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Another Caravan Is Scheduled to Arrive at the Border Just in Time for Trump’s State of the Union Address

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The second Central American caravan has been heading towards the United States-Mexico border for awhile. This new caravan was originally supposed to have roughly 2,000 people on it. According to Mexico, that number has multiplied and currently sits around 12,000. The caravan is expected to arrive at the border on Monday, in plenty of time for President Donald Trump’s Tuesday State of the Union address, Fox News reported. To intensify orders, the Pentagon recently announced an additional 3,750 troops were being deployed to the border.

This new caravan began on Jan. 15 in Honduras. Their final stopping point will be in Piedras Negras, Mexico, right along the Texas border, where Mexican officials have established shelters for the caravan riders. If the United States refuses to grant the riders asylum, some riders plan to cross into the United States illegally. . .

Jose Fraustro, the Secretary of Coahuila, said the caravan should have been kept along Mexico’s southern border instead of allowing the riders to trek an additional 1,300 miles. Now, the riders are facing health issues and long waits to get into the United States under an asylum claim. (Read more from “Another Caravan Is Scheduled to Arrive at the Border Just in Time for Trump’s State of the Union Address” HERE)

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Are Dems Starting to Break? Prominent Party Member Signals Chance for Border Wall Accord

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By The Blaze. House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) appeared to deviate from his Democratic colleagues on Sunday by saying he “would not rule out a wall in certain instances.”

“The notion that we can’t have barriers is just something that’s not true,” Thompson said on ABC’s “This Week.”

According to Thompson, Democrats are still willing to work with President Donald Trump.

“Mr. President, Democrats will work with you,” Thompson said. “But you can’t pick what Democrats you work with. We have picked our leaders, and you have to work with our leaders.” . . .

“What we have to do is sit down, work through this, and let the public know exactly what we’re talking about and what they can expect,” he said. “And we’re not there yet.” (Read more from “Are Dems Starting to Break? Prominent Party Member Signals Chance for Border Wall Accord” HERE)

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Top Homeland Security Dem Breaks With Party: ‘I Would Not Rule out a Wall in Certain Instances’

By Fox News. House Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., broke with some of his fellow congressional Democrats on Sunday by acknowledging in an interview that he “would not rule out a wall in certain instances,” although he cautioned that the White House needs a better “plan” than simply using a wall as a “talking point.”

However, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who preemptively rejected Trump’s proposed border wall compromise on Saturday as a “nonstarter,” has pledged not to fund the president’s border wall under any circumstances — and, Thompson suggested in an interview with ABC News’ “This Week,” Trump is stuck with her. . .

Pelosi said earlier this month that “a wall, in my view, is an immorality” and “the least effective way to protect the border and the most costly.”

That view has the support of the party’s progressive wing. In an interview last week, for example, Democratic Texas Rep. Veronica Escobar told CNN that “we know walls don’t work, that they don’t stop drugs, that they don’t stop migration.”

Escobar also suggested she was open to destroying existing walls, remarking that they are “really ugly” and “monuments to division.” (Read more from “Top Homeland Security Dem Breaks With Party: ‘I Would Not Rule out a Wall in Certain Instances'” HERE)

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How Much Does Trump’s Wall Actually Cost?

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The United States has reached the 27th day in the longest government shutdown in U.S. history. The sole purpose of the shutdown is to give more time to congressional Democrats and Republicans to come to a financial agreement so President Donald Trump can begin to build additional barriers at the border.

The U.S. border already has some barriers in place, but the government’s current battle is deciding on funding for extended barriers. These new barriers would be built in areas that are currently unfenced in the attempt to prevent further illegal immigration.

This biggest sticking point is not over whether or not Democrats agree with border security but rather that they are rejecting Trump’s demands for an additional $5.7 billion to “build that wall,” as he has so famously chanted since his 2016 campaign trail. . .

Homeland Subcommittee on Appropriations ranking member Sen. Jon Tester highlighted these changing demands in a speech on the Senate floor, urging Republicans to end the Shutdown.

