Obama to Request Additional Funding for Border Security

Pres. Barack Obama is expected to ask Congress for an additional $27 billion for border and transportation security along the Southwestern border. The move would help fulfill a promise to the Mexican government to stop the flow of guns across the border and will also likely set the stage for immigration reform and Amnesty by putting the focus on border security first.

The spending represents an 8% increase from the 2009 budget and will provide funding for the hiring of more agents, enhanced security at air and seaports, expanded screening for illegal immigrants in jail and improvements to web-based workplace verification.

The President stated during his prime-time press conference last week that the government couldn’t begin reforming the current immigration system without assuring the American people that the current laws can be enforced.
 

If the American people don’t feel like you can secure the borders then it’s hard to strike a deal that would get people out of the shadows and on a pathway to citizenship who are already here, because the attitude of the average American is going to be, ‘Well, you’re just going to have hundreds of thousands of more coming in each year.’

The 2010 budget would increase funding for the Department of Homeland Security to $47 billion. It would add more than 100 more Border Patrol Agents and Customs and Border Protection officers along the Mexican border.

For more on this story, see the Los Angeles Times.