Thousands mistakenly allowed past U.S. border, report says

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Government watchdogs have found that thousands of people who shouldn't have been admitted to the United States were mistakenly allowed in last year because of security lapses at legal border crossings.

However, a source who has seen a full version of the report, in which those statistics were included, put the total at 21,000.

The author of the GAO report, Richard Stana, said most of those who were wrongly allowed to enter were economic migrants who did not present a security risk.
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Some of the problems that caused this :

Understaffing and turnover at Customs and Border Protection, the agency that oversees the nation's 326 land, sea and air ports of entry.

...weak management controls and complacency and inattentiveness by some officers.

GAO investigators arriving at one point of entry found no border agents in the inspection booth, while at other locations, agents didn't ask for travel documents...

The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents 17,600 Customs and Border Protection officers manning ports of entry, said the agency is understaffed and poorly managed and officers are overworked and not adequately trained.
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Yes, we are so much safer now than we were before. bin Laden could be starting fires in California, and the government wouldn't know about it.

Heck of a job, georgie, heck of a job.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: DorianGreyed,

Meanwhile, on the Pakistan/Afghanistan border, the guys who might actually stumble across Bin Laden some day are also at the bottom of everyone's priority list:

Despite billions of dollars in U.S. military payments to Pakistan over the past six years, the paramilitary force leading the pursuit of al-Qaida militants remains underfunded, poorly trained and overwhelmingly outgunned, U.S. military and intelligence officials said.