History Repeats Itself by Laurel Davila

I'm not one much given for knee-jerking with the mainstream media. They would have me giving attention to this, or that issue, blowing attention way out of proportion with the truth of any given situation. It is unfortunate that we have to scrutinize the news sources for their credibility these days, since most sensationalize quite a bit for their corporate sponsors.

The latest blow up in the corporate news media is about the influx of refugee children coming into the United States through the Mexican border.

The governmental website for the Border Patrol has a plethora of information regarding illegal immigration. There I found the below excerpt which I am passing along to you in hopes that we can all take a deep breath, and know that we have successfully dealt with this problem before, and we can surely deal with it again. The Republicans in Congress must appropriate the necessary funds for the Border Patrol; and then the Administration (President) may take care of the problem, just like we have done so in the past.

Here is the excerpt:

"As illegal immigration continued along the Mexican border, sixty-two Canadian border units were transferred south for a large-scale repatriation effort. In 1952, the government airlifted 52,000 illegal immigrants back to the Mexican interior. The program was terminated after it ran out of funds during its first year. The Mexican government offered train rides into the Mexican interior for nationals being returned from the San Antonio and Los Angeles districts, but this program was halted after only five months. Throughout the early 1950s, a special taskforce of 800 Border Patrol agents was assigned by the United States Attorney General to round up and ship home thousands of illegal immigrants in southern California. The task force moved to the lower Rio Grande valley, then to Chicago and other interior cities. The Border Patrol began expelling adult Mexican males by boatlift from Port Isabel, Texas, to Vera Cruz in September 1954. The project was discontinued two years later after nearly 50,000 illegal aliens had been returned home. Various other flights, train trips, and bus trips originated along the border and terminated in the Mexican interior. In spite of the major successes in repatriation, many deportees simply turned around and recrossed the seriously undermanned border. Repatriation programs proved extremely expensive and were phased out primarily because of cost.
Significant numbers of illegal aliens began entering the U.S. on private aircraft in the late 1950s. In cooperation with other federal services, the Border Patrol began tracking suspect flights. During the Cuban missile crisis of the early 1960s, Cuban defectors living in Florida flew aircraft out over the ocean in an effort to harass their former homeland. The American government made this harassment illegal, and assigned the Border Patrol to prevent unauthorized flights. The Patrol added 155 officers, but discharged 122 of them when the crisis ended in 1963." 

http://www.cbp.gov/border-security/along-us-borders/history

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