U.S.-Mexico border wall. Photo by Jeff Foote.
By Maureen Dowd, volunteer with the Sierra Club's Borderlands Program in Tucson
This month, our country and the rest of the world has smiled watching the warmth of the forward-thinking pope who has come into our lives. Whether or not Washington can implement living according to the Golden Rule, being protective of our Earth, or acting with courage to promote the good, all remains to be seen.
Certain things are "in the works" in Washington right now that are clearly not in keeping with Pope Francis's wisdom. From September 14-17, several members of the Sierra Club's Borderlands Team visited members of Congress to talk about the Club's position on proposed legislation that affects the environment, for better or worse.
Above, that's Sierra Club President Aaron Mair and U.S. Congressman Raul Grijalva of Arizona meeting with Borderlands Team members Julie Shipp, Maureen Dowd, Krista Schlyer, Catalina Ross, and Cyndi Tuell. Below, Dowd, Schlyer, and Tuell in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.
We asked for support for the Save Oak Flat Act and the Wilderness Act, full funding of the Land and Water Conservation Fund, and support for the Voting Rights Advancement Act. We asked for opposition to the "Offshore Production and Energizing National Security Act."
Above all, we stressed our opposition to S750/HR1412, the so-called Arizona Borderlands Preservation and Protection Act. In truth, if enacted, the proposal would do nothing to "protect" or "preserve" anything or anyone. In fact, it would take away protections and authorize environmental destruction.
The bill, introduced by Arizona senators John McCain and Jeff Flake, would free the Border Patrol from the inconvenience of all laws except the Constitution. Accordingly, it would leave the people, wildlife, and land stripped of protective laws, subjecting us to the whims of various agencies, as applied uniquely to our border with Mexico and all federal public lands up to 100 miles north of the border.
That includes the national parks, national forests, and tribal lands that encircle Tucson, where I live. These are lands I visit with pride when family and friends come to visit -- places I'd like to see stay as they are so that they can be enjoyed free of unreasonable interruption, surveillance, monitoring, vehicle noise, stops, and environmental destruction; places where I recreate, hike, camp, and inhale the peace, beauty and relaxation that these lands provide. How dramatically these lands enrich our lives!
Already as a result of waivers of law authorized by the Real ID Act of 2005, environmentally sensitive public lands that lie nearer the border have been torn up by thousands of miles of roads created by border wall construction equipment, Border Patrol vehicles, and activities related to militarization. Flooding caused by construction has destroyed rare plant life, and the border wall has cut off mating opportunities, as well as food and water sources for endangered species and other wildlife.
In addition to harming the land, people, and wildlife, the wall has been a costly demonstration of what happens when experts need not be consulted. Moreover, it is a flagrant failure in terms of its intended but unjustifiable purposes, frequently demonstrating its wastefulness and uselessness by falling down and being breached -- over, under, around, and through.
Every reason given for turning the borderlands into a police state is easily refutable by solid evidence, but the push goes on, not only from senators McCain and Flake, but by way of similar proposals from elsewhere, and one wonders: Why?
Why the big push and why only us? Why only the southern border?
National security? No, that won't work. Not a single "terrorist event" has been related to the Borderlands. All have involved planes, northern border crossings, and domestic terrorists, but the push goes on. Why the false fear-mongering?
Criminal activity along the border? No, that doesn't work either. Crime statistics here are lower than in cities to the north, yet this part of the country has been targeted for official invasion and promoted as a terrifyingly dangerous place. Why the false fear-mongering?
Drug trafficking? No, that doesn't work. Drugs are known to be entering the country at border checkpoints, not where the wall is in place. So that's not it.
Too many people entering illegally? No, that definitely won't work. Deportations are up; crossings are down. This is so for economic reasons. It is not attributable to current policy, which can be shown to have had no effect.
The bills in the House and Senate are not moving right now, but if history repeats itself, the push will be hidden in larger bills, sneaked in, or "bargained for," so we need to be vigilant.
But again, what is the real reason for the push? Is it profit by the powerful? Which powerful? The prison industry? The military complex? Favored contractors? All of the above? None of the above?
Is it prejudice and bigotry or people capitalizing on the same? Is it political pandering to the worst side of public consciousness? Is it sincerely held but baseless fears, a.k.a paranoia?
Should we just blindly trust that there are unknown but legitimate reasons? We've done that as a country in the past and wound up in a war based on false information.
To be sure, the push to allow unfettered destruction and militarization in the Borderlands stands in direct opposition to Pope Francis's urgings to listen to our better selves. He has called upon us to reject the philosophy of profit over people, to protect our precious planet, and to exercise compassion toward one another.
We know from experience that fear brings out the worst in us. False fear-mongering manipulates us; it lies to our souls, our spirits and our better selves.
We the people need to make a loud noise about this, and it needs to be a national voice, because our public lands -- national parks, forests, preserves, wetlands, designated wildernesses, etc. -- belong to all of us. Tribal lands within our nation belong to tribal nations. We need to make it clear that we will not allow public and tribal lands to be abused.
The message is simple: No walls; no waivers and exemptions; no sacrificing of this unique part of our country based on false fears and an absence of factual justification.
We cannot afford to be quiet. Dorothy Day and Thomas Merton weren't, and we shouldn't be.
Borderlands Team members on the steps of the Supreme Court.