Click2Houston.com - Senator: Southern Border Top Priority

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Click2Houston.com - Senator: Southern Border Top Priority

By Robert Arnold

Texas Sen. John Cornyn urged President Barack Obama's administration to make securing our Southern border a top priority. Local 2 investigative reporter Robert Arnold spoke with Cornyn who also extended an invitation to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to visit Texas to see the problems first-hand.

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# READ IT: Reporter's Blog: Letter
WATCH IT: Senator Urges President To Secure Border

Shootings, murders and kidnappings -- violence in Mexico has claimed thousands of lives.

"The drug cartels are fighting it out for supremacy in Mexico," said Cornyn. "It's destabilizing this neighboring country, one of our major trading partners."

Cornyn told Local 2 he is asking for more federal resources to help both Mexico fight the cartels and to shore up our southern border.

"Certainly that work is not completed yet, we need to continue to staff up," said Cornyn, who added he would not be opposed to sending troops to the border if the violence escalates.

Texas border sheriffs have long maintained the violence has already spilled into Texas.

"There's spill over, there's spill over every day," said Hudspeth County Sheriff, Arvin West.

West and other sheriffs said the violence has intensified since thousands of Mexican troops and federal police officers were sent to border towns like Juarez, just across from El Paso. West has long been a critic of our government not responding to this problem faster.

"I guarantee the first time they have to deal with some of this stuff they'll stick their tail between their legs and they will beat cheeks right straight to Washington, D.C. and get behind their condominium doors up there and lock their doors and have 911 on speed dial," said West.

Local 2 has learned the federal government is sending more investigative resources to the border to help crack down on the flow of drugs coming into our country and to stop the river of guns and ammunition flowing into Mexico.

Last month Local 2 reported the drug cartels and gangs are arming themselves with weapons bought in the United States.

"The Houston area is the No. 1 area for guns going to Mexico," said J. Dewey Webb, special agent in charge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Houston Division.

Today, there was positive news in Mexico's battle with the drug lords. Mexican authorities arrested Vicente Zambada, one of the Sinaloa cartels top ranking chiefs and the son of one of the leaders of the cartel.

Despite the additional federal resources, officials with Gov. Rick Perry's office told Local 2 no decision has been made yet on his request to send 1,000 National Guard troops to the border along with six military observation helicopters.

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