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Tuesday's annual hearing on "Threats to the Homeland" took on a new importance with the war raging between Israel and Hamas.

"As the last few weeks have shown, the threat environment our department is charged with confronting has evolved and expanded constantly," said Department of Homeland Security Sec. Alejandro Mayorkas.

Mayorkas, FBI Director Christopher Wray and Director of theNational Counterterrorism CenterChristine Abizaid all told the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs that they are worried Hamas' attack will embolden other bad actors, both in the U.S and abroad.

"Homegrown violent extremists inspired by foreign terrorist organizations are in many ways the biggest threat we face here in the homeland, and those lone actors will draw inspiration from all sorts of things," said Wray.

"Iran has a significant escalatory capability that if it intended to be escalatory in this current conflict, we should be very concerned," Abizaid said.

Wray testified the threat facing Jews is reaching historic levels. He said the FBI is bringing its hate crimes investigators and its domestic terrorism teams together to combat the growing threat.

Beyond Israel, both Democrats and Republicans pressed the trio on immigration and the southern border.

Director Wray testified that the FBI is targeting fentanyl at every level from the "pill mills" who produce the drugs to the organizations who smuggle it across the border and the gangs who distribute it on the streets.

"We well know that the trafficking of fentanyl is not specific to a nationality. Tragically, we have individuals from various countries of origin. We have American citizens trafficking in fentanyl. Fentanyl is a scourge that we must all work together to overcome," said Mayorkas.

Secretary Mayorkas testified that his agency is surging staff and technology to the border, but he also stressed the need for comprehensive immigration reform.

A vast majority of the hearing focused on those two issues border security and Israel and those issues will likely figure prominently on the campaign trail for 2024.

SEE MORE: Biden administration pushes split Congress over aid to Israel, Ukraine

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Israel war, border security are top 2 threats facing the US - WPTV News Channel 5 West Palm

In a seemingly stark policy reversal, President Biden announced his administration will build 20 miles of new fences along the U.S.-Mexico border. DHS Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas says Bidens hand has been forced, as Congress allocated funds for this fencing in 2019, which could not be repurposed. Moreover, Mayorkas argues that Biden has been under pressure from both parties to show decisive action at the border. In short, Biden officials claim that even though he may not want to build a wall, he must, or he will face serious political consequences.

But new fences are not a reversal of the Democratic Partys agenda. They are part of an extensive history of both Democrats and Republicans selling Americans on the idea that they can stop border-crossings by simply starting a new program or building a big fence. Politicians from both parties have consistently attempted to close the border, as if doing so is actually possible, let alone desirable. Biden is not continuing construction on Trumps border wall; he is continuing to build Americas border wall.

Read More: In Reversal, Biden Moves to Expand Border Wall

The first border fences built along the U.S.-Mexico border to curb immigration from Mexico began in earnest under Democrats Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Harry S. Truman. After building fences for decades to stop animals, the federal government shifted its focus when people began migrating in significant numbers from south to north in the 1940s and 1950s.

In this transitional moment, both Mexico and the United States embraced the borders permeability. To fill labor gaps left by World War II, the nations agreed to a guest worker program, known as the Bracero Program. Not everyone qualified to participate, though, so thousands began migrating independently. Growers in the north yearned for affordable labor. Mexicans within and outside of the program provided it. Under pressure to control the flow of people, the Roosevelt Administration began planning fence construction in urban areas to divert traffic to more isolated areas. By the end of the Truman Administration, most border cities were fenced. Even as both nations facilitated Mexican migration, they looked to fences to aid them in filtering who could enter.

The Bracero Program ended in 1964, and a year later, Democrat Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Immigration and Nationality Act which, for the first time, placed a cap on the number of people who could immigrate to the U.S. from Western Hemisphere countries like Mexico. This shift in regulation directed greater attention to the border.

Read more: What Donald Trump Got Rightand WrongAbout the History of Deportation

Despite new laws and fences, immigrants kept coming. Lured by U.S. demand, smugglers brought drugs, too. In 1969, Republican Richard Nixon launched Operation Intercept. He tried to close the border for weeks to stop the movement of illicit drugs. The initiative increased security and surveillancea virtual fence, not a material onebut it failed by its own measure.

Two years later, First Lady Pat Nixon established Friendship Park along the border near San Diego where people could celebrate cross-border culture. At the dedication ceremony, Nixon requested that her security detail cut strands of barbed wire there so that she could greet Mexicans across the borderline. I hope there wont be a fence too long here, the Republican famously said. Nixons administration never built significant barriers.

Facing economic distress and American angst with rising tides of labor migrations from Mexico, Democrat Jimmy Carter replaced the fence Nixon had cut with a bigger, stronger fence in 1979. A year before it went up, its design stirred controversy when the contractor stated it would sever the toes of anyone who dared to breach it. After public outcry, Carters administration redesigned the fence to be plain, but tightly woven, wire mesh topped with barbed wire. Even if that fence did not sever toes, it did tear through Pat Nixons bi-nationally spirited park.

Republican Ronald Reagan also closed the border for a few weeks in 1985, repeating Operation Intercept. Despite his idea that he could close the border at his whim, Reagan, like First Lady Nixon, demonstrated hesitation about actual border fences. In a 1980 debate with future President George H.W. Bush, Reagan had said, Rather than talking about putting up a fence, why dont we work out some recognition of our mutual problems, make it possible for them to come here legally with a work permit and then while theyre working and earning here they pay taxes here.

Reagan later signed the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act. The law provided legalization to over two million undocumented immigrants who had been working in the United States, increased the legal culpability for employers who hired undocumented people, and provided funding for more Border Patrol agents. Although Reagan did not build fences, his administration did maintain the ones that existed, and he provided funds to increase border surveillance, as did George H.W. Bush.

In the 1990s intense xenophobia and public debate about unauthorized immigration escalated in the United States, prompting both parties to move toward physically securing the border. Democrat Bill Clintons policies would not just tear through Pat Nixons park, they would effectively destroy it. In 1993 and 1994, Clinton launched three separate border operations: Operation Hold the Line in Texas, Operation Safeguard in Arizona, and Operation Gatekeeper in Southern California.

Read More: Barriers to a Border Wall

The fences were part of what Clinton referred to as a get tough policy at our borders. He used steel surplus military landing mats, which the Army Corps of Engineers welded together, to build an allegedly impassable wall. In the middle of Friendship Park, the Immigration and Naturalization Service built three parallel fences. Multiple fences, they argued, would allow agents to catch fence-jumpers in between them. Clintons barriers to humans went up alongside NAFTA, which opened the border to material goods, once again making the border more of a sieve than a seal.

Instead of stopping people from crossing, a more militarized border diverted them to dangerous landscapes, increasing migrant deaths exponentially. In the decade following Clintons fences, deaths along the border doubled.

Like his father, George W. Bush began his presidency hoping to build bridges with Mexico. He floated the idea of reviving and expanding a Bracero-style guest worker program to allow Mexicans to work in the United States legally. He made that recommendation consistently, even after the terrorist attacks of 2001. But reacting to those same attacks also led Bush and Congress to tighten border security and ultimately abandon his plan.

In 2006, Bush signed the Secure Fence Act, authorizing 700 miles of double-layered, reinforced fencing. When he left office, he had completed more than 500 miles. Barack Obama continued the work, building 130 more miles of fencing. He also famously funded the Border Patrol and deported more people than any president before him.

Read More: Trump's Immigration Crackdown Seems Designed to Spread Fear

Although Donald Trump championed building his wall, his administration only built about 85 miles of new fences. Biden will now add 20 more.

Additional fencing will do what previous fencing has done: impose severe harmon the environment, on borderland communities, livestock, and most of all on the human beings hoping to cross who will be diverted into costlier and deadlier routes. Fences have transformed the borderlands into a racialized graveyard, but they have not and will not stop people from migrating if doing so is a matter of survival. In a future where climate crises and political unrest is certain, so too are continued waves of migration.

