The Senate is set to
vote on the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act (S. 744) today.
The
word is that Democrats are on board to pass a reform bill with a “path to
citizenship” for folks who presently lack legal immigration status. The Grand
Old Party has its doubts about the legislation. To pull in enough of their
votes for passage the Corker-Hoeven Amendment was added to the bill. This is
the “border security” bit of the law that would add 20,000 more border patrol
agents (a total that could place a border patrol agent along the U.S. Mexico
border every 500 feet), 700 more miles of walls and fences, plus cameras,
lights, drones, and a whole bunch of stuff that makes our southern border
resemble some sort of latter day Maginot Line.
To
get GOP votes, I guess they figured that they also had to throw the environment
under the bus. The bill would open up federal lands to motorized patrols,
meaning that the Border Patrol could drive their jeeps and trucks over
federally protected lands anywhere they wanted, and that they can build
communications, surveillance, and detection equipment on these lands. The law
stipulates the preparation of Environmental Impact Statements according to NEPA
for these activities. These EISs, however, “shall not control, delay, or
restrict actions by the Secretary to achieve effective control on Federal
lands.”
So,
in essence, go ahead and prepare the EIS, just don’t let it get in the way of
driving your Border Patrol jeep anywhere you want, and you don’t have to pay
attention to those geese and tortoises whose nests you have just trampled on. There has already been a great deal of environmental damage because of the border buildup; we don't need more of the same. According
to the govtrack website, however, the bill has only a 27 percent chance of passage, so I’m
only slightly concerned.
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| Dont' let the geese and tortoises get in the way of your Border Patrol jeep |
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