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2005S1274-1  05/18/05


By:  Hinojosa, et al.                                             S.R. No. 970



SENATE RESOLUTION
	WHEREAS, The Minuteman Project is a group of volunteer 
civilians who have set up a patrol to monitor a portion of the 
United States border with Mexico for illegal immigration; during 
April, 2005, a few hundred volunteers conducted 24-hour patrols 
of a portion of the Arizona border; and
	WHEREAS, The Minuteman Project plans to begin patrols 
along the Rio Grande in South Texas starting in October, 2005, 
despite the expressed reservations of both United States and 
Texas government officials and agencies and various 
representatives from Texas border communities; and
	WHEREAS, Border communities in Texas rely heavily on 
tourism and commerce and the free flow of legal cross-border 
traffic to help support their economies; Minuteman patrols could 
impede the traffic and negatively affect both tourism and trade 
along the border; and
	WHEREAS, While the Arizona patrols took place along a 
stretch of the border that consists of open, mostly uninhabited 
desert land, much of the area along the South Texas border is 
privately owned and some of it is urbanized; an earlier effort to 
stop illegal immigration on private South Texas ranches in 2003 
led to an assault charge against the landowner's representative 
and a civil lawsuit and settlement; and
	WHEREAS, During the Minuteman patrols in Arizona in April, 
United States Border patrol officials said their job was 
complicated when some of the patrol members set off motion 
detectors that had been installed to detect illegal immigration; 
members of law enforcement have said that their jobs, already 
dangerous because of illegal immigration and drug trafficking, 
are made more difficult and dangerous by civilian patrols; and
	WHEREAS, President George W. Bush has stated his 
opposition to the Minuteman civilian patrols, saying "I'm 
against vigilantes in the United States of America, I'm for 
enforcing the law in a rational way"; Commissioner Robert C. 
Bonner of the United States Customs and Border Protection agency 
stated that the United States Border Patrol is best qualified and 
trained to handle border control issues and that civilian patrols 
could cause not only illegal migrants but also American citizens 
to be harmed; now, therefore, be it
	RESOLVED, That the Senate of the State of Texas, 79th 
Legislature, hereby urge Governor Rick Perry to oppose the plans 
of the Minuteman Project to come to Texas and to ask Minuteman 
Project representatives not to begin patrols of the Texas border 
with Mexico; and, be it further
	RESOLVED, That the secretary of the senate forward a copy 
of this Resolution to the Governor of the State of Texas.