Fences cannot close the border because borders are never simply open or shut. And the costs of making them impenetrable are grave.

As it stands, fences are piecemeal and violent. And historically, Republicans have been less inclined to build them than Democrats. There are currently 700 miles of non-contiguous fences along the 1,951-mile border. A Republican built most of those, but we cannot ignore that Democrats have also built and supported their fair share, showing bipartisan commitment to this symbol of illusory control. Biden has not made an about-face, he is simply continuing an interminable trend of border-building policies and now, like many who came before him, he has fallen into the same, familiar, repetitive pattern.

Mary E. Mendoza is an assistant professor of history and Latino/a Studies at Penn State University and an environmental historian of the U.S.-Mexico borderlands. Made by History takes readers beyond the headlines with articles written and edited by professional historians. Learn more about Made by History at TIME here.

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The History of the U.S.-Mexico Border Wall | TIME - TIME

A flood of homeless migrants is pushing the states shelter system to its limit as Massachusetts officials plead for federal immigration reform.

Earlier this month, migrant families began arriving at hotels in New Bedfords suburbs, where the state is leasing rooms as overflow shelter space. Eight families are at the Seaport Inn in Fairhaven and 10 are in a hotel in Dartmouth.

Theyre among the 7,000 homeless families in Massachusetts emergency shelters. Many are seeking asylum from dangerous conditions in Haiti and Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America. They depend on the state for food and shelter because federal immigration law prevents them from legally working for months after they arrive in the U.S.

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Gov. Maura Healey has repeatedly asked the Biden administration to streamline the work authorization process so the migrants can support themselves. The states congressional delegation has made similar requests. But federal policy hasnt caught up to their demands.

Healey expects the states shelter system to reach its capacity of 7,500 families by the end of this month, she announced last week. At that point, she says, the state wont have the resources to guarantee shelter for every family, despite a 1983 right-to-shelter law that requires the state to shelter all homeless families with children and pregnant women.

Service providers have begun to help the sheltered migrants in Fairhaven and Dartmouth. They include Haitian families and Spanish speakers from Latin America, service providers said, but some have been living in the U.S. for years.

Its a whirlwind at the moment, said Pam Kuechler, executive director of People Acting in Community Endeavors, one of the organizations providing services to the migrants.

National Guard troops are staffing the Dartmouth and Fairhaven hotels to provide for the migrants day-to-day needs, including meals, access to medical care, and diapers and baby cribs. Healey deployed the National Guard to help at hotel shelters as demand there outpaced what local service providers could supply.

Staff from PACE are providing additional food at the hotels and helping migrants sign up for health insurance, Kuechler said.

The Immigrants Assistance Center, based in New Bedford, has offered to help the migrants with their immigration cases and is talking with the National Guard about how to do so, said Helena DaSilva Hughes, the centers president. The center hopes to help migrants with immigration court dates in other states to move their cases to Boston. Migrants who miss a court date risk deportation.

Fairhaven officials are working to enroll the newly arrived children in school, said Fairhaven Town Administrator Angie Lopes Ellison. She declined to say how many children there were for safety reasons. Dartmouth Town Administrator Shawn McInnes referred questions about the migrants to state housing officials. The state is providing school districts with $104 per day in emergency aid for each new students enrollment and transportation costs, a state spokesperson said.

Healey announced last week that her administration was stepping up efforts to transition families out of shelters. Those efforts include expanding re-housing and rental assistance programs for homeless families, as well as two new job training programs.

One program will allow businesses to provide job training to sheltered migrants who are still waiting for work authorization. The other new program connects businesses in need of workers with shelter residents who are ready and eligible to work.

Items can be dropped off at the Fairhaven Fire Department at 146 Washington St., Fairhaven.

Find more information on how to help families in crisis here.

DaSilva Hughes of the Immigrants Assistance Center was doubtful that the new programs would make much of a difference, since they dont address the underlying issue: the wait for work permits.

We can put people through trainings, but if they dont have the proper documents to get a job, employers are not going to hire you, she said.

