Thursday, December 18, 2008
[IWS] CRS: BORDER SECURITY: THE ROLE OF THE U.S BORDER PATROL [20 November 2008]
IWS Documented News Service
_______________________________
Institute for Workplace Studies----------------- Professor Samuel B. Bacharach
School of Industrial & Labor Relations-------- Director, Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th floor---------------------- Stuart Basefsky
New York, NY 10016 -------------------------------Director, IWS News Bureau
________________________________________________________________________
Congressional Research Service (CRS)
Order Code RL32562
Border Security: The Role of the U.S. Border Patrol
Updated November 20, 2008
Blas Nuñez-Neto, Analyst in Domestic Security, Domestic Social Policy Division
http://opencrs.cdt.org/getfile.php?rid=65785
[full-text, 41 pages]
Summary
The United States Border Patrol (USBP) has a long and storied history as our
nation's first line of defense against unauthorized migration. Today, the USBP's
primary mission is to detect and prevent the entry of terrorists, weapons of mass
destruction, and illegal aliens into the country, and to interdict drug smugglers and
other criminals along the border. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 dissolved the
Immigration and Naturalization Service and placed the USBP within the Department
of Homeland Security (DHS). Within DHS, the USBP forms a part of the Bureau of
Customs and Border Protection under the Directorate of Border and Transportation
Security.
During the last decade, the USBP has seen its budget and manpower more than
triple. This expansion was the direct result of Congressional concerns about illegal
immigration and the agency's adoption of "Prevention Through Deterrence" as its
chief operational strategy in 1994. The strategy called for placing USBP resources
and manpower directly at the areas of greatest illegal immigration in order to detect,
deter, and apprehend aliens attempting to cross the border between official points of
entry. Post 9/11, the USBP refocused its strategy on preventing the entry of terrorists
and weapons of mass destruction, as laid out in its recently released National
Strategy. In addition to a workforce of over 17,000 agents, the USBP deploys
vehicles, aircraft, watercraft, and many different technologies to defend the border.
In the course of discharging its duties, the USBP patrols 8,000 miles of
American international borders with Mexico and Canada and the coastal waters
around Florida and Puerto Rico. However, there are significant geographic, political,
and immigration-related differences between the northern border with Canada and
the southwest border with Mexico. Accordingly, the USBP deploys a different mix
of personnel and resources along the two borders. Due to the fact that over 97% of
unauthorized migrant apprehensions occur along the southwest border, the USBP
deploys over 90% of its agents there to deter illegal immigration. The Border Safety
initiative and the Arizona Border Control initiative are both focused on the southwest
border. The northern border is more than two times longer than the southwest border,
features far lower numbers of aliens attempting to enter illegally, but may be more
vulnerable to terrorist infiltration. As a consequence of this, the USBP has focused
its northern border efforts on deploying technology and cooperating closely with
Canadian authorities through the creation of International Border Enforcement
Teams.
Some issues for Congress to consider could include the slow rate of integration
between the USBP's biometric database of illegal aliens and the Federal Bureau of
Investigation's (FBI) biometric database of criminals and terrorists; the number of
unauthorized aliens who die attempting to enter the country each year; the increasing
attacks on Border Patrol agents, and the threat posed by terrorists along the sparsely
defended northern border as well as the more porous southwest border.
This report will be updated as circumstances warrant.
Contents
Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Organization and Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Evolution of the National Strategic Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
National Border Patrol Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Budget and Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Surveillance Assets (Secure Border Initiative) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Automated Biometrics Identification System (IDENT) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Apprehensions Statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Multiple Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Successful Illegal Entries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Multiple Correlations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Southwest Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Prevention Through Deterrence In Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Southern Border Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
SW Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Border Safety Initiative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Interior Repatriation Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Northern Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
U.S.-Canadian Cooperation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Northern Border Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Integrated Border Enforcement Teams (IBET) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Northern Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Border Patrol Issues for Congress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
9/11 Report and the Northern Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Migrant Deaths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Attacks on Border Patrol Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Interior Enforcement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Integration of IDENT/IAFIS Law Enforcement Databases . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Deployment of SBInet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Coordination with Other Federal Agencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Civilian Patrol Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Civilian Humanitarian Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Staffing and Training Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Agent Attrition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
List of Figures
Figure 1. Border Patrol Appropriations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Figure 2. Southwest Border Agent Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Figure 3. SW Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Figure 4. SW Border Apprehensions, by Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Figure 5. Percentage of Southern Border Apprehensions, by State . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Figure 6. Border Patrol Agents at the Northern Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Figure 7. Northern Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Figure 8. Migrant Deaths, Center for Immigration Research Data . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Figure 9. Migrant Deaths, Border Patrol Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Figure 10. Migrant Mortality Rate, per 10,000 Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Figure 11. Attacks on Border Patrol Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Figure 12. Overall Border Patrol Agent and Pilot Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Figure 13. Border Patrol Agent Attrition Rate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
______________________________
This information is provided to subscribers, friends, faculty, students and alumni of the School of Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR). It is a service of the Institute for Workplace Studies (IWS) in New York City. Stuart Basefsky is responsible for the selection of the contents which is intended to keep researchers, companies, workers, and governments aware of the latest information related to ILR disciplines as it becomes available for the purposes of research, understanding and debate. The content does not reflect the opinions or positions of Cornell University, the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, or that of Mr. Basefsky and should not be construed as such. The service is unique in that it provides the original source documentation, via links, behind the news and research of the day. Use of the information provided is unrestricted. However, it is requested that users acknowledge that the information was found via the IWS Documented News Service.
Stuart Basefsky
Director, IWS News Bureau
Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell/ILR School
16 E. 34th Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Telephone: (607) 255-2703
Fax: (607) 255-9641
E-mail: smb6@cornell.edu
****************************************
_______________________________
Institute for Workplace Studies----------------- Professor Samuel B. Bacharach
School of Industrial & Labor Relations-------- Director, Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell University
16 East 34th Street, 4th floor---------------------- Stuart Basefsky
New York, NY 10016 -------------------------------Director, IWS News Bureau
________________________________________________________________________
Congressional Research Service (CRS)
Order Code RL32562
Border Security: The Role of the U.S. Border Patrol
Updated November 20, 2008
Blas Nuñez-Neto, Analyst in Domestic Security, Domestic Social Policy Division
http://opencrs.cdt.org/getfile.php?rid=65785
[full-text, 41 pages]
Summary
The United States Border Patrol (USBP) has a long and storied history as our
nation's first line of defense against unauthorized migration. Today, the USBP's
primary mission is to detect and prevent the entry of terrorists, weapons of mass
destruction, and illegal aliens into the country, and to interdict drug smugglers and
other criminals along the border. The Homeland Security Act of 2002 dissolved the
Immigration and Naturalization Service and placed the USBP within the Department
of Homeland Security (DHS). Within DHS, the USBP forms a part of the Bureau of
Customs and Border Protection under the Directorate of Border and Transportation
Security.
During the last decade, the USBP has seen its budget and manpower more than
triple. This expansion was the direct result of Congressional concerns about illegal
immigration and the agency's adoption of "Prevention Through Deterrence" as its
chief operational strategy in 1994. The strategy called for placing USBP resources
and manpower directly at the areas of greatest illegal immigration in order to detect,
deter, and apprehend aliens attempting to cross the border between official points of
entry. Post 9/11, the USBP refocused its strategy on preventing the entry of terrorists
and weapons of mass destruction, as laid out in its recently released National
Strategy. In addition to a workforce of over 17,000 agents, the USBP deploys
vehicles, aircraft, watercraft, and many different technologies to defend the border.
In the course of discharging its duties, the USBP patrols 8,000 miles of
American international borders with Mexico and Canada and the coastal waters
around Florida and Puerto Rico. However, there are significant geographic, political,
and immigration-related differences between the northern border with Canada and
the southwest border with Mexico. Accordingly, the USBP deploys a different mix
of personnel and resources along the two borders. Due to the fact that over 97% of
unauthorized migrant apprehensions occur along the southwest border, the USBP
deploys over 90% of its agents there to deter illegal immigration. The Border Safety
initiative and the Arizona Border Control initiative are both focused on the southwest
border. The northern border is more than two times longer than the southwest border,
features far lower numbers of aliens attempting to enter illegally, but may be more
vulnerable to terrorist infiltration. As a consequence of this, the USBP has focused
its northern border efforts on deploying technology and cooperating closely with
Canadian authorities through the creation of International Border Enforcement
Teams.
Some issues for Congress to consider could include the slow rate of integration
between the USBP's biometric database of illegal aliens and the Federal Bureau of
Investigation's (FBI) biometric database of criminals and terrorists; the number of
unauthorized aliens who die attempting to enter the country each year; the increasing
attacks on Border Patrol agents, and the threat posed by terrorists along the sparsely
defended northern border as well as the more porous southwest border.
This report will be updated as circumstances warrant.
Contents
Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Organization and Composition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Evolution of the National Strategic Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
National Border Patrol Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Budget and Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Surveillance Assets (Secure Border Initiative) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Automated Biometrics Identification System (IDENT) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Apprehensions Statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Multiple Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Successful Illegal Entries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Multiple Correlations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Southwest Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Prevention Through Deterrence In Action . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Southern Border Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
SW Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Border Safety Initiative . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Interior Repatriation Program . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
Northern Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
U.S.-Canadian Cooperation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Northern Border Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Integrated Border Enforcement Teams (IBET) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Northern Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Border Patrol Issues for Congress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
9/11 Report and the Northern Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Migrant Deaths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Attacks on Border Patrol Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Interior Enforcement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
Integration of IDENT/IAFIS Law Enforcement Databases . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Deployment of SBInet . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Coordination with Other Federal Agencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Civilian Patrol Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Civilian Humanitarian Groups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Staffing and Training Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
Agent Attrition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
List of Figures
Figure 1. Border Patrol Appropriations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Figure 2. Southwest Border Agent Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Figure 3. SW Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Figure 4. SW Border Apprehensions, by Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
Figure 5. Percentage of Southern Border Apprehensions, by State . . . . . . . . . . . 17
Figure 6. Border Patrol Agents at the Northern Border . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Figure 7. Northern Border Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Figure 8. Migrant Deaths, Center for Immigration Research Data . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Figure 9. Migrant Deaths, Border Patrol Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
Figure 10. Migrant Mortality Rate, per 10,000 Apprehensions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Figure 11. Attacks on Border Patrol Agents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Figure 12. Overall Border Patrol Agent and Pilot Manpower . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
Figure 13. Border Patrol Agent Attrition Rate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
______________________________
This information is provided to subscribers, friends, faculty, students and alumni of the School of Industrial & Labor Relations (ILR). It is a service of the Institute for Workplace Studies (IWS) in New York City. Stuart Basefsky is responsible for the selection of the contents which is intended to keep researchers, companies, workers, and governments aware of the latest information related to ILR disciplines as it becomes available for the purposes of research, understanding and debate. The content does not reflect the opinions or positions of Cornell University, the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, or that of Mr. Basefsky and should not be construed as such. The service is unique in that it provides the original source documentation, via links, behind the news and research of the day. Use of the information provided is unrestricted. However, it is requested that users acknowledge that the information was found via the IWS Documented News Service.
Stuart Basefsky
Director, IWS News Bureau
Institute for Workplace Studies
Cornell/ILR School
16 E. 34th Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10016
Telephone: (607) 255-2703
Fax: (607) 255-9641
E-mail: smb6@cornell.edu
****************************************
# posted by SBasefsky : 11:40 AM
