Border security debate intensifies in Arizona

The murder of a prominent Arizona rancher has intensified an election-year debate about border security, with Republicans stepping up calls for National Guard deployments. Facing a tough primary contest, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) has been drawn into the fight, with his conservative opponent J.D. Hayworth accusing him of “28 years of inaction” on border security. Smack in the middle of it all is Napolitano, who in 2006, as governor of Arizona, persuaded President George W. Bush to send in the Guard to bolster border patrol forces fighting illegal immigration. Now she’s on the other side, the head of the agency in charge of Customs and Border Patrol and securing the nation’s borders. The administration, however, hasn’t yielded to the requests that came in a year ago from the governors of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas for a National Guard presence on the border. It maintains that security along the border has improved...more