states, it is not only a matter of what happens here, and what happens in the a heart and the brain, but it is about what happens s happenses in the external environment. how do we shape the external environment? how do we encourage cooperation that matters to us? for example antagonizing the

mexican politician,politicians, perhaps, nationalist, and an tie tie- -- anti-u.s. position, it is not going to make it a happier and more prosperous country. >> and so with that i want to bring this to a close and wrap it up. i want to have you do a one-minute pitch of what you envision to be a smart border security plan for the united states. vanda? >> not build the wall. invest more money into the improving legal ports of entry, and not simply in terms of the security, but also in terms of the efficiency, and that might include cargo and shipping security deeper into canada and mexico. the obama administration tried

that and far more could be invested. invest more in the people, the agents who work at the bord, and do so in a way that improve tharg quality of liimproveing their quality of life, and also, with the training, and the vetting and the resources they need. put more money in the coast guard. do not take money away from the coast guard, and conceive of the border as being larger of a body of the united states, and larger organic border. the border is not just a line of separation with a structure on it, but it is a membrane of separation. >> and so when we look, it is not just the southern border, but the southern bord, and the coast s th coasts that we have, and that is how we have to look at how things are coming in, or how the people or the drugs come in. you have to understand that it is not just the southern border. it reminds me of the french and the germans in world war i where the french built this defense,

and the germans went around on the other side. so you have to understand how the security works and how the stop it. technology works very well. for example, all you need is 100 of the right aerostats, and you can cover the whole border. we have surplus from the military that the taxpayers paid, and all we have to do because lit cover 40 miles, and you will be able to cover the whole bord wer 100 of them. and the personnel is also men and women in blue and green s, d not only border patrol, but the cpb, and technology that is used well. you have to also look at the you, keep in mind, create more border control, you need more activity, and you will have judge, and district judge, and marshalls and other staff. i have added something that nobody has done for a long time.

u i have added 55 immigration judges and a couple of years ago, i have added 25 and the obama administration wanted zero, which is beyond me, but i told the republican phrenes, next to those judges, i have 65 judges on the appropriation, and i will intend to add more. integration judges are very good, because they will tell you that you can stay or unfortunately sometimes, it is you go. you have to have a judge to make the decision. finally, the last thing, you have to make sure that you understand what is happening in the homeland. did you know that border patrol is losing more personnel than they are hiring personnel. at one time, it is 18,000500, and maybe now 19,000. and so it was a point when the trump administration was paying a company to provide border

control. so what are we doing here, guys? what is wrong with the picture? we also have to understand the demograph demographics, and it is not just homeland and cbp and there is a large number of people retiring, and we are not hiring enough people. so when we are looking at the diversity of immigration, a lot of the immigrants are going to be filling the position s ths te are trying to hire right now. >> okay. thank you so much for joining us in this important and timely panel. follow the news, and you can follow us, and ask additional questions through the brookings institution. we want to thank you for joining us. you have a great day. [ applause ]

>> the federal government faces a possible shutdown this coming friday night. lawmakers are going to decide on a short term package to keep the government working until the middle of next month. the house will debate it torl and the senate may are also take it up tomorrow. following the congressional bill funding the federal government, live coverage on c-span, and the senate on c-span 2 and you can watch online at cspan.org or listen with the free c-span radio app. here's a story posted about an hour ago by npr. former