Representative Bishop On Wilderness And The Border

This is an almost hour long video of floor statements of Rep. John Carter of Texas and Rep. Rob Bishop of Utah. Both are discussing border security, or the lack thereof.

For those of us from public lands states, Rep. Bishop's comments start at 17:57. His primary topic is wilderness and how it is keeping the Border Patrol from securing the border. Bishop points out that 40% of the land along our southern border is owned by the federal government and that 4.3 million acres of that has been designated as wilderness. For those of you who may not know, the Wilderness Act prohibits the use of motor vehicles and mechanized equipment in wilderness areas. Needless to say, that puts our Border Patrol at a great disadvantage when trying to combat the drug runners and human traffickers, which is why they are using wilderness areas to illegaly enter the U.S. Bishop does an admiral job laying this all out. His presentation ends at around 33 minutes, and the rest is a colloquy between him and Rep. Carter, also with some interesting info.

If you want to see a picture of a vehicle barrier fence put up by the US Fish & Wildlife Service to keep the Border Patrol out, go to 21:20.

If you want to find out about rape trees go to 36:30.

Thanks to both gentlemen for once again bringing these issues to the attention of the House and the public.

Below is the complete video presentation.