Mines, Water, Roads, Borders

The Resolution Copper land grab is also a water grab, with a projected use of millions of gallons per year and contamination of more; and during what could be a mega-drought. Water is often compared to gold as its value increases the more scarce it becomes, which means we may soon be fighting not only the increasing privatization of land, but also of water. Despite the fact that the Resolution Copper deal, having been snuck into a defense bill, involves an exchange of land, it is being done to the advantage of a transnational mining corporation and to the detriment of the Chi’Chil’Ba’Goteel/Oak Flat/Apache Leap area and the people who hold it sacred. This land grab represents a continued prioritization of economic development in so-called Arizona, which means more resource-extraction and increased international trade (specifically with or through Mexico). Mining and other industries shaped by trade-related demand bring not only risk to water, but also more roads like Interstate 11 and rail (which require land acquisition), and increased border militarization. US trade policy is largely culpable for the violence on the border and south of the border.

Economic development is portrayed as bringing more jobs, but these “free-market” policies, as in the case of NAFTA, are meant to redistribute wealth to the hands of the rich. Because of their trade relationship and connecting infrastructure, Arizona and Sonora have a shared fate as land, water, safety, indigenous ways of life and sacred sites are all at risk. The state governments enable resource-extraction and other infrastructural projects, lucrative to those who would build them and those who would finance them, through subsidization and protection with our tax dollars.

Arizona's connection to a port in Guaymas, Sonora is crucial to the Arizona mining industry. Copper is one of the fastest growing US exports, and much of what is and would be mined in Arizona would be transported down to where mining companies such as BHP Billiton (of Resolution Copper) and Freeport McMoran do business at this Mexican port on the Sea of Cortez. Guaymas is also significant because shipping companies can have lower standards for working conditions in Mexico versus the US. This port is the southernmost point of the CANAMEX Corridor, the NAFTA trade route connecting Canada and Mexico through five US states including Arizona. The Port of Guaymas has been expanding over the years and brings along its own set of problems in the vicinity, requiring its own energy sources and water, damaging the environment, impacting the local communities, etc. Arizona is counting on the continued growth of the Mexican economy, yet the importance of the Port of Guaymas also signifies that a lot of exports from the US are meant to cross the Pacific ocean (especially if the Trans Pacific Partnership goes into effect), not stay within its favored trade partner's borders.

The CANAMEX Corridor already exists, but will be considered complete once Interstate 11, which is in the study phase (aside from the Boulder City Bypass which is scheduled to break ground this year) has been constructed, connecting Las Vegas and Phoenix with a route fit for freight traffic. Interstate 11 may eventually refer to the entire trade corridor reaching from Mexico to Canada, or at least is intended to span from the Mexican border and beyond Las Vegas. Parts of it maybe multi-modal including rail and other infrastructure possibly including water pipeline. This massive project will cut through communities and damage the environment. Conceptualized as the entire trade corridor, it is currently also referred to as the Intermountain West Corridor--basically CANAMEX but with a more updated, more western route where it would run north of Las Vegas. South of the border, the Mexican government has recently agreed to the request by Arizona officials to improve Route 15, which is part of this Corridor, for freight traffic.


Intermittent blockades of Route 15 have been one tactic used by Yaqui resisters in response to the theft of their water in the last few years. The rapid growth of the City of Hermosillo in the state of Sonora, Mexico situated along the CANAMEX Corridor, on the way to the Port of Guaymas, is due in part to NAFTA-fueled agribusiness and mining which are the primary water-users. As it is, Sonora essentially exports millions of gallons of fresh water to the US in the form of fruits and vegetables. In the context of the drought and overuse of water, and as a result of the ways international trade has impacted Sonora, Hermosillo has required acquisition of water, impacting the Yaquis, Mayos, and Guajiríos with aqueducts and dams on the rivers. These mega-projects, enacted by Sonora SI (started by the Sonoran Governor who has a close relationship with the mining industry), have the intention of addressing the water crisis (for Hermosillo), contributing to the competitiveness of the region and providing new infrastructural projects for companies to make money from.

Since technology is now allowing for relatively affordable removal of salt from the plentiful ocean water, one megaproject planned for Sonora is one or more desalination plants. It is possible that the Agreement of Cooperation between the states of Arizona and Sonora signed by the respective governors at the Arizona-Mexico Commission’s Plenary Session last summer to jointly evaluate the feasibility of desalination at the Sea of Cortez for a new water supply for Arizona and Sonora is related to the Sonora SI project, which includes a desal plant in San Carlos near Guaymas. The potential for desalinated water piped from California or Mexico is part of Arizona's official water strategy. This year, a bill is in the Arizona House of Representatives to fund and arrange a study for the potential for desalination for Arizona. The intention for Arizona to expand and become more competitive in trade, along with potential new copper mine(s) will mean new demand for water, and with the combination of scarcity and new infrastructure, the water could be privatized. Desalination plants threaten the environment in various ways including the direct impact on their location on the water, as well as through the use of energy in the process and transport of the water.

