The Wastefulness of the Billions Spent on Border Enforcement

Maria Mendoza of Associated Press provides a sobering report about the Obama administration’s “enforcement now, enforcement forever” immigration strategy:

“The Associated Press tallied the combined costs using White House budgets, reports obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, and congressional transcripts. Among the expenses:

■ Deployment of 1,200 National Guard soldiers for one year: $110 million

■ One rail cargo X-ray screening machine: $1.75 million

■ Average annual salary of a Customs and Border Protection officer: $75,000

■ Cost of a drug-searching dog: $4,500

For taxpayers footing these bills, the returns have been mixed: fewer illegal immigrants but little impact on the terrorism issue, and no stoppage of the drug supply, officials said.”

Such reports should make us all think about responsible and practical immigration reform.  If done the right way, such reform hopefully could make the immigration laws more enforceable and save scarce federal dollars spent on enforcement measures that do not work, result in deaths on the U.S./Mexico border, and have fueled human trafficking.

KJ