Senator Robert Byrd
311 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510

March 23, 2005

Dear Senator Cochran and Senator Byrd,

The stranger who sojourns with you shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love the stranger as yourself; for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. Leviticus 19: 33-34

As organizations rooted in faith, we understand that the call to “love your neighbor as yourself” extends beyond borders, and implies that our own security cannot be bought at the expense of our neighbors’ security. In the past decade, since fencing projects began on the U.S./Mexico border, more than 2,500 migrants have died in the deserts and rivers along the border. Meanwhile, rates of migration across the border have only increased. Fencing is expensive, ineffective and deadly; and there are alternatives that improve security for the United States and its neighbors.

Therefore, we urge you to oppose the REAL ID Act (H.R. 418) and its fencing provisions (Section 102), which would exempt the Department of Homeland Security from our nation’s laws and bar judicial review of border construction projects. The REAL ID provisions have been attached by the House of Representatives to H.R. 1268, the Emergency Supplemental Appropriations for Iraq and Afghanistan and Tsunami Assistance.

Section 102 Provisions:

• Gives the Secretary of Homeland Security sweeping authority to waive all laws that prohibit construction of barriers and roads along our nation’s 7,500 miles of border. Currently, all construction is subject to public comment, environmental regulation and judicial review.
• Waives the rights of Native American nations to control the use of their lands, and eliminates environmental or zoning laws--local, state or federal--that prohibit this type of construction in environmentally sensitive or residential areas.
• Prohibits judicial review of these projects, eliminating any checks against the Department of Homeland Security for its use of land in border regions; and bar any individual, organization, business, or local or state government negatively affected by these projects from seeking compensation for losses.

Negative Impacts:

• Eliminates the Border Patrol requirement to conduct Environmental Impact Analyses before border construction projects. Currently, this process, mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act of 1976, is the only mechanism to allow public input into these proposals.
• Clears the way for the construction of over 75 miles of fencing in Arizona. Currently, there are only 75 miles of fencing across the entire U.S./Mexico border. In 2004, over 221 migrants died in Arizona alone, using isolated desert routes to avoid border infrastructure. The proposed fencing would funnel migrants onto the Barry Goldwater Air Force bombing range, and into the most remote stretches of Arizona desert, resulting in increased deaths.
• Allows completion of the “triple fence” in San Diego, California. Along with Border Patrol operations, the two fences already spanning this area have relocated migration, decreasing traffic through the area by 94 percent from 1993 to 2004. The vast majority of remaining migration through the San Diego Border Patrol Sector is not in the urban area where the fence would be constructed, but through the mountains east of the city.
• Opens more than one dozen federal and state parks, wildlife refuges and wilderness areas for unmonitored construction by the Border Patrol.

Human and Other Costs:

• Fencing and other infrastructure projects do not decrease migration. Rather, they shift the flow to more dangerous areas. For example, whereas apprehensions in the San Diego sector have dropped 74% from 1993 (531,689 apprehensions) to 2004 (138,328 apprehensions), they have skyrocketed in Arizona, with a more than 500% increase there in the same time period (116,187 in 1993 to 588,719 in 2004).
• The existing triple fence in San Diego cost approximately $3 million per mile. The original projected cost for the fence was $14 million. Total costs to date exceed $42 million, according to Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA).
• With over 7,500 miles of border, it is unrealistic to expect fencing and other related operations to “seal” our nation’s borders. With the completion of all current fencing proposals, less than eight percent of our border with Mexico, and only 0.02 percent of our national borders would be sealed.

Positive Alternatives:

• Provide safe and legal means of entry to migrants seeking opportunity or protection in our country. Meaningful immigration reform could eliminate the vast majority of undocumented entry across U.S. borders.
• Cooperate with local, state or provincial authorities--as Canada and the United States have done--to allow low-risk travelers and cargo across the border, and to improve detection and apprehension of high-risk people and goods before they reach the border.
• Distinguish efforts to deter terrorists from those to stop migrants. Current border infrastructure is intended for migrants, not terrorists. Our border security strategy has not changed since the September 11, 2001; we have simply reinforced an anti-migrant strategy begun in 1993.
• Establish a bipartisan commission to study what border security might look like in the context of meaningful immigration reform, and to reevaluate the effectiveness of Border Patrol operations and infrastructure.

In conclusion, we as faith-based organizations invite you join with us in opposing the REAL ID Act, and in advocating for borders that are truly secure--for ourselves and for our neighbors.

Respectfully,

Ted Lewis, Human Rights Programs Director Global Exchange
San Francisco, California

Sister Janet Gottschalk, Coordinator
Medical Mission Sisters Alliance for Justice
Laredo, Texas

Amy Woolam Echeverria, Coordinator
Columban Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation Office
US Regional Office, Washington, DC

Scott Wright, Executive Director
Tara Carr-Lemke, Border Program Associate Religious Task Force on Central America and Mexico
Washington, DC

Laura Carlsen, Director
Interhemisperhic Resource Center Americas Program
Silver City, New Mexico

Cristina Espinel and Kelleen Corrigan, Co-Chairs
Colombia Human Rights Committee
Washington, DC

Rev. William J. Morton, SSC
Columban Missionaries at the US/Mexico Border
El Paso, TX

Ouisa D. Davis, Executive Director
Diocesan Migrant & Refugee Services, Inc.
El Paso, Texas

Camilo Perez-Bustillo, Director of
Migration and Mobility
American Friends Service Committee
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

The Jesus Gallegos Blanco and The Rev. Mark S. Adams, Coordinators
Frontera de Cristo, A Presbyterian Bi-national Border Ministry
Douglas, Arizona

Paul Johnston, Executive Director
Monterey Bay Central Labor Council
Monterey, California

Rev. Séamus P. Finn, OMI, Director
Oblate Justice and Peace/ Integrity of Creation Office
Washington, DC

Edwin Argueta, Community Organizer
East Boston Ecumenical Community Council
East Boston, Massachusetts

Sean Mariano García, Senior Associate
Latin America Working Group
Washington, DC

Jennifer Allen, Executive Director
Border Action Network/Accion Fronteriza
Tucson, Arizona

Olivia Lopez, Steering Committee Coordinator
Colorado Immigrant Rights Coalition
Denver, Colorado

Phil Jones, Director
Church of the Brethren Witness National Office
Washington, DC

Charles Clements, President and CEO
Unitarian Universalist Service Committee
Cambridge, MA

Marie Dennis, Director
Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns
Washington, DC

J. Daryl Byler, Director
Mennonite Central Committee U.S. Office
Washington, DC

Bob Buxman, Director
West Coast Mennonite Central Committee
Reedly, CA

Elenora Giddings-Ivory, Director
Presbyterian Church USA
Washington, DC

Simone Campbell, SSS, National Coordinator
NETWORK, A National Catholic Social Justice Lobby
Washington, DC

John Stith, Operations Coordinator
School of the Americas Watch
Washington, DC

Joe Roberson, Executive Director
Church World Service Immigration and Refugee Program
Washington, DC

Ruben L. García, Director
Annunciation House
El Paso, Texas

Jose Matus, Executive Director
Coalición de Derechos Humanos/Alianza Indígena Sin Fronteras
Tucson, AZ

For more information regarding this letter, please contact Sean García or 202.546.7010