Senator Eliot Shapleigh - El Paso, Texas

Cameron County Judge Carlos Cascos is one of the few border leaders to defend Gov. Rick Perry's decision to deploy the Texas Rangers on the border.

BROWNSVILLE, Sept. 21 - The American Civil Liberties Union of Texas wants to know a lot more about Gov. Rick Perry’s decision to send Department of Public Safety "Ranger Recon" teams to the border.

The ACLU announced Monday it had filed open records requests with both the Governor’s office and DPS seeking documents related to Perry’s directive. The move follows a letter sent to Perry by the Texas Border Coalition voicing concerns over his latest border security initiative.

Rebecca Bernhardt, policy director for the ACLU of Texas, said her group fears Perry’s move will expose border residents to the operations of yet another law enforcement entity lacking sufficient coordination or oversight.

“We understand there is a high level of nervousness surrounding the violence in Mexico,” Bernhardt said. “With scores of local, state and federal law enforcement agencies already operating on the border, there is an increasing risk that border residents could be injured or worse by efforts made in the name of public safety.”

Bernhardt said the ACLU is also concerned Perry’s move will place an additional burden on already stretched state law enforcement resources. She pointed out that the state’s own audit – released last month – found that a similar move to reassign DPS personnel to the border jeopardized safety in the rest of the state.

“At a time when budgets and resources are strained, smart security measures that consider the safety of all Texans are of the utmost importance,” Bernhardt said.

Bernhardt said that while the security situation in Mexico is very serious, there is little evidence that sporadic cartel-related violence on the Texas side of the border is any more common than it was before the situation in Mexico worsened, when such incidents received less attention.

However, the Guardian's El Paso columnist, Mike Seifert, voiced concerns about the spillover into El Paso of drug cartel violence from Ciudad Juárez. Click here to read Seifert's Noticias de El Paso column. Faculty at the University of Texas at El Paso are currently staging a forum on the U.S. War on Drugs.

Last week, the Texas Border Coalition (TBC), which represents border cities and counties from El Paso to Brownsville, wrote to Perry to voice concerns about his latest plan to expand Operation Border Star.

The move followed a stinging rebuke from Brownsville Mayor and TBC executive committee member Pat Ahumada over Perry’s actions.

“While each of our communities has their own unique issues, being overwhelmed by criminal elements from Mexico is not one of them,” said Chad Foster, chair of the TBC and mayor of Eagle Pass.

“If you are devoting additional law enforcement personnel to our region, we would appreciate you and your staff taking the time to make sure that our efforts to secure the border are complimentary and coordinated.”

Foster noted news accounts of Perry’s initiative, in particular citing the Governor’s remarks that Texas Rangers and National Guardsmen will be “deployed to high-traffic, high crime areas along the border.”

Foster said that as county and municipal officials on the border, TBC members “strongly suggest” improved coordination with local border officials. “Your remarks, if accurately reported, create a public impression of lawless hordes overrunning the border region and do not reflect our collective experience,” Foster said.

Perry made his announcement about Texas Rangers and National Guardsmen being deployed on the border at a news conference in Houston the week before last. Critics questioned why the announcement was made there and not on the border itself.

Perry said a “Ranger Recon” Team effort comprised Texas Rangers and Texas National Guard counter drug forces, with support from the Operation Border Star Unified Command, including Texas sheriffs, Highway Patrol strike teams and Department of Public Safety aviation resources.

He said the Ranger Recon Teams were launched in early August to address increased burglaries of rural homes, ranches and hunting camps in remote areas along the Texas-Mexico border. In order to maintain operational security, the specific number, composition and location of the Ranger Recon Teams will not be disclosed, he said.

“Texas’ proven border security strategy is based on putting boots on the ground and equipping those personnel with the technology, training and funding they need to stem the flow of contraband across our border. Deploying Ranger Recon Teams to high-traffic, high-crime areas along the border will enhance our efforts,” Perry said.

“This is the latest in a series of aggressive actions we’ve taken to fill the gap left by the federal government’s ongoing failure to adequately secure our international border.”

Perry said that with nearly 73 percent of Texas’ 1,254 mile border privately owned, landowners along the boundary sometimes face extortion or threats from violent criminal organizations that smuggle drugs, people and weapons across the border.

Perry said the Ranger Recon Teams will identify high-intensity smuggling routes in remote areas, and conduct operations to reduce border-related crime in these corridors. These activities are also an essential element of a proactive strategy to deter spillover violence, he said.

Perry said increased violence in northern Mexico poses a significant threat to Texas communities, pointing out that more than 5,700 homicides occurred in Mexico in 2008, with roughly 1,600 in Juárez alone. Already in 2009, Juárez has seen more than 1,500 brutal homicides, he said.

Ahumada was quick to challenge Perry’s assertions. In an e-mail sent to TBC members and the media the day after Perry’s announcement, Ahumada slammed the new security initiative.

“This is not what we need for security. This is an extremist and alarmist reaction to incidents that are happening in Mexico and that are being handled by the Mexican government,” Ahumada said.

Ahumada predicted commerce with Mexico would be affected by the “lawless perception” being created “for political gain by Governor Rick Perry.”

Ahumada pointed out that El Paso has been designated as one of the safest cities in America.

“It is unfortunate that this Governor is determined to bring troops to the Southwest border,” Ahumada said. Such actions compound the “negative perception the national media has been eager to create because of isolated incidents in Mexico,” he said.

Ahumada’s criticism led to a story about the Perry initiative in the Wall Street Journal on Monday.

In his Sept. 16 letter, Foster said crime on the Texas border is on the way down after decreasing 65 percent over the past several years. He noted that apprehensions of illegal border crossers are down more than 40 percent. In just this year, Foster said, El Paso, the third safest city in the U.S., has seen apprehensions decline by 60 percent.

A number of newspapers across the state have questioned the motive for Perry bringing the Texas Rangers to the border. They have suggested it has more to do with gubernatorial politics than any real security threat.

In a guest column in the Guardian last week, Josemaria Vasquez, commander of America’s Last Patrol in the Rio Grande Valley and a member of the Juan “Chuy” Hinojosa chapter of the American GI Forum, blasted Perry. Vasquez said the announcement brought memories flooding back of the savage violence the Texas Rangers metered out on Mexican Americans living along the border during the 20th Century.

“Known by Mexicans as Los Rinches de Tejas – these foul-mouthed lawmen too often took the law into their own hands and lynched Mexicans simply because they were there and because they were defenseless,” Vasquez said.

One of the few border leaders to defend Perry's actions has been Cameron County Judge Carlos H. Cascos. He told the Brownsville Herald that it was just a matter of time before the violence that has been occurring in places like Laredo and El Paso would spread to South Texas.

“The governor’s office may have intelligence about violence that we might not be aware of. If we knew all the state’s Department of Homeland Security knew, we would probably be doing the same thing,” Cascos said.