In 2005, Congress passed the REAL ID Act, which (among other provisions) directed the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to meet a 2008 year-end deadline for completing 670 miles of fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border. The Act also gave DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff broad authority to waive property rights, environmental, labor and other laws in order to get the job done. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to intervene in the case of Defenders of Wildlife vs. Chertoff, in effect legitimizing the huge grants of power given to DHS in the REAL ID Act.
You could spend hours reading up on the REAL ID Act and all its implications -- or you could listen to two very informative news programs on your local community radio station. This week, two of KOOP's public affairs shows will be examining the REAL ID Act and its provisions assaulting the civil liberties of all Americans. The two shows are TEXAS POLITICS TODAY and SHADES OF GREEN.
On TEXAS POLITICS TODAY, airing Wednesday from 2:30 to 3:00 p.m. CDT, Melissa Del Bosque of the Texas Observer, whose coverage of the border wall controversy along the Rio Grande has won national acclaim, will discuss the border wall battle and the Chertoff decision. Melissa's coverage can be viewed here, here and on the Observer’s blog.
(N.B. -- TEXAS POLITICS TODAY is produced and co-hosted by yours truly.)
On SHADES OF GREEN, airing Thursday from 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. CDT, a representative of the national Defenders of Wildlife organization will talk about that organization's lawsuit. Sheila Dean, an activist and blogger working on REAL ID issues, will also appear on Thursday's show.
KOOP, "the little station that could," is Austin's only community-owned radio station. It shares the FM 91.7 radio frequency with KVRX, the University of Texas student radio. It also streams live over the Web at http://www.koop.org/. KOOP is on the air on weekdays from 9:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. and on weekends from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m.
1 comment:
Actually, the part of the Real ID Act relating to the border wall (section 102) gave Chertoff the power to waive any law, federal, state, or local, that he saw as an impediment to border wall construction. At that time (2005) only 14 miles of border wall were scheduled to be built, and lawsuits from the Sierra Club, Defenders of Wildlife, and the California Coastal Commission, had led to a halt in construction.
The 670+ miles of border wall that are currently called for were in the Secure Fence Act, passed in 2006. By an odd coincidence, the bill passed just 2 weeks ahead of the midterm elections when conservatives were desperately trying to hang on to Congress in the face of voter anger over corruption scandals and conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan that were increasingly unpopular. The Real ID's waiver provision also applied to the Secure Fence Act's miles of border wall. In April Chertoff waived 36 federal laws to build those walls. The only reason to waive these laws is because he knows that the border wall will violate them, and he does not want to be held responsible for wholesale violations of our nation's laws.
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