Despite the likely need for drastic measures even if Arizona doesn't grow, some in Arizona find that expansion is necessary and inevitable. A so-called “megapolitan” area including Phoenix and Tucson called the “Sun Corridor” is intended as an economically integrated trade hub along the CANAMEX Corridor. Those interested in this concept have been attempting to reform state trust land law in the interest of further growth and development. The Sun Corridor concept is supposedly justified by—at the same time as it is used to encourage—growth and accompanying infrastructure especially for freight traffic in the area despite that growth is not sustainable in the area. The infrastructure required includes new roads, rail, ports, and border security.

Along with the steps to build Interstate 11, just in the last few months, Arizona opened trade offices in Hermosillo and Mexico City, committed funding to increase freight rail infrastructure near the border and to expand ports of entry at the AZ/Mexico border. According to ADOT's press release, Arizona was involved in a US/Mexico joint investment “implementing U.S. technology, equipment and training to enhance the efficiency of the military inspection station north of Hermosillo," which involves $6.8 million almost certainly from the Mérida Initiative, with an additional $4 million from the Mexican Government.

The primary intention of the Mérida Initiative (also known as Plan Mexico, a reference to the failed Plan Columbia) is supposedly to fight the drug trade, but one major role, to create a “21st Century Border Structure,” deals with trade and migration as well. This is meant to “Facilitate legitimate commerce and movement of people while curtailing the illicit flow of drugs, people, arms, and cash. The Mérida Initiative will provide the foundation for better infrastructure and technology to strengthen and modernize border security at northern and southern land crossings, ports, and airports.” Sure, the US wants to prevent the illicit activity that correlates with increased movement of trucks across the border. It is also the trade policies themselves, and the accompanying poverty and displacement, that contribute to migration (and arguably contribute to the drug trade). Many in US benefit from exploiting the cheap labor created by criminalization of migrants. And then there are the security and technology companies who can profit from infrastructure and equipment involved in securing the border. Large transnational companies such as Israeli company Elbit Systems brings their similar experience in militarizing the Gaza Strip and enforcing their apartheid wall to the border as well. The potential for any future Comprehensive Immigration Reform to bring about a "border surge" manifesting a massive profit-making opportunity for the military industrial complex to the US/Mexico border will likely make it even worse than it already is. Migrants continue to die crossing the border. Tohono O'odham who live along the border or visit relatives also face daily harassment, abuse, check-points, invasion of privacy, limits on movement, drones, cameras, etc. due to the border patrol's activities where the border bisects their lands.

Arizona officials and business leaders want to believe the myth that Mexico has the violence and organized crime under control. In the interest of becoming more friendly to international investment, for just a few years prior to the violent disappearance of the students from Ayotzinapa in late 2014, Mexico attempted to make itself look as though it was successfully instituting the rule of law. Yet law enforcement is clearly involved in much of this violence. And U.S. trade policy is largely culpable. Many violent acts tend to be depoliticized and obscured by associating the victims with drugs. Students at the Normal school in Ayotzinapa were known for protesting neoliberal reforms in Mexico. The fact that they were clearly not involved with the drug trade and that it involved so many youths made what happened to them more worthy of media attention.

The drug war, instead of curtailing the production and movement of drugs, functions, even if not specifically intended to, to facilitate resource-extraction and international investment in areas such as Mexico and Central America. Militarization and paramilitarization benefit US and transnational corporations' involvement there through displacement and social control, as described in Dawn Paley's new book, "Drug War Capitalism." With at least a couple dozen mining conflicts in Mexico alone, and the violence faced by activists who oppose mining, it is clear that even when organized crime groups are involved in law enforcement and violence, these are often acts of repression. For mining to continue, people are forcibly displaced, and the state facilitates this, in part by US tax dollars and to a certain extent for Arizona trade interests. Mining companies around the world often have arrangements with paramilitaries and/or military to protect them, such as in the cases of Resolution Copper's BHP Billiton in Columbia, and Phoenix-based Freeport McMoran in Indonesia.

In modern history in Arizona, displacement looks different but is no less significant. Confiscation of livestock, used as a tactic of attrition to force Diné who have resisted displacement from their lands so Peabody Coal can continue strip-mining the Black Mesa area, has occurred as recently as October 2014. Some members of Congress have recently urged that the relocation project be completed. Arizona's urban areas' access to water and electricity involves a mega-project that has a complex history few know about, which is all the more relevant in relation to the Yaqui water struggle and the potentiality of infrastructure being built for desalinated water. Often characterized as savvy and industrious, the efforts made to create the Central Arizona Project (CAP) that brings water from the Colorado River, and the whole project including Peabody Coal's strip-mining (to fuel the generating plant that powers CAP and provides electricity to Phoenix, Las Vegas and other areas), rests on a history involving manipulation, manufactured conflict between the Diné and Hopi and among tribal members, forced removal of families, contamination and depletion of water, and the poisoning of those who have lived close to the mines and the generating station.

Indigenous people's access to clean and plentiful water has been threatened since settlers arrived, even after they were given priority water rights by the federal government. Not only did Southern Arizona settlers divert water away from sources Tohono O'odham and other indigenous people relied upon, and contributed to erosion of their lands, indigenous people have been swindled for their priority water rights over the the last several decades. The Arizona Department of Water Resources considers the resolution of tribal water rights claims (9 more out of 22 total) the number one priority due to the uncertainty of long-term water availability for Arizona. Often the settlements promise infrastructure to provide water delivered to homes on the reservations, instead of addressing the root causes of poverty and lack of access to clean water. The mining industry consumes and contaminates water on a massive scale, and because of how much water it depends on, is especially interested in securing water rights at the expense of priority water rights held by some tribes in Arizona, such as in the case of Freeport McMoran being involved in the settlement of Hualapai water rights claims last year.

In some cases, mining companies like Freeport McMoran have been buying land for the associated water rights. Freeport and Resolution Copper have benefited from legislation and/or legal exemptions that allow them to essentially hoard water. No doubt the Resolution Copper mine near Superior would use several millions of gallons of water a year. Rio Tinto (of Resolution Copper) has purchased future water rights from CAP. The risk to water in AZ will be compounded if the Rosemont Copper mine near Tucson also gets approved. Access to clean water that is also affordable becomes a grave concern as water becomes scarce, commodified, and potentially privatized as more infrastructure is involved in its acquisition and treatment.

As is implied in "There is No Drought: California's Twisted Waterways," the threat of a serious drought can be used by those interested in profiting off the scarcity of water, and the "solutions" which are proposed are those that benefit these private interests. Obama made water privatization in the US easier, when on June 13 of 2014, he signed the Water Resources Reform and Development Act (WRRDA) into law. This included the Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Authority (WIFIA) which is a 5-year pilot program providing financing for P3s for water projects. WIFIA, mirroring the "Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act" (TIFIA), was a concept developed and promoted by the American Water Works Association (AWWA). The new director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources was a member of the AWWA.

Additionally, various companies involved in other Arizona infrastructural projects (AECOM, CH2MHill, CDM Smith, Bechtel) are involved in water privatization across the world.AWWA, a non-profit, is supported by CH2MHILL and closely affiliated with AECOM. And with more P3s for transportation, the likelihood for P3s for water increases.

Private interests have pushed for Interstate 11 due to its role in trade. I-11 is also likely to be procured as a public-private partnership (or several). Public-private partnerships (P3), a type of arrangement which we'll be seeing more of in the coming years (and is in the works for the South Mountain Freeway), are proposed as a mutually-beneficial solution that uses complicated financial strategies to leverage state assets and essentially provide federal and/or state subsidies (through tax-free bonds, low-interest loans, etc.) to the private sector. It helps finance projects for which funding is otherwise lacking—therefore it is a much desired arrangement for construction and engineering companies, consultants, as well as banks. The P3 creates new profit opportunities for financial institutions, in the meantime creating more debt, and therefore it is largely about financialization. A P3 can also be understood as a form of privatization, not because a P3-built road would not be publicly accessible, but because P3s afford private entities influence, agency, and financial deals they would otherwise not have access to. Projects such as roads are more likely prioritized based on the interest of private parties, and based on what is incentivized by the federal government. A public-private partnership could also refer to an organization ("P3 unit") that involves public officials and private members, creating new forms of governance that provide opportunities for private involvement in decision-making.

Two such P3 units of note in Arizona are the Arizona-Mexico Commission (AMC) and the Transportation and Trade Corridor Alliance (TTCA). Both of these organizations involve the Director of the Arizona Department of Transportation and other state officials as well as various corporate leaders, with much overlap between the two. The pro-NAFTA AMC, who takes credit for pushing CANAMEX along, seems to have had a lot to do with getting TTCA instituted and becoming a major influence in Arizona policy on trade and transportation in recent years. Freeport McMoran has been a major sponsor of AMC and has had someone on the board of directors for several years. The locations of Freeport's Arizona mines and their use of the Port of Guaymas correlates with their interest in CANAMEX and I-11. Freeport hired the last director of the Arizona Department of Water Resources as their water strategist, and this department now has an intimate relationship with AMC, even listing AMC

It is no surprise as well that Senator John McCain has been a large proponent of the land swap for Resolution Copper, the Mérida Initiative, increased trade with Mexico, and the TPP. But this goes far beyond him and the AMC. Across the world, the World Bank and IMF have coerced countries into adopting structural adjustment programs or other changes in exchange for access to loans. We may be aware of austerity measures in the US, but we may not realize the various ways in which Arizona (or other US states for that matter) is also impacted by state-enabled free market ideology even as the state is not forced into formal agreements to open new areas up to private "partners." The economic development, made to seem intended to create jobs and improve the livelihoods of citizens is about nothing more than accumulation of wealth. It is clear though, that whether we call it neoliberalism, capitalism, or colonialism, is also a project of the state.

Plunder Road: CANAMEX and the Emerging Impact of NAