美国国家公共电台 NPR Former Agent Says, 'Border Patrol Does Good Work ... But There's Tension There'

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STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

About 10 years ago, a recent college graduate named Francisco Cantu told his mother what seemed like good news. He got a job.

FRANCISCO CANTU: I think she was terrified when I decided¹ to join the Border Patrol. And I think she was also confused about why I was doing this.

INSKEEP: Cantu had studied the border in school, but he wanted to understand it more deeply. He was accepted as a new agent guarding the United States southern border. And his experience offers a personal view of an issue we constantly debate. He attended the Border Patrol Academy and emerged equipped to patrol the Arizona wilderness².

CANTU: What any Border Patrol agent always carries with them is a tricky³ bag. We call it a tricky bag. You've got binoculars⁴. You've got the paper forms that you need to fill out in the field if you apprehend⁵ someone, five, six, seven, eight, nine different flashlights because the worst thing that could ever happen to you is to run out of light in the middle of the night somewhere.

INSKEEP: Tricky bag in the car, he drove out across the desert - sometimes in a team, often alone - to look for people crossing. Cantu tells the story of his Border Patrol years in a new memoir⁶ called "The Line Becomes A River," which is one way to describe the U.S.-Mexico border. In this book, we find out why his mother was terrified, not so much by the physical danger as by a fear that her son would lose his soul. That's how she viewed the difficult work of rounding up people and deporting⁷ them from the desert. Cantu began to fear for himself when he arrested people like a middle-aged⁸ mother abandoned in the desert by her guide. He saved that border crosser's life, as agents often do.

CANTU: I remember sort of bandaging her feet and cleaning her wounds, which is this very, you know, direct, tangible⁹ way of, like, helping¹⁰ someone. I think it's almost biblical in a sense to clean someone's feet. And I remember her looking down at me and just kind of like very tenderly and thanking me. And I felt like, don't thank me. At the end of the day, I'm taking you back to a cell. And I'm, you know, sending you on your way to be sent back to this place that you're literally¹¹ risking your life to flee. And so, yes, it's true that the Border Patrol does good work and rescues people and saves lives, but there's tension there.

INSKEEP: A tension that eventually caused him to quit the Border Patrol. It also gave him a perspective on this country's immigration debate.

CANTU: In the station where I worked, we had quite a bit of border fencing, a wall. It was a 20-foot-high steel mesh¹². And, you know, guys on the south side found a way to pry¹³ open the steel panels and put a hydraulic¹⁴ tire jack¹⁵ underneath¹⁶ and jack them up and lift them high enough to drive cars underneath. And, you know, when that didn't work, they would show up with welders¹⁷ and weld holes just big enough for people to walk through or to crawl through. And so I really think no matter what obstacle we put at the border, it's going to be subverted¹⁸. People are going to find a way up, over, under or around it.

INSKEEP: What is it like when you're out in the desert alone in that really dry, really dangerous, really mountainous landscape?

CANTU: It's funny. I actually remember one of the very first jobs that I was assigned. You know, the first time you're thrown a set of keys, you're often sent to one of these lookout¹⁹ positions. And I remember, like, standing²⁰ outside of my truck and just looking out at the desert on all sides of me. And I'm someone who grew up in the desert, so it's not unfamiliar²¹ to me, but I'll never forget that feeling. I was - I felt, you know, completely overwhelmed. It was like I was looking out across the ocean. I mean, that's how vast it is.

INSKEEP: Were people watching you as you were up there watching for them?

CANTU: Yeah, absolutely. You know, if you're anywhere within 40 to 80 miles of the border, you're being watched by cartel scouts²². But, of course, you're also being watched by the United States government. I mean, our border is one of the most heavily patrolled, surveilled terrains²³ that there is. And so when I go out now, you know, for a hike or for a day out in the borderlands and, you know, explore some little canyon²⁴, I'm always kind of conscious of that in the back of my mind. I'm like, I wonder who's watching me right now?

INSKEEP: So what was the effect on your soul of several years of doing this kind of work?

CANTU: My biggest takeaway from the job, you know, more than, you know, any drug bust²⁵ or car chase or when you arrest somebody who has a extensive criminal history and you pat yourself on the back, like, all of that was sort of insignificant²⁶. You know, I'll never forget, as a Border Patrol agent, bringing this guy into my station as part of a group that I apprehended²⁷. And I was rolling his fingerprints²⁸ and putting him into, you know, the database to be shipped back to Mexico.

And I remember him just kind of like looking around while I was asking him these formulaic questions. And he's like, hey, you know, I know there's a couple hours before the bus comes. Is there anything I can do? Can I take out the trash? Can I clean the cells? You know, I want to show you that I'm here to work. And I just - it changed things for me to have someone in front of me and say that to me. And so those are the kind of things that I carry with me. I think there's nothing as powerful as an individual story. And I think we need to listen to the people who have those stories right now.

INSKEEP: Did he just want you to know that he wasn't a crook²⁹?

CANTU: I think he wanted me to know that, but I think he also wanted to work. He saw that there were - the trash hadn't been taken out. He saw that there was sweeping³⁰ that could be done. And I think he very sincerely would have liked me to hand him a broom.

INSKEEP: The book is "The Line Becomes A River: Dispatches From The Border." The author is Francisco Cantu. Thank you very much.

CANTU: Thank you so much.

(SOUNDBITE OF RER REPETER'S "LEARNING THE ROPES")