HOUSE ON ROAD ABOUT BORDER PANEL HAS HEARING NEAR SAN DIEGO.

Byline: RACHEL URANGA Staff Writer

SAN DIEGO -- House Republicans focused a debate over immigration reform on national security, claiming Wednesday that plans from Democrats -- and President George W. Bush -- have more holes in them than the border itself.

At an unusual, on-the-road House subcommittee meeting, law enforcement officials complained that their jails are overcrowded with illegal immigrants, and that border agents are overwhelmed by border crossers and demoralized by policies that tie their hands.

``Immigration reform must be national security reform,'' said Rep. Ed Royce, R-Fullerton, chairman of the House International Relations Subcommittee on International Terrorism and Nonproliferation.

While House Republicans orchestrated the made-for-media hearing -- and others across the country -- to bolster support for an enforcement-heavy reform package; Democrats used it to point out failed immigration policies under a Republican administration and Congress.

In opening remarks, Rep. Brad Sherman, D-Sherman Oaks, held up a chart illustrating a slowdown in hiring more Border Patrol agents after Sept. 11, 2001, under a Republican administration and Congress.

``They have an ugly record of not controlling our border and not providing adequate resources to our border control,'' he said. ``These hearings are not designed to legislate but to whip up public opinion.''

In Philadelphia, Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., held a competing hearing examining the need for foreign workers. There, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said the economy would collapse if the country's 11 million illegal immigrants were deported.

Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca -- in whose jails nearly one-fourth of the inmates are illegal immigrants who officials say cost county taxpayers $80 million to $90 million more each year than the federal government reimburses -- mentioned similar concerns at the hearing at a Border Patrol office near Imperial Beach.

``You have hundreds of thousands of employees at a very low wage. That is the reality here. You take away that resource and criminalize it, (and) the impact on the American quality of life will be sufficiently strong,'' he told the hearing panel.

``People are going say, `Why didn't you tell me what my real cost is going to be?'''

The comment drew loud boos in the hearing room where about 200 people gathered, some wearing shirts with the slogan ``Stop Illegal Immigration Now.'' An overflow crowd stood under a tent outside, some waving American flags in support of strict immigration policy.

House Republican leaders called the unusual meeting in San Diego and another in Laredo, Texas, in part to gain support for their version of immigration reform.

The dueling committee hearings illustrated the deep divides over immigration policy. House Republicans support an enforcement-heavy reform bill while President George W. Bush and the U.S. Senate, including many Republicans as well as Democrats, have favored broader legislation including a guest-worker program and a way for illegal immigrants to gain citizenship.

Still, several congressmen said the hearings are not likely to move both houses of Congress any closer to resolution of a stalled immigration package before the November elections.

Dana Rohrabacher, R-Huntington Beach, said the hearings could signal the beginning of a years-long debate the next president will face.

In San Diego, along another road leading up to the Border Patrol office, dozens of protesters called the hearing offensive and one-sided.

``There is no discussion here. They are going to give one point of view, and nobody is going to counter that point of view,'' said Enrique Morones, director of Border Angels, a humanitarian group.

Calling attention to the thousands of deaths along the border, Morones symbolically laid out 4,000 wooden crosses along the entrance to the station.

The four-hour hearing focused on border restrictions -- key to the House bill -- with top border agents and law enforcement officials describing parts of the border with Mexico as a war zone where increasingly sophisticated smugglers elude agents using satellite phones.

Darryl Griffen, chief patrol agent of the San Diego area, said it would be possible to smuggle a ``dirty bomb'' through the border and more electronic detection equipment is needed.

Still, he said the densely populated and once out-of-control region has seen a 77 percent increase in the number of apprehensions and a 55 percent increase in deaths since 1995, when Operation Gatekeeper was implemented. The effort brought miles of multilayer fences.

The enforcement-heavy House bill authored by Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., calls for building a 700-mile fence along the U.S. border and making criminals of illegal immigrants.

The Senate bill would provide a pathway to citizenship for the millions of illegal immigrants if they learned English, paid a fine and showed good moral character.

rachel.uranga(at)dailynews.com

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CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1) A lone U.S. Border Patrol vehicle and tower-mounted video cameras monitor activity Wednesday along the border fence between Tijuana, Mexico, and San Diego.

Lenny Ignelzi/Associated Press

(2) Martin Rodriguez holds crosses Wednesday to symbolize the deaths of people trying to cross the U.S. border from Mexico.

Denis Poroy/Associated Press