Waiving Environmental Concerns Along the Border: Fence Construction and the Waiver Authority of the Real ID Act

Authors

  • Jennifer Echemendia University of Pittsburgh School of Law

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/pjephl.2009.16

Abstract

In 1994, the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (“INS”) instituted a border enforcement policy aimed at deterring illegal immigration along strategic points of the United States’ southern border by increasing the presence of border patrol agents and constructing physical barriers.

 

3 The INS anticipated that securing conventional routes of entry would force illegal immigrants to more remote and rugged sections of the border that would be more difficult to traverse.4 The ultimate success of the policy has been debated, but it did result in a substantial decrease of illegal entries in places like San Diego, California and El Paso, Texas.5 As anticipated, the number of attempted illegal entries also increased along more remote sections of the border, although it is unclear that the inhospitable terrain has deterred significant numbers of illegal immigrants from crossing the border.

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Published

2009-04-15