President Obama's $500 million request for border protection and law enforcement activities has some U.S. lawmakers and state officials along the border screaming, "Show me the money!"
Obama is expected to send a proposal to Congress next week that calls for sending as many as 1,200 National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border and for $500 million to fund programs for Drug Enforcement Administration, Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms, the FBI and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
The Arizona attorney general, Terry Goddard, has set up a 10-person team to prosecute crimes that occur related to the border. The state already has $94 million dedicated but expects the Feds to chip in some of that $500 million in supplemental spending for it because border-related crime is a federal issue.
"I believe that's an important commitment of national attention to the real problem we're facing in Arizona and throughout the Southwest, and that is the violent crime fomented by criminal drug cartels," Goddard said at a news conference this week.
At a White House news conference Thursday, Obama touted his request for additional resources, saying, "if we are doing a better job dealing with trafficking along the border, we've also got to make sure that we've got prosecutors down there who can prosecute those cases."
One Republican congressman wants Obama to request $2 billion and send 25,000 additional troops.
"The president's proposal is about 24,000 men short of what's needed," Rep. John Carter, R-Texas, said in a written statement, adding that 1,200 troops will do nothing but provide the administration with a photo op.
"President Wilson sent 100,000 National Guard in 1916 when violence spilled across our southern border under his watch, and got the situation back under control," Carter said. "Twenty five thousand is a good number to start with now, but to suggest just 1,200 show a very disingenuous position on securing our border against armed drug gangs shooting our border patrol officers and now even American civilians on their own property."
Arizona's sweeping new immigration law, which requires police to question anyone stopped on other matters whom they suspect of being in the country illegally, has made the topic a national campaign issue. Obama was pushed to take action Tuesday after Republicans threatened to force a congressional vote on sending troops to the border.
On Thursday Senate Republicans were denied a chance to beef up enforcement and security measures at the U.S. border with Mexico, with one senior Senate Democrat telling them, "We cannot just throw money at this problem."
Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., who is leading Senate Democratic efforts to craft a comprehensive immigration reform bill, albeit with no GOP support at this time, called the GOP measures "a grab bag of enormous spending."
Obama, meanwhile endorsed a comprehensive approach on Thursday, telling reporters that in a closed-door meeting with Republicans the previous day, he promised, "I don't even need you to meet me half way, meet me a quarter of the way. I'll bring a majority of Democrats."
But Senate Democrats are not expected to consider a bill this year, if GOP support is not forthcoming.
The amendments offered Thursday to an emergency spending bill by border state Republicans, including Arizona Sens. John McCain and Jon Kyl, and Texas Sens. John Cornyn and Kay Bailey Hutchison, would have added significant muscle at the border. One, trumpeted by McCain, would have sent 6,000 National Guardsmen to the border.
McCain noted that Obama's deployment of guardsmen is only a fifth of what's really needed, saying, "The borders are broken. There has been improvement. We have shown in San Diego, in Texas, even in the Yuma sector of Arizona, we can secure our border, but we need manpower, surveillance and fences. And we can do it," McCain said, "We have an obligation to our citizens to secure our border and allow them to lead lives where they not live in fear of home invasions, property being destroyed, and well-armed, well-equipped drug smugglers as well as human smugglers operate with, if not impunity, certainly great latitude."
"It is in fact the federal government's responsibility to deal with this as the president himself has acknowledged in his recent announcement to send 1,200 additional National Guard to the border. I will tell you that it is a welcome gesture, but it is no more than that a gesture," Cornyn said.
Schumer decried the GOP amendments, which failed to get the necessary 60 votes for passage, as "overmagnified," and "the worst kind of robbing Peter to pay Paul" to use the stimulus funds to pay for border protection, funds that Schumer said are intending to create jobs.
Fox News' Trish Turner and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
