Pubdate: Sun, 29 Jun 2014
Source: Las Vegas Review-Journal (NV)
Copyright: 2014 Las Vegas Review-Journal
Contact: http://www.reviewjournal.com/about/print/press/letterstoeditor.html
Website: http://www.lvrj.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/233
Page: 2D

BORDER CRISIS FIX: END THE DRUG WAR

Americans Fund Cartels That Have Kids Fleeing

Since Oct. 1, U.S. Border Patrol agents have apprehended more than 
52,000 children traveling alone from Central America and Mexico. Many 
of these kids made the dangerous trip to escape even more dangerous 
conditions in their home countries. According to a 2013 United 
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees survey of 400 children who 
fled to the United States from Central America and Mexico, nearly 
half said drug cartel and gang violence had affected them personally, 
while 20 percent said they had been abused or otherwise experienced 
violence in their own homes.

Three out of every four children detained by U.S. Customs and the 
Border Patrol have come from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala - 
countries that have seen an escalation in violence associated with 
drug cartels and gangs. Honduras has the most murders per capita of 
any country.

The danger of their home countries is just the beginning. The 
perilous trip north puts these children at risk of torment by human 
traffickers who, according to Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, have been 
forcing children to, among other things, cut off the fingers or ears 
of other little boys and girls to extort money from their families.

Under U.S. immigration law, children who enter the country illegally 
and alone from Mexico can be returned immediately to their home 
country. Children from other countries, however, cannot be removed 
immediately and must first be taken into U.S. custody. Because of a 
backlog in the immigration court system that reached as many as 
30,000 cases before the recent border surge, it now may be several 
years before these children's cases are heard. Between now and then, 
the children will be able to live in American cities, receive health 
care, attend public schools and likely even work here for years. So 
what's the answer? This newspaper has long been a proponent of 
decriminalizing, regulating and taxing the sale of currently illegal 
drugs. (We support the legalization of recreational marijuana, for 
example.) We hold to this position because of the supreme costs 
related to policing, prosecuting and incarcerating drug offenders - 
not to mention the tragic (and preventable) cost in human lives - and 
the fact that no amount of government pressure has ever reduced 
demand for illegal drugs in the United States. In fact, it has done 
the exact opposite.

We have also long advocated stronger border enforcement and the 
enforcement of existing immigration laws - laws that now must be 
deemed broken if we have to accept tens of thousands of immigrant 
children and burden southwestern state taxpayers with the bill for 
educating them and providing medical care. Selective enforcement of 
immigration laws certainly isn't helping.

These children must be sent home at some point, but they can't be 
turned around on the spot and told to start walking back. The federal 
government should bear the cost of this humanitarian crisis, not a 
handful of states.

If the United States wasn't such a profitable marketplace for Mexican 
and Central American drug lords - so much so that it's crippling 
governments in those countries - children would not be rushing here 
in such alarming numbers. The border, and Latin America itself, would 
look vastly different if we were engaged in lawful, taxed trade that 
provided legitimate employment to people here and there. Instead we 
enable the growth of violent, multibillion-dollar criminal 
enterprises that are expanding into the ransom and extortion trades.

This month, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., called the war 
in Iraq "the biggest foreign policy blunder in the history of the 
country." Please. The chaos in Iraq still can't touch the 
international carnage, cruelty and cost in lives and treasure of the 
war on drugs.

No form of immigration reform and no amount of border security is 
ever going to fix this problem. The best policy solution at this 
point is to immediately end the war on drugs.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom