The Nation By Matthew Longo 4/18/2019
Border dwellers in the US and Mexico are subject to two authorities. It’s only fair to give them the cross-border rights and permissions to match.In American politics, the problem of the border is simple: You’re either for the wall, or you’re against it. For proponents, the wall guarantees security. For opponents, it is costly and ineffective.
What the debate doesn’t have is an alternative. Progressives fail to answer the simple question: if not a wall, then what?
In many ways, the answer is staring us in the face. While toxic, exclusionary rhetoric about bordering fills the airwaves, the situation is very different on the ground. Every day new forms of cross-border accommodation are being forged. Across government agencies (DHS, CBP, Border Patrol) a new way of thinking has taken hold: Instead of walling, to make the border safe, we need a strategy that is collaborative and binational–one that works with our partners in Mexico rather than against them.
This co-bordering approach was first formalized in Border Patrol’s 2012–16 National Strategy, which institutionalized collaboration with Mexico and Canada, and has taken hold ever since, transforming the border into an expanded, binational security zone. As one border official explained to me in an interview, the goal is to create a unified border zone “where we could cross and patrol together.… It would be a dual-sovereign zone, almost like a eurozone.†This new attitude doesn’t downplay the threat at the border; rather, it takes it seriously. Today, states simply cannot, and indeed, do not, secure their borders on their own.
More:
https://www.thenation.com/article/border-citizenship-mexico-us-deportation/