“The president came in with his budget request last year … and asked for $1.6 billion dollars for a wall,” the Montana Democratic senator stated. He then explained that the subcommittee approved the $1.6 billion dollars for the wall, but the Republican-controlled Senate did not pass the bill. (Read more from “How Much Does Trump’s Wall Actually Cost?” HERE)

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House Majority Leader Breaks With Pelosi: ‘A Wall That Protects People Is Not Immoral’

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Border security is an issue where the Democratic Party is suffering from schizophrenia. They were for it before they were against it. Donald Trump winning the 2016 election caused that, despite some very prominent Democrats, like Barack Obama, supporting border barriers in times past. Now, the war cry is that “a wall is an immorality.” That is coming from Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Walls are immoral. So, what about illegal aliens who murdered American citizens? Apparently, that’s not a concern; dreams of amnesty and expanded Democratic voter rolls have clouded the liberal mind.

Yet, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer appeared to have broken ranks with Pelosi, saying that it’s not a question of morality, but rather functionality and practicality. Also, a wall isn’t immoral if it protects people. Hoyer made these remarks in an interview with Fox News’ Bret Baier last night (via RCP):

(Read more from “House Majority Leader Breaks With Pelosi: ‘A Wall That Protects People Is Not Immoral'” HERE)

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Pentagon: Another Round of Troops Will Head to the Border

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By Townhall. The Pentagon on Monday announced a mission to extend the length of time active duty troops remain on the Southern border. Troops will continue to assist border patrol with and provide security through Sept 30, Reuters reported. The decision was made based on a request from the Department of Homeland Security, the agency that over sees the border patrol.

New troops heading to the border “will include combat engineers to fortify border crossings and aviation units to help ferry Border Patrol agents,” USA Today reported.

“DOD is transitioning its support at the southwestern border from hardening ports of entry to mobile surveillance and detection, as well as concertina wire emplacement between ports of entry. DOD will continue to provide aviation support,” the Pentagon said in a statement Monday.

The current deployment was issued by former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and was set to expire Jan 30. The new order was approved by Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan. (Read more from “Pentagon: Another Round of Troops Will Head to the Border” HERE)

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Pentagon to Send More Active-Duty Troops to Southwest Border

By USA Today. The Pentagon will send a fresh deployment of active-duty troops to the southern border at the request of officials from the Department of Homeland Security.

Late Monday, the Pentagon also announced that deployments of active-duty troops would extend through September.

The new contingent of troops will include combat engineers to fortify border crossings and aviation units to help ferry Border Patrol agents, according to a Defense Department official who was not authorized to speak publicly.

The troops will also help with surveillance at the border, according to the Pentagon statement.

The new deployment has been anticipated since Homeland Security officials made the request to the Pentagon for additional resources late last month. There are about 2,350 active-duty troops and an additional 2,200 National Guardsmen at the border. (Read more from “Pentagon to Send More Active-Duty Troops to Southwest Border” HERE)

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There’s a National Emergency on the Border, but It’s Not What You Think

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During negotiations to end the government shutdown last week, President Trump said he might declare a national emergency over the southern border in order to bypass Congress and build his wall with defense funding. Trump repeated this threat on Sunday, then on Monday morning announced he would address the nation tonight regarding what he called “the Humanitarian and National Security crisis on our Southern Border.”

Do we really have a national emergency on the border, or is Trump just trying to leverage the language of crisis as part of his negotiations with Democrats? Yes and no. There is indeed a crisis on the border, but it’s not what you think.

The crisis is not, as Trump would have us believe, that record numbers of illegal immigrants are entering the country. In fact, the number of illegal immigrants apprehended on the southern border has been declining for nearly two decades, from a high of 1.6 million in 2000 to about a half-million last year. It’s true that the numbers are up relative to 2017, which saw a precipitous decline from 2016, but that increase has mostly consisted of record numbers of families and children coming from Central America seeking asylum.

As recent reports in the Washington Post and The New York Times explain, this surge of Central American families has overwhelmed border facilities that were designed to detain and process primarily single men. Sparse holding cells are now crowded with children, which has proven dangerous. Last month, two Guatemalan children died after being taken into U.S. custody.

So the surge in Central American families—and the administration’s refusal to manage it, opting instead for deterrence—is part of the crisis. But it could be mitigated by adopting different policies for admitting asylum-seekers at ports of entry, allocating more resources to process asylum claims, and hiring more immigration judges along the border, among other things. If they took the situation seriously, Democrats and Republicans might even be able to reach a compromise on all of this, including some funding for a border wall. (Read more from “There’s a National Emergency on the Border, but It’s Not What You Think” HERE)

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Mattis Explains Which Troops Will Be Staying at the Border and What They’ll Be Doing

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After officially signing the order to extend the deployment of active-duty troops on the U.S.-Mexico border, Secretary of Defense James Mattis explained what they will be doing to the end of January.

“So we get missions in and I accept certain missions because they’re appropriate for us,” Mattis told reporters while on a trip to Canada. “The — in Texas, basically the engineering tasks are complete. In Arizona, they’re pretty much complete. I’ll probably leave a few engineers in each place who would actually move — if we ever had to close the ports of entry; the commissioner of border patrol says close this as you saw it done once for six hours in California.” . . .

“So that will leave a modicum of engineers out there. You don’t need many to move the last Jersey barriers or barbed wire barricades into position,” he said. “There are some MPs who are still there. Those MPs, generally in Texas, Arizona, those places, are there as oversight of the U.S. army engineers or of the — where the helicopters are stationed just — they’re basically guards, that sort of thing. Side arms they don’t —they only carry rifles.”

Mattis pointed out those that will be sent home are not the National Guardsmen who were sent to the border beforehand since they are under different orders. (Read more from “Mattis Explains Which Troops Will Be Staying at the Border and What They’ll Be Doing” HERE)

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Men With ‘Ties To Terrorist Groups’ Just Apprehended By US – But It’s Where They Were Found…

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By Maegan Vasquez. A letter from a San Diego congressman to the Department of Homeland Security says that several dozen Pakistani and Afghan men have come into the United States through a Tijuana since September, and two of those men have ties to terrorist activity, the San Diego Reader first reported.

In a letter from Congressman Duncan Hunter (R-CA) to Defense Secretary Jeh Johnson, the two men in their 20’s were among those found during a recent increase of “military age” men “carrying U.S. cash” apprehended on the Tijuana-San Diego border. The letter says one individual had “associations with a known or suspected terrorist,” while the other was flagged for “derogatory information.”

The Reader reports:

“Until November, they would enter in groups and seek a federal agent to surrender to, according to union officials. It is believed that they did this because illegal entrants who are not Mexican citizens and who are deemed to not pose a significant threat are generally given a date to appear at immigration court and then released on their own recognizance.”

(Read more from “Men With ‘Ties to Terrorist Groups’ Just Apprehended By US – But It’s Where They Were Found…” HERE)

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‘Military Age Men’ at San Diego’s Southern Border

By Marty Graham. Among the several dozen Pakistani and Afghan men who have entered the U.S. illegally, coming into San Diego from Tijuana, two were found to have ties to terrorist groups, according to a letter sent by U.S. Rep. Duncan Hunter to the Department of Homeland Security.

Muhammad Azeem and Muktar Ahmad, both in their 20s, surrendered to U.S. Border Patrol agents in September, according to Immigration and Customs Enforcement. One was listed on the Terrorist Screening Database for “associations with a known or suspected terrorist. The other was a positive match for derogatory information in an alternative database,” according to Hunter’s letter.

Azeem and Ahmad are among dozens of men — described by Border Patrol agents as “military age and carrying U.S. cash” who began entering the U.S. through a Tijuana-based human-smuggling pipeline in September. (Read more from “‘Military Age Men”‘ at San Diego’s Southern Border” HERE)

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The Band of Brothers Who Voluntarily Patrol the US-Mexico Border

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Dressed in camouflage gear and wielding heavy machine guns, these men look like they are off to war.

But while the pictures appear to show this band of brothers patrolling a conflict zone, they are actually guarding the border between the US and Mexico.

The ‘watchmen’ of The Arizona Border Recon – led by the group’s chief ‘Nailer’ – protect the border near the Mexican town of Nogales, with three goals; stop illegal immigration, stop drug smuggling, and stop human trafficking . . .

They look like soldiers – and some of them are veterans – but many are or were private security experts, Mr Milano told Feature Shoot . . .

Mr Milano said: ‘To them this is most certainly an invasion. In some respects I believe the US/Mexico border is the nearest domestic geographic place where many of the vets can compare to their tours in Afghanistan or Iraq, or elsewhere, so in some way it is the easiest way to get back into “protecting the country” from what they believe is the most imminent threat and performing their civic duty.’ (Read more from “The Band of Brothers Who Voluntarily Patrol the US-Mexico Border” HERE)

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