Texas Senate approves using herbicides to fight illegal border crossings

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Houston Chronicle

Texas Senate approves using herbicides to fight illegal border crossings

Jeremy Wallace April 29, 2019 Updated: April 29, 2019 4:39 p.m.



The Rio Grande River stretches between the United States (on the left) and Mexico near the border crossing at Del Rio, TX,Thursday, August 17, 2017. (Mark Mulligan / Houston Chronicle)
Photo: Mark Mulligan, Staff Photographer / Mark Mulligan / Houston Chronicle

It’s not a wall and it isn’t more boots on the ground, but the Texas Senate on Monday approved a bill that would send millions of dollars of herbicides to the front lines to battle illegal immigration.

The Texas Senate passed legislation to send up to $10 million in additional funding to the Texas border to fight Carrizo cane, a weed that can grow 25 feet tall and provides cover for border crossers along the Rio Grande Valley.

“It’s all about border security,” said State Sen. Donna Campbell, a New Braunfels Republican.

Along the river, Carrizo cane grows in thick clumps, like corn or bamboo, and become a good hiding place for people illegally crossing the border. It is an exceptionally fast growing plant, able to grow about 4 inches per day and reach a mature height of over 25 feet in about a year.


Read more: https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/politics/texas/article/Texas-Senate-approves-using-herbicides-to-fight-13804919.php

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(Short article, no more at link.)

[Cold War Spook]

1. What could possibly go wrong.

Ask the men and women who served in Vietnam.

[LearnedHand]

8. My exact thought, my exact inference

Like we’re too freaking stupid to make the connection if they just call it a herbicide.

[forgotmylogin]

23. Poisoning the border?

Yeah, sounds like an excuse so they can basically use gas. They're "killing the weeds".

[duhneece]

32. Agent 🍊 Orange redux. Nt

[duforsure]

48. I thought the same thing.

[niyad]

37. and the Vietnamese.

[dixiegrrrrl]

47. Exactly my first thought.

2nd thought...how to increase Montesanto's stock. They gotta be talking about Roundup.
It persists for a long time, so yeah, let's pollute the rive, no body actually drinks it or fishes in it, I'm sure.

[Maxheader]

49. Yep..my thoughts too...agent orange...

[DemoTex]

51. Might as well call it "Operation Ranch Hand."

And use ratty old C-123s.

[GReedDiamond]

2. Up next...

...Agent Orange and Napalm.

[sinkingfeeling]

3. You beat me to it. Exact same thought.

[GReedDiamond]

4. Think of it as one of those...

..."great minds" moments.

I had that sinking feeling when I read the OP.

[bronxiteforever]

6. +1000 and kick and recommend op

The river will also likely be impacted by the “herbicide” aka defoliant

[Traildogbob]

9. Cancer anyone?

Round Up and Monsato could care less about cancer deaths. And this GOP does not either. Maybe airdrop crushed Russian asbestos over on those damn brown people. Use to be regulations about poison near waterways. Air and water.........over rated. Like regulations. Be Best, MAGA!

[pazzyanne]

17. If you eat grains of any kind these days, you are eating Roundup!

I ate Cheerios and oatmeal for years because it was healthy. I avoided roundup in my yard and garden like the plaque. I still ingest roundup. We are poisoning ourselves, and people are too stupid to realized that!

[watoos]

19. Eat organic or home grown

or local grown that you know doesn't use Roundup. It isn't 100% guaranteed but your chances are a lot better. My family and daughter's family have been doing organic for a long time now.

[pazzyanne]

27. As have I, but it is almost impossible to be 100% organic today.

At best all we can do is minimize the impact of the chemicals in our world.

[Traildogbob]

22. Not we, Corp AmurKKka

Recent studies have shown round up in every tested piece of broccoli, freaking broccoli. Every other TV commercial is law firms that will represent you for Mesothelioma and Round Up cancers. But, trump welcomes, now, Russian asbestos, with his damn mug on the shipping bales, and Monsato is a huge lobbying group and political contributor. Then, our amazing health care Corporate thugs get rich off your cancer before you die. MAGA, God be blessin MurKKKa. They even poison our damn air and water. Greatest country on earth??? Joking, right?

[pazzyanne]

26. We, because the collective we is allowing this to happen and

to continue happening. I have been anti-corporation since long before John Roberts and the Supreme Court decided they were "persons". WE need to get our collective heads on straight and change our perception of what exactly corporations are in reality. VOTE BLUE LIKE YOUR LIFE DEPENDS ON IT, BECAUSE IT DOES!!!

[House of Roberts]

13. I thought Trump IS Agent Orange already.

[GReedDiamond]

16. You got that right...nt

[DBoon]

29. "I love the smell of napalm in the morning"

[Honeycombe8]

5. Republicans care nothing about wildlife & the environment.

I'm sure wildlife live in those cane plants, or off of them. And tons of herbicides being dropped in the area?

Horrible, horrible idea. Is there nothing on earth they care about besides themselves and money?

[FailureToCommunicate]

7. Great plan Texas.

?itemid=7806823

[lunasun]

10. It will all go down river . Is this a drinking water source for towns along there?

[TexasTowelie]

12. Yes it is.

It's the drinking source for Laredo and most of the towns in the Rio Grande Valley. The water already has a brackish taste and the area has a high proportion of anecephalic births and other neurological problems.

[Delmette2.0]

11. Will they be able to do this on private property?

[mr_lebowski]

14. I guess that's one way to get his wall ... just start dropping poison all over the environment ...

Eventually we'll decide that just building his stupid fucking wall is the only humane and reasonable thing to do to make the Trump atrocities against human and nature ... STOP.

If this doesn't work, what's next? Landmines? Strafing runs?

