New Bill Targets Mexican Crime Tunnels

A new bill was introduced to the Senate today to restrict and prevent the building of crime tunnels that connect Mexico to the United States.

The new bill will aid another piece of legislation passed in 2007 in order to further control crime tunnels, reported AFP.

According to the San Francisco Chronicle, most of the tunnels connect to California and Arizona, though two tunnels were found to connect to Texas. A spike in tunnel growth was seen in the past decade, which has given rise to further concerns over regulating the tunnels.

The new bill will allow the government to use wiretaps during investigations involving the tunnels and to penalize the builders of these illegal tunnels by seizing their assets.

A proponent of the bill, Senator Dianne Feinstein from California, calls the tunnels “a serious national threat,” reported SF Chronicle.

“I mean, they could run armies through there for that matter or large groups, and it’s a real way of serious criminal penetration into the United States and obviously a lot of it we don’t know about because we haven’t found it,” Feinstein said, according to Main Justice.