Borderfire Report

By Michael Cutler

The news article "Climate Change Seen as Threat to U.S. Security" appeared in today (Sunday's) edition of the New York Times and is of great importance to our nation and bears great relevance to the issue of our nation's failures to secure its borders and create an immigration system that possesses integrity.

The news article discusses the issue of energy sources but incredibly not a single word of that report addresses an issue that is of at least equal importance- border security and enforcement and administration of our nation's immigration laws.

While the news report would have us believe that these concerns are newly discovered, in point of fact there have been numerous intelligence assessments that have been prepared by various intelligence agencies of our government that have projected the ways in which our planet may change in by the year 2020 and the year 2025.

While much has been made about global warming and climate change, few of our nation's "leaders" have been willing to discuss what climate change would mean for our nation's security especially in terms of the need to create secure borders. If, indeed, global climates do change, the impact on people around the world can be anticipated to be profound, making it more difficult for an ever increasing global population to find sources of safe water to be used for human consumption as well as to irrigate crops and meet the needs of livestock.

While there are many factors that may be behind climate change- both manmade as well as forces that are utterly outside human causality, the fact remains that it would appear that our planet is experiencing some climatic change. Many questions remain but let us consider what climate change will mean for our planet irrespective of the forces that are driving these changes.

If, as some predict, sea levels rise significantly, coastal cities may be lost to the rising sea levels. More and more people will lose their homes and their ability to feed themselves and their children.

It should be anticipated that this sort of catastrophe would propel large numbers of people throughout the world, to seek to find suitable places to live. To desperate people, international borders will mean nothing.

Furthermore, as we all know, poverty breeds extremism and such poverty provides opportunities for those who would see in large masses of uneducated and poverty stricken people a fertile place to recruit those who would advance their radical goals. Terrorism thrives in such conditions.

Clearly our nation is now in the sights of terrorists who are determined to attack our nation.

Yet our nation's borders remain porous and administration of our nation's immigration laws encourages massive levels of fraud in which aliens are easily able to game the "system." I place the term system in quotation marks because there is really not much of a system in place. The adjudicators at USCIS (United States Citizenship and Immigration Services) are under extreme pressure to keep the paper moving. The easiest (and most expeditious) way for an adjudicator to dispose of an application for an immigration benefit such as an application for lawful residence or even United States citizenship is to approve the application. Once the application is stamped "Approved" no further action is needed and the adjudicator can take credit for completing an action. The adjudicators are evaluated by their productivity. If they want to be successful in the eyes of their bosses, they need to move as many applications as possible. This sort of situation does not encourage the adjudicators to seek to uncover fraud but to simply approve as many applications as possible in the shortest time possible.

The administration is about to launch a massive drive to implement "Comprehensive Immigration Reform" that, according to my sources, will begin within a few short weeks.

Senator Charles Schumer of New York is the chairman of the Senate Immigration Subcommittee. He has been holding preliminary hearings on Comprehensive Immigration Reform, making it clear that he is absolutely determined to jam this ill-conceived program through the process as quickly as possible. For him the only issue is the security of our nation's borders. He has never even talked about the dysfunctional agency that would be placed in charge of administering his Comprehensive Immigration Reform program, USCIS.

As I have noted on ever so many occasions, our borders are not secure, a fact backed up by a number of GAO and OIG reports. What is even more important to understand is that USCIS is utterly inept and incapable of carrying out its mission right now. In a manner of speaking, USCIS is comparable to a locksmith that has been told to provide the keys to the front door of our nation.

If USCIS is unable to run its critically important programs now, before God knows how many millions of additional applications will be dumped on the desks of its overworked and thoroughly beleaguered adjudicators, just think of what mayhem such a massive program will create when millions upon millions of illegal aliens whose true identities, backgrounds and intentions are unknown and unknowable!

Add to all of this the ways in which experts believe that climate change will further increase, exponentially, the pressure on our nation's borders and immigration systems!

In the days and weeks after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 many of our nation's politicians stood before the cameras and thumped the podium behind which they stood, and demanded to know why no one connected the dots. This news report offers yet another example of how our nation had better get serious about border security and the issue of the lack of integrity of the immigration system.

Clearly the clock is ticking and time is not on our side.

Our nation must not only secure its borders against the illegal entry of illegal aliens, but must create an immigration system that has meaningful integrity if our nation is to effectively address the many challenges confronting our country and our citizens.

In less than two years each and every member of the House of Representatives is up for reelection. In less than two years more than one third of the members of the United States Senate will have to face their constituents. They need to be reminded that they work for us, We the People!

The large scale apathy demonstrated by citizens of this nation has emboldened elected representatives to all but ignore the needs of the average American citizen in a quest for massive campaign funds and the promises of votes to be ostensibly delivered by special interest groups. There is much that we cannot do but there is one thing that We the People absolutely must do- we must stop sitting on the sidelines!

The collective failure of We the People to get involved in make our concerns known to our politicians have nearly made the concerns of the great majority of the citizens of this nation all but irrelevant to the politicians.

I implore you to get involved!

If this situation concerns you or especially if it angers you, I ask you to call your Senators and Congressional "Representative. This is not only your right- it is your obligation! You need to politely but pointedly, demand to know what they are doing to protect our nation. You need to ask them how they are protecting you and your families. You can also forward this commentary to them.

All I ask is that you make it clear to our politicians that we are not as dumb as they hope we are!

We live in a perilous world and in a perilous era. The survival of our nation and the lives of our citizens hang in the balance.

© 2009 - Michael Cutler - All Rights Reserved

Michael W. Cutler began working for the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in October 1971 when he entered on duty as an Immigration Inspector assigned to John F. Kennedy International Airport. From 1973 until 1974 He was assigned as an examiner to the unit which was responsible for adjudicating petitions filed by United States Citizens and Lawfully Admitted Permanent Resident Aliens (LPRs) on behalf of their alien spouses to accord them LPR status. His goal in this assignment was to attempt to uncover fraud marriages and fraud marriage rings.

In August 1975 he became a Criminal Investigator (Special Agent) for the INS at NYC. He rotated through virtually every squad in the Investigations Branch. From 1988 until 1991 he was assigned as the INS representative to the Unified Intelligence Division (UID) of the DEA in New York. In 1991 he was promoted to the position of Senior Special Agent and was assigned to the Organized Crime, Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) which required that he work with members of other law enforcement agencies including the FBI, DEA, ATF, U.S.Customs and local and state police as well as law enforcement organizations of other countries including Israel, Canada, Great Britain and Japan, to conduct investigations of aliens involved in major drug trafficking organizations which ultimately resulted in the seizure of their assets as well as their arrest and successful prosecutions for a wide variety of criminal violations.

Finally, Mr. Cutler has appeared on numerous television and radio programs including the O'Reilly Radio Factor, O'Reilly's No Spin Zone, Fox News and the Lou Dobbs Tonight Program on CNN to discuss the enforcement of immigration laws and has participated in various public debates and panel discussions on issues involving the enforcement and administration of immigration laws.

E-Mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Michael Cutler articles can be emailed to a friend with just two clicks!
Click the email link near the article headline.

Michael Cutler Archives