"President Bush’s proposal to send military forces to the border is bad military policy and even worse border security policy.

"We do not need to militarize our borders. Our brave soldiers are not trained, prepared, or equipped to carry out border patrol functions.  We’ve already seen what happens when we ask our young men and women to do a tough job for which they are not trained.  None of us wants to see another Abu Ghraib, this time on the Rio Grande.

"Dispatching troops to patrol the border is bad policy because the U.S. military is already overused and under-equipped. It’s not just my opinion.  It’s also the assessment of General Richard Myers, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, who stated in a recently leaked classified report that the President has already overextended U.S. forces in the Middle East.  The National Guard, which would undoubtedly be charged with handling a large part of the new border security portfolio, is stretched thin as well.  Not only is the Guard extended to the breaking point, but Guard units deployed to Iraq have consistently reported shortages of equipment and lack of proper training.  Many National Guard units here at home suffer the same fate.

"Our military forces are overextended worldwide.  We have too small an army and cannot continue to depend on part-time citizen soldiers to fill the ever-widening gap between overseas and domestic obligations.  The President’s decision to use our military men and women as temporary border control agents sets another terrible precedent for the misuse of the military.

"I have other concerns. The National Guard is not trained to undertake a law enforcement mission. Certainly the extra cost of training the Guard to carry out a new mission will be sizeable, not to mention the added costs of deploying units along our southwest border.  I am also concerned about the legal precedent of using the military for law enforcement and the potential diminution of the National Guard’s more traditional function of backstopping our first responders, particularly during natural disasters.

"The bottom line is that the President must fix our nation’s current deficit in border security by increasing funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) as well as other law enforcement and government agencies involved in securing our nation’s borders. To date, the President and the Republican controlled Congress have broken promises made on additional funding for border patrol agents, immigration enforcement agents, and detention beds.  Most ironically, the President’s speech to America tonight comes on the heels of the Republican’s $70 billion tax cut package for the wealthy.  How many border agents could be trained and deployed and new detention centers built with an additional $70 billion?

"Enhanced border control is only one part of the solution to fixing our nation’s broken immigration system. We must also implement immigration reform that realistically addresses the fate of roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants who currently reside in the U.S., provide for those who qualify a path to legal residency status and eventual citizenship, and write into law enforceable and substantive penalties for employers that hire undocumented workers."