Under federal law, migrants who file a claim for asylum in the U.S. arent eligible to apply for work permits until five months later. After that, application processing adds even more delays. In the meantime, the migrants depend on the state for food and shelter.

The bureaucratic hurdles are frustrating to DaSilva Hughes, who said the migrants want to work.

If you speed up the working permits, theyll be able to get a job and get out of the shelter, she said.

Since the federal government controls immigration policy, Massachusetts officials are pressuring the Biden administration for reform.

Healey sent a letter to U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas last month after a meeting with him. She asked for migrants to immediately receive provisional work authorizations when they apply for permits, rather than wait months for their applications to process. She also suggested logistical improvements to cut down on application processing times.

Since then, Healey has met with the White House chief of staff and welcomed a Homeland Security consultant team that visited shelters in Massachusetts.

The Massachusetts congressional delegation sent Mayorkas a letter in July asking for similar changes. They met with Mayorkas last week to discuss work authorizations and other requests.

U.S. Rep. Bill Keating, who represents the South Coast, South Shore, Cape, and Islands, told The Light in a statement that he shares the frustrations of other state and local leaders.

I strongly believe that those entering the U.S. should do so in a legal manner, Keating said, which is why it is so necessary to reform our countrys immigration system, so those seeking to provide a better life for their families and contribute to our country can come to the U.S. in a way that is both legal and efficient.

Healey and Keating say they also support President Joe Bidens recent request of $1.4 billion for migrant shelter services. The money is urgently needed for states like Massachusetts that are experiencing historic surges in migrant arrivals, Healey said in a statement.

But Congress hasnt passed the funding. Until Wednesday, the House of Representatives had been stalled for weeks without a speaker.

Healey has also asked the Massachusetts Legislature to pass $250 million in additional state funding for shelters.

MassHealth, the states Medicaid program, is seeking approval from the federal government to pay for up to six months of temporary housing for people on its health plans who are in the state shelter system. Many of the migrants in shelters have legal status that makes them eligible for MassHealth, and this would allow the state to use federal Medicaid funds for their housing.

DaSilva Hughes fears what will happen when the shelter system reaches capacity. She said she has never seen this many migrants in need. She said she hopes Healeys announcement will deter more migrants from coming to the state.

I hope the message is loud and clear: Yes, we have a right to shelter, but where are we going to put them? she said.

State Rep. Chris Markey, who represents Dartmouth, said he thinks the Healey administration is doing its best. Its important to welcome migrants who come seeking a better life, but the situation has become unsustainable, he said.

We cant become the place where everyone comes, he said. Its not affordable. Its not realistic.

Markey said it might be time to reevaluate the states right-to-shelter law. He reasoned that its better to give quality assistance to some than partial assistance to all.

State Rep. Bill Straus, who represents Fairhaven, and state Sen. Mark Montigny did not comment in response to requests from the Light.

Recent hate group activity in New Bedford has made service providers nervous about the migrants safety. But Lopes Ellison, the Fairhaven town administrator, said that the community has been overwhelmingly supportive and donations have been pouring in.

Im speechless at the level of volunteerism and humanitarian efforts that have come out of this process in helping the town, she said.

Email Grace Ferguson at gferguson@newbedfordlight.org

October 29, 2023October 29, 2023

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Migrant crisis stresses services in South Coast - The New Bedford Light

It must be fun for the person who reads and publishes some of these letters. They must laugh for most of the day. I get a kick out of them, some make me laugh others I disagree with, but people express their thoughts and opinions. Some start off with their military experience. "Well I served as the Bla bla bla." So what? I'm a veteran myself. What does that have to do with immigration? The most important thing is to get the facts right, this takes accurate research.

A lot of people just believe what a politician says or what they want to hear on propaganda TV stations. They hear for example "Biden is going to confiscate your gas stove?" How ridiculous! "inflation" was big for awhile now that it's coming down it's immigration and fear of another "Invasion." What happened to the caravans of millions of illegals in 2018 election cycle? The blue wave came and Republicans lost. No invasion.

