Illegal immigrants picked up after sneaking across the U.S.-Mexico border – and then released to await hearings – are reportedly getting onto commercial planes without any ID other than "a simple paper document that anyone can easily alter or reproduce."
An outraged local spokesman for the National Border Patrol Council, Hector Garza, told
Breitbart News the security threat from the lax policy "is absolutely unacceptable."
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"The aliens who are getting released on their own recognizance are being allowed to board and travel commercial airliners by simply showing their Notice to Appear [hearing] forms," he told Breitbart in an interview posted Friday.
"We do not know who these people are. We often have to solely rely on who they say they are, where they say they came from, and the history they say they have.
"We know nothing about most of them. [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] releases them into the American public, and now they are boarding aircraft at will with a simple paper document that anyone can easily alter or reproduce themselves."
Allowing them unrestricted travel access "just adds insult to injury," he said.
"Not only are we releasing unknown illegal aliens onto American streets, but we are allowing them to travel commercially using paperwork that could easily be reproduced or manipulated on any home computer," he charged.
Garza warned the practice has wider implications.
"The threat this poses from terrorists upon the American people is absolutely unacceptable," he said.
"Central Americans are not the only people crossing our border and being released. Does anyone actually think that cartels and other criminal or possible terrorist organizations are not taking advantage of the fact that we are having to leave our border wide open while we reassign the majority of our agents to process family units and minors? Of course this situation is being exploited by such threats."
The national Border Patrol Council released a statement warning the practice will worsen problems triggered by the recent influx of illegal immigrants, including
some 52,000 unaccompanied children since last October.
"The National Border Patrol Council adamantly opposes the decision of [the Department of Homeland Security] to release the illegal aliens who have been transported from the Rio Grande Valley Border Patrol Sector to other locations for processing," the group stated.
"The lack of consequences has furthered this crisis and will only continue to do so. The fact that TSA is accepting the [Notice to Appear] as a form of identification and allowing illegal aliens to travel commercially shows just how little regard the federal government has for its own immigration laws."
The Transportation Security Administration didn't immediately comment to Breitbart about the report.
The revelations came just three days after President Barack Obama asked Congress for an emergency
$3.7 billion to contain the surge of illegal immigrants, most from Central America, crossing into the United States from Mexico.
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