April Fool’s 2008 will assuredly go down as a cruel day in the history of these United States. On this April 1, the United States government opted to bypass more than 30 laws in hopes of rushing construction of a controversial border wall. The wall is currently held up in negotiations, court cases, local protests, and wavering public support, but Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff ordered these waivers stating, “`Criminal activity at the border does not stop for endless debate or protracted litigation…These waivers will enable important security projects to keep moving forward.”
The waivers are the biggest use of legal waivers since the administration started building fence. The government waived 20 environmental laws to build the wall in Arizona, but this waver will cover a “total of 470 miles along the Southwest border.” As stated by the Associated Press article leaked today at 11:40, the department will conduct environmental surveys when necessary, but allow them to start building before these are completed.
30 laws. 30 laws which took hundreds of days to pass, millions of dollars to lobby and legislate. 30 laws which represent millions of Americans and thousands of endangered animals and ecosystems. 30 laws tossed aside in the name of anti-terrorism. 30 laws tossed aside to complete the Secure Fence Act of 2006 which was proposed as immigration legislation and which has almost no terror-deterrent utility, as admitted by government officials.
Chertoff has stated that the border wall will be beneficial to the environment because immigrants degrade the land with trash and human waste. I somehow cannot reconcile natural human movements with two eighteen-foot walls of solid concrete and vegetation cleared for visibility, mobility, and Border Patrol Access. Having just seen my first jaguarundi this past Saturday, I might be one of the last people to ever see them on American soil if this wall demolishes their ecosystem, along with that of Sonoran Pronghorns, ocelots, Sabal Palms, and many other native fauna and flora.
- What makes a law “red tape,” a thing to be cut and disregarded?
- What makes deterring immigration more important than preserving the rights of a nation of immigrants?
- Who is to decide that people on the border are less important than people in mid-America?
- Who decides that certain endangered animals are not worth saving, certain ecosystems dispensable, certain people undesirable, certain solutions nonnegotiable?
I cannot believe that Americans could be in support of such a foolhardy negation of so many laws, even if they are for a border wall. If “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,” then these waivers of legislation serve as a chilling precedent of further lawlessness, much like parts of the Patriot Act. I beseech you to contact your Congressmen, since Congress authorized these waivers just today. I beg you to pray with me that Americans will come to their consciences and oppose these waivers. How we react to these waivers and the impending border wall in this cruel month will decide the legacy of our generation and our nation.
Smart Borders 