Triple fence along border would split Indian nation

October 22, 2006

SELLS, Ariz. – The latest front in the federal government's struggle to control the border with Mexico runs partly across 75 miles of sand, tall saguaro cactuses and mesquite creosote brush, guarded by brooding mountains 8,000 feet high.

Congress wants to build a triple fence along the border to make it tougher for illegal immigrants and drug smugglers trying to cross. The barricade would divide an American Indian tribe whose people were on this land four millenniums before the birth of Christ.

“We didn't ask for this fence to be built here,” said Chairwoman Vivian Juan-Saunders of the Tohono O'odham Nation. “We have some individuals who feel the federal government can come onto the Nation and do what they want.”

The Secure Fence Act of 2006, passed in late September, requires 700 miles of border fence from Texas to California, including a stretch extending 10 miles east and 10 miles west of Tecate in San Diego County.

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http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20061022-9999-1n22tohono.html

My kids are Yaqui (and white like me) and the boys and I vsited the Yaqui reservation in Tucson about 10 years ago. The Elders told me that they also have been going back and forth over the border for centuries and that they got reservation lands here (in U.S.) because they have traditions of going back and forth and that they "had an eloquent speaker" who convinced the governemnet to grant them (their) lands here when the BIA was being formed. Are these dispicable fences going up in AZ too?

How disgusting that borders (and a bunch of hysterical white people) are more important than family and tradition. Geez!

Cat In Seattle

This is more proof that it just won't work.

Tohono O'odham Tribe,duh-nuh-nuh-nuh-nuhn

So proud to live,

So proud to be chopped in half by a triple border-fence