A subcommittee of the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability held a hearing in Arizona on August 8, about 15 miles from the nation’s southern border, at which a local sheriff and cattle rancher shared with committee members stories and information about the dangers and expanding lawlessness the men deal with and confront in-person and on a daily basis.
Another witness, an expert on immigration, also gave testimony to the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs.
The hearing, titled “Biden’s Border Crisis and its Effect on Communities,” took place at Cochise College, on its campus in Sierra Vista, a city located within the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CPB) Tucson zone, which covers most of the state of Arizona and is among the busiest CPB zones.
“It couldn’t be more appropriate than we’re here in the Tucson sector because the Border Patrol apprehended over 40,000 illegal immigrants in the month of July alone,” said Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.), chairman of the subcommittee in his opening statement. “That’s the highest it’s been in 15 years.”
Mr. Grothman added: “I'll tell you, from being down here and talking to so many in the past, you cannot know what is going on in the southern border unless you’ve been here and talk to the people who live it, both law enforcement, ranchers, what have you.”
Joining Mr. Grothman in the hearing were his fellow Republican House members Juan Ciscomani, whose district includes Sierra Vista; Andy Biggs of Arizona, William Timmons (S.C.), and Chuck Edwards (N.C.).
Mr. Grothman said that Democrats were invited to participate in the hearing, but none chose to attend.
The Epoch Times reached out to four Democratic members—ranking member Robert Garcia (Calif.), Cori Bush (Mo.), Dan Goldman (N.Y.), and Katie Porter (Calif.)—of the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, seeking a comment on Mr. Grothman’s statement that no Democrat chose to participate in the hearing.
Rep. Garcia’s office responded to the request, saying that the congressman was on a delegation to Israel on the day of the hearing.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) did not respond to The Epoch Times’ request for comment on the hearing.
The three sworn witnesses who testified were Andrew “Art” Arthur, a fellow at the Center for Immigration Studies; Mark Dannels, the sheriff of Cochise County; and the cattle rancher John Ladd.
‘Border-Related Crime Is at an All-Time High’
Sheriff Dannels, a U.S. military veteran, who has served in law enforcement for 39 years, told the lawmakers and hearing attendees that in his work, he has “personally experienced the good, the bad, and the ugly of being a border county.”“To best understand my presentations is to understand where we were over three years ago,” said Mr. Dannels. “My county was one of the safest border counties based on the collective governmental efforts, messaging, and, yes, enforcement efforts supported by the rule of law.”
Mr. Dannels said, though, that matters of public safety have recently gone downhill, and that his enforcement personnel are busy chasing got-aways and illegal immigrants who are dressed in camouflage and smuggled into the United States.
“Border-related crime is at an all-time high,” said Mr. Dannels. “Death, murder investigations, aggravated acts against my citizens, failure to yield, search and rescue and recovery; and, yes, assaults against law enforcement officials, my deputies.
15 Illegal Immigrants Trespass Cattle Range Per Hour
John Ladd’s sprawling cattle ranch shares a border with Mexico of about 10 miles in length, with a portion of that border separated from Mexico by a wall that had been built during the Trump administration, yet construction stopped in the Biden presidency.Mr. Ladd, a fourth-generation cattle rancher whose family has been on the property for more than 100 years, employs a network of barriers and monitoring technology, including camera towers and radar, to monitor his ranch.
He knows first-hand the illegal immigration problem. Through the years, he has found several dead bodies on his farm. About 15 illegal immigrants per hour trespass on his ranch.
Mr. Ladd lauded and gave tremendous credit to local law enforcement and border patrol agents, and lauded their efforts to police the border, some of which he said have been effective. He said that Sheriff Daniels and his department were successful in keeping drugs off his ranch.
But he sees that the authorities are overwhelmed and that there are not personnel to adequately handle the illegal immigration problem, which he testified has become a lot worse.
“We have about a third of the agents that we normally have patrolling, and my hats off to them,” said Mr. Ladd. “But they’re getting worn out, and none of them are gonna go past the 20-year career; they’re done—and that’s the sad part of America.
Testimony of Immigration Policy Expert
“In my 32 years of direct involvement in immigration, the southwest border has never been in such crisis,” said Mr. Arthur. “Border Patrol agents here have apprehended more than 5.6 million illegal entrants since February of 2021, while CBP officers at the southwest border ports have encountered more than half-million more.”He emphasizes that the drugs that illegal immigrants transport into the United States are wreaking deadly havoc on the country.
Mr. Arthur said that the Biden administration has released into the country 2.2 million illegal immigrants it had intercepted and was bound by law to remove from the United States. When that number, he noted, was combined with the 1.5 million others who skirted and eluded apprehension, it amounts to 3.7 million who are here illegally and do not have the right to be here.