Now they're at it once again for 2024. Local radicals in government can't get the job done on roads, lower taxes, out-of-sight insurance rates, and wasteful spending. BTW mine is being canceled because Farmers is no longer insuring in Florida!

These people like Finegan would rather focus on silly resolutions, woke policies, attacking library officials and things that don't affect your pocketbook. "Look there goes a squirrel" kinda thing. We know better than thatmost of us anyway.

There's no invasion coming to Citrus County, OK? It's more hype than fact. According to the FBI and law enforcement, the No. 1 threat is right wing extremism, not illegal aliens, and gun deaths, massacres on a daily basis , and all that's done by Republicans is to loosen gun laws. Immigration has been around for decades with Bush and Reagan giving "amnesty" to thousands of illegals. In 2013 we had a bipartisan gang of eight to fix immigration, and Republicans scrapped it. Trump said he was all for immigration reform in 2017, then after conferring with radicals in the Freedom Caucus pulled out. Instead we got this fabulous wall that Mexico was supposed to pay for. We got fraudsters like Steve Bannon that took money for a wall and bought a yacht with it.

The fact is, Republicans have never been serious on immigration, drug reforms or anything else.

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Letters editor must have fun | Letters to the Editor | chronicleonline.com - Citrus County Chronicle

President Joe Biden has proposed additional funding to address a flood of immigration issues, and Senator Shelley Moore Capito says the proposal still needs work.

The full, $106 billion package from the White House also would provide aid for American allies Ukraine and Israel. A significant element is $14 billion for immigration enforcement.

Right now, the proposal includes $4.4 billion for the Department of Homeland Security and $3.1 billion for additional Border Patrol agents, asylum officers and processing personnel. It also includes $1.4 billion to help state and local governments with shelter and services for migrants. And the request seeks $1.2 billion in additional funding to boost narcotics detection and interdiction at the border.

Capito said senators are likely to write their own version of the allocations, and her preference would be to bolster the border security provisions while reducing the proposals emphasis on additional resources to process the immigrants who cross into the country.

There has to be something significant on the border, Capito, a Republican, said in a briefing this week with West Virginia reporters.

Last month alone, over 269,000 people were apprehended at the southern border, the highest number ever. I mean, we keep saying this, this is the highest number ever. And it keeps getting higher and higher and the administration is not making the significant moves to try to deter people from coming into this country.

Capito elaborated on how she views the balance after being asked by reporter Charles Young of West Virginia News.

I will not vote for something that only at the border provides more processing agents so that people can come in quicker, get processed and come into the interior of the United States more, Capito said. I will not vote for something that just throws money at a problem that needs to be deterred and curtailed in the numbers.

So if its more healthcare, if its more transportation, if its more soft-sided tents to do the processing, no. We need significant immigration reform that I think we could get in here.

That means, Capito said, quicker and more meaningful asylum claims. In other words, lets turn people back as they enter rather than waiting seven or eight years if their asylum claim is not legitimate.

Number two, the remain in Mexico policy, Capito continued, and that is saying to someone who comes in You can have your asylum claim heard, but you have to wait in Mexico. Youre not going to wait eight years in the United States of America. That is a deterrent because people want into this country; thats their goal.

More barriers is another piece, Capito said.

At least, barriers do prevent and where people are coming in is where we dont have significant barrier, she said. That could be wall; that could be more virtual types of barrier.

Congresswoman Carol Miller, R-W.Va., also says increased border security is necessary although she seemed critical of particular aspects of the Biden proposal.

We need to have the right people securing our border, Miller said Thursday on MetroNews Talkline.

Ive talked since 2018 about building the wall. But I believe, lets put back remain in Mexico. Let them stay there. If we are giving asylum to people, lets make it asylum. Weve got so many people leaking through our border.

She continued, I dont want to bring the judges in and all those people like that who are just gonna say, Sure, you can come over, yeah your left foot hurts, sure you can come on in. We have to be very careful who were letting in. Enoughs enough.

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Capito says additional funding on immigration issues needs to focus ... - West Virginia MetroNews