President trumps wall initiative. Want to get your thoughts on that initiative. Guest weve always been pretty straightforward, even back to president bush that the wall by itself is not going to work. They come over and around it, under it, through it. So the idea that we can carry with just that is just a mistake. Host do you think guest its just how do we get there. Host do you think the cure involves that and other things who are you opposed to a wall at all traffic im not opposed to it wall at all. There are places where it will work and has worked in the big cities, out in the open expanses. I have a section of the wall in my office of las cruces where people are near the side cutting it down after 5 oclock. We are putting it up and they were cutting it down. In places and replace it with papiermache and so you just have to understand the wide open expanses theyre going to require technology to stop groups moving here and just someone to meet them and say this is not the way you come to the country. Host lets get into some of that technology. What would you recommend to the president . Guest again, we had the ability to see from unmanned aerial vehicles, whatever. 1. That Congress Paid for very expensive towers and Computers Aided devices to spot. That money got squandered by the Border Patrol, but there is technology available. We use it all over the world. So lets start using it to just secure the southern border, the northern border of the us. Host the present is proposing putting hundreds of millions of dollars towards the Border Patrol for a new hiring initiative. How do you ensure that that money isnt squandered . Guest again, i think before we spend more money on more people we need to change the culture inside the agency. Watch as president bush increase, he doubled the size of Border Patrol. He didnt change the inside coulter saying that we need to secure the border. I think President Trump has been much more willing to enforce the law. Thats all we need to do. And so just today i think the announcement came out that Border Crossings have dropped tremendously precipitously. Host you think that stems from the message that hes sending, that deterrence message we talked about . Guest sure. Where going to enforce the law and when president bush was in office, governor richardson and new mexico, but the National Guard down the southern border, no guns but just the presence of an additional force. The local ranchers were telling me they have lived their entire life at a never seen the Border Crossing that low. They dropped to almost nothing. So its a combination of yes we need in places of walking someplace we need technology in most places we just need a different culture inside the agency. If we do need more people then we look at it. Which is to jump the number of people without changing the culture is going to result in the same thing we got under president bush and that is no additional secured at the border at all. Host if you want to talk to congressman steve pearce of new mexico, republican, he is here with us for about the next 25 minutes, democrats 2027488000. Republicans 2027488001. Independents 2027488002. I want to ask you about how mexican elected officials feel about the wall proposal to you recently minted u. S. Mexico Interparliamentary Group and have had some of the discussions i assume . Guest yes. The Mexican Government has been very honest with president bush that they feel like that its not the best solution. But again i dont think that our present needs fitness or listen to them about the solutions for our border. Mexico is somewhat more interested in securing their southern border than the northern border. I think the president is simply say look, weve got to Work Together on this. I think that right now the entire world is wondering exactly where mr. Trump stands on lots of things. Hes definitely shaking things up. Thats what americans elected him to do, in my opinion. So we will see, but around the world were beginning to see the us respected more. I dont know exactly where the conversation will go but mexico has a lot of trade with new mexico. They are our friend pick sometimes your friends have to be told look, were going to operate just a bit differently. Host lets see where the conversation is with our viewers. Utah is up first. Sean, republican. Good morning. Caller yes. I had a comment about building the wall. One thing about the wall is that its a permanent structure, and regardless what president or who is in power, least the wall will be there. So if you get another president that does catch and release, at least with something thats a kind of permanent structure to kind of slowdown, slow down the people crossing the border. And then the other comment that they had was about the automation, that it took a lot of jobs. Automation also creates a lot of jobs. You have the people that work at all the automatic equipment and keep it running, so its a real high skilled jobs that high skill also creates. We might lose some labor jobs but it also creates some more highly skilled, better paying jobs as well. So we dont just lose jobs automation. It also creates some jobs. Guest to your point about the wall, regardless of presidency, even right now the cartels are digging to lane tunnels under the wall. They are sending ultralights over the wall, its about a two minute flight. They would just launch them. Theyre not even manned. They come across the wall. A remote trigger that drops the drug package, comes back and lands etc. Constantly back and forth. They got vehicles come to 10 vehicles that run up the wall. They have a hydraulic ramp that extends over the walls. They create a bridge in five to 10 seconds and then the vehicle simply coming up and over. So i understand the attraction of the permanent wall but Henry Cuellar kept saying we dont need to deceive ourselves. We need to be very transparent and honest even with their own discussions about what were going to accomplish and how much its going to cost. So as long as we as a congress commit to paying for building a wall, thats one thing, but then we need to assess that it will be defeated fairly easily in some areas and thats generally the wideopen remote areas like my district. Host linda, arizona, line for independents, good morning. Caller good morning, congressman. Thank you for being here on the subject. I am a 40 mins away from the border, 500 Border Patrol are authorized to be stationed at this Border Patrol station we see them in a vehicles daily in this area. I have a high interest in understanding one thing from you and that is you say that in order to improve the problems of people coming over without permission, that the culture within the Border Patrol has to change. Two weeks ago i interviewed for people had been deported, three of them got in through the they said the indians were there to meet them. Indians helped get them up in the nation and over to tucson and that they were treated with royalty. So that also would be tied to my question, how could it be stopped through the nation . Guest one of the cultural changes that has been needed, and again im not talking about the people on the border, the Border Patrol agents themselves up always been dedicated. I have sat in the middle of the night with a night vision goggles watching people crossing. Its the upper layers. And so just President Trump signing an executive order that for the first time will allow Border Control agents to pursue into federal territory, even in wilderness study areas, even in federal, in the case of the reservations, anything that have not had access to before, which is quite a large swath, the National Monument on the arizona southern border was just wideopen way to cross to because Border Patrol agents were not allowed to go into that area. So he is changed that one piece. The second was agents were told to catch and release. Thats another cultural thing that was not in keeping with the law. It was just a practice that was generated from very high levels of Border Patrol, so thats the cultural shift that im saying were going to have to have. We are beginning to see that right now. Host idaho, robert, republican. Good morning. Caller good morning. My name is robert and i am, was a county commissioner in 2005. We have 44 counties in idaho. We have about 1,500,000 people, yet i was able to calculate that mexico owed the county 2 million for the indigent medical welfare cost of their illegal aliens. Secondly, representative cuellar mention of Border Patrol, not being able to hire anyone. How could a higher in what if they were looking to be prosecuted . And thirdly, i still would like to know how 60,000 kids were able to travel all the way from south america and arrived in idaho without ever having any difficulties at the border . Guest the three points, the indigent care, absolutely, is a very high cost to our counties, to the system. Secondly, on the hiring of Border Patrol agents, for some reason they had a policy that they dont hire locally. They cant get agents you really want to come live in Southern New Mexico on the border. Its a very remote. You would have to have grown up there, but they dont allow the Border Patrol to our people and keep them there. So we discussed the hiring practices with Border Patrol, something obviously should be looked at. On the task force that the speaker of the house created to look at these kids who are coming all the way north. That looked like a pipeline that was wellestablished. It appeared that the president at the time president obama was encouragement was drawing people into the system, not sure how much it was facilitated with funds but it was a well oiled machinery that brought those people north. And then once they got here, they just sort of turned themselves in with a wink and a nod and then the system then place them very expensive, 750 a day is what the taxpayers were paying for each one of those kids each one of the beds for them. Again, its what the president was saying we do have money to take care of our own country. Why dont we slow this process down, secure the border and will take a look at it, be fair but weve got to slow the process down and see where we are. I think thats whats going on right now. Host you mentioned your portfolio on capitol hill. Want to talk about your Committee Work specifically on a newly formed committee, the Financial Services subcommittee on terrorism and illicit finance chairman. What is that committee charged with doing . Guest basically look at how the list of financing affects the us. Thats the drug cartels, and Terror Financing is very sophisticated. Isis is the most richly funded most wellfunded Care Organization in human history. So theyre able to do the damage they do. Very strong financially. But we are to look at all the systems worldwide. Where to look at those systems which are affecting the Business Climate in the us. Those things which are affecting our security, and its not just isis. Local rom, alshabaab, the farc, the cartels control is very common in our view husband focusing on isis, what are sort of the main Revenue Streams that they have coming in . Guest the largest revenue stream comes while. I took exception with the Obama Administration even coming to the point of going to a top secret hearing just myself and three or four of them. I grew up in the oilfield. I know it very well. They kept objecting that they couldnt, they could not anyone who is not a combatant. I would be the Truck Drivers who are carrying oil to market and said there are other ways do that. They were never interested so half a billion a year is going to the terrorist financing through that. They are sex trafficking which is a huge resource. We just traveled into afghanistan and into some of the african countries where that trafficking is going through. People in the nation there, they are all telling us please, help us to something about this trafficking problem because they are using our nation as a conduit. They use automobile sales, put illicit funds in that. Take the automobiles overseas and resell them on the market and taking the profits. Theres just a wide range of activities. One of the ones that has a lot of personal, people just react personally as the jack hammering some of the world oldest archaeological monuments. Go back to the beginning of humankind, jackhammer goes up, selling them on ebay and on the open market. Generating tremendous revenue there. Its a wide range. Host what is the low hanging fruit you can start with . Guest oil sales. I was talking to the commanding general in afghanistan and saying i know youre not in iraq and syria where the sales are mostly occurring, but youre talking to the people. You were on their same level. Why did you not do it . He kind of shrugged it off and i said people are dying because youre shrugging this off. We are going to continue pressing the Trump Administration to start targeting the sale of oil. The line is so stable that trucks sit in it for months waiting to get to the tanks to load their one load of oil in a sixmonth period. The people just live in those trucks, and we cant find a way to disrupt that. Im sorry, but i think that the american lives are more important than the routines of the bureaucracy of the services, or the treasury it would not establish those as major target. Host North Carolina is waiting to peter is a democrat. Good morning. Caller good morning. I have a question for the congressman. Its about employment in the United States and all the Illegal Immigrants that are taking the jobs. Theyre going to keep coming across the border as long as there are jobs here. What are the employers of illegal aliens punished . My idea would be that the first time they catch an employer with one illegal alien in its implement would be a 1000 fine and one day in jail. The second time, ive days in jail and 5000 fine. Theyre going to keep coming across the border as long as theres jobs here for them. The hypocrisy is the same people that hire them later on give them a political right and say otherwise. But it would be simple. We dont need to increase the number of guardrail along the border and we dont need the wall. I guarantee you that if people stop hiring the illegal aliens, within six months we would have at least 80 percent of illegal aliens out of this country. Guest again, your point is well made but its also missing a point. That is, that if you hold the employer accountable, right now the federal government cannot tell me as an employer who is legal and who is not. They have a green card that is very easily counterfeited. We have Social Security cards that were designed in the 1930s, or whenever they were designed. They still are the three caller card that is easily counterfeited. At one point we had 3 million of those stolen, legitimate Social Security cards. I have asked the agencies please put some sort of chip in it, make it to where it is not so counterfeited bill. But my wife and i have a company in the oilfield. We never want to break the law. We wanted to know who was legal. We were faced with a 10,000 a day fine if we hire illegals. And we took every precaution but still we were never certain that those papers we were getting were legitimate. I think our government should require themselves, are agencies, should have a thumbprint and a retina scan for every visitor here who is legitimate. And i should be able as an employer to look on a computer screen, have the potential employee look into the camera, screen that retina. That technology is easily available. If we can tell the employers who is legitimate now, then i would agree with you that we should hold them accountable even far more than the 1000 a day penalty that you are suggesting. But right now we would put the employer in the position of the government, and the government cant tell us who is legitimate and who is not. Its a circuitous problem and the comet has done nothing to stabilize knowing who is here and it was here legitimately. But again, your frustrations i very much felt in our state, to. Host tom in college park maryland. Independent, good morning. Caller good morning and thank you. Im calling from the independent line because im increasingly too far left for the democrats, so im not a big fan ofmy pants but actually find myself really rooting for him to be our president immediately. I think thats the patriotic thing to do, given that this Current Administration is completely divorced from reality with claims of voter fraud and wiretapping and all sorts of things that the president just makes up and thinks of fairfax pics so my question is, how can you sort of ignore all of the proven constitutional violations continue to normalize and support the Current Administration . Why do you think that might pants wouldnt be a better president and actually be able to get more things done because he wouldnt be constantly immersed in crisis and scandal . Guest mike, i said at the beginning of the program i see where the illegal Border Crossings have dropped dramatically in the first two months of this administration. Thats an effect that most americans would agree with. Also with his discussions with ford. Ford says okay, we were not send up 1. 7 billion to mexico and build a new plant. We will reinvest in jobs in america. Thats the now, most americ