[Cold War Spook]

28. Now he is going to get Mexico to pay for a wall.

It will be on their side of the border. Seriously, if this junk gets blow South of the border won't Mexico sue?

[Cryptoad]

15. Reckon MonoSanto is loving this,,,,,,,

[Grokenstein]

18. Wow, herbicides!!

...although technically Zylon-B is a pesticide, right?

We're watching it happen all over again.

[watoos]

20. My cousin has been in a wheelchair for 47 years

with MS-like symptoms because of exposure to Agent Orange in Nam.

I have come to the conclusion that Republicans are either stupid or devils. WTF is the IQ of our nation?

[turbinetree]

21. So now the fucking Texas right wing fascist legislature is going to turn the International border

Last edited Tue Apr 30, 2019, 10:41 AM - Edit history (1)

with Mexico into the new Vietnam and it's past program, like when this country was using Dow Chemical Agent Orange to defoliate the countryside, these people are just fucked up in the head, and they are getting paid to be fucked up in the head...............................I had friends come back from Vietnam that developed cancer because of Agent Orange......and this Donna Braunfels is a real piece of work, she should have her pay docked to pay for the health issues that are going to happen on both sides of the border, but in her small world thinking, she doesn't see that, but everyone else in this country will be hit with the bill sometime or later, what a fucking racists, because that's what she really is .............................POS.................

[llmart]

24. Dow Chemical

in Midland, Michigan. Their motto should be "killing people and animals on a daily basis".

[turbinetree]

30. Corrected, Thank you...........they are all the same, just differant name.......................

[llmart]

35. Actually I wasn't trying to correct you because I think DuPont and Dow now really are the same.

Don't quote me on that. You know how these mega mergers go nowadays. Anyway you slice it, they're all killing our citizens or making them gravely ill one way or another. Why we tolerate this is beyond me.

I worked with a woman when I first moved to Michigan and she told me that her father worked at Dow Chemical (she was raised in Midland) and that he died of cancer in his early 50's. I'm pretty sure there were more than we'll ever know. They also use animals in their research.

What is it going to take for people to wake up in this country? I'm reading a very good book right now written by an Amish man talking about how the Amish farm with only little or no chemicals. He advocates for getting back to the small, non-corporate owned farms as do I, but I don't see that happening. I honestly think Americans won't be happy until they've completely ruined the country and it's lands.

[keithbvadu2]

25. Trump can use our troops to spray it of course. And NOT allowed to drift to populated areas.

Trump can use our troops to spray it of course.

And NOT allowed to drift to populated areas.

Sarcasm?

[Haggis for Breakfast]

42. Another category of treatment for the VA.

[angrychair]

31. Horrible idea

Would think you could buy a lot of night vision goggles and heat sensors with $10 million dollars.

[ancianita]

33. So "Texan" of them to want biochemical warfare on the border. This decision is anti-American.

It's not about stupidity. It's about the banality of evil inhumanity. It shocks the conscience.

Pollute, kill everything to solve a problem Texas could solve a hundred other ways.

[keithbvadu2]

34. Wonder if the border legislators voted for this for their districts?

[niyad]

36. JFC on a trailer hitch--AGENT ORANGE , anyone???

[niyad]

38. sooooo, which mega-chemical company will get the contract, and how many of those legislators

are on that payroll?

[kimbutgar]

39. Wrecking the ecosystem with a poison might be a decision they will regret in a few years

there are many unintended consequences when you fool with Mother Nature!

[niyad]

40. actually, a LOT more at link:

During a hearing on the bill earlier this month, State Sen. Pete Flores, R-Pleasanton, said even infrared equipment is not effective in picking people out of the brush. Flores’s district includes hundreds of miles of the Texas border from Eagle Pass to Big Bend National Park.

Getting rid of the weed would give border patrol a clear vision of the border along the Rio Grande River, Campbell said. But battling Carrizo cane is easier said than done. Campbell said simply cutting it down makes it come back stronger and thicker. Instead there is an herbicide called imazapyr that can be used against the plant.

It’s not the first time Texas Legislature has battled Carrizo cane. In 2015 the Legislature set up a program to control Carrizo cane growth through the Texas State Soil and Water Conservation Board, but there was not enough funding with the program to last more than a few months. Environmental groups have objected to aerial spraying of chemicals to eradicate Carrizo cane, and the Mexican government has also expressed concerns in the past.

EPA officials have said that imazapyr, which has been in use since 1985, has not been found to pose a risk to people ingesting residue in food or drinking water, including children. The EPA also found risks to birds, mammals, fish, bees, and aquatic insects to be unlikely.

. . . . .

[niyad]

41. a little bit on this herbicide

Concentrated imazapyr has low acute toxicity on the skin or if ingested, but is harmful if inhaled and may cause irreversible damage if it gets in the eyes.

[Haggis for Breakfast]

43. The stupid just never ends does it ?

[keithbvadu2]

44. Film of Soldiers spraying Agent Orange without protective equipment

Film of US Soldiers spraying Agent Orange defoliant onto a riverbank without protective equipment

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=spraying+agent+orange+in+vietnam

No bone spurs.

[End Of The Road]

45. It hasn't passed the Texas House, and it may not.

First, the Texas Legislative session ends May 27. They may not have enough time to get it through committees. Next session doesn’t begin until January, 2021.

Second, the Texas House isn’t quite as fascist as the Senate. They may not be willing to deal.

One can hope!

[bluestarone]

46. WE need NAMES with FACES of the ones that voted for this bullshit!

Then post them all over every STATE! (especially TEXAS)

[Nitram]

50. Yeah, let's just spray Agent Orange along the entire border and turn it into a toxic waste dump.

That'll discourage immigrants.

[walkingman]

52. Just another thing that makes wonder what the FUCK has happened to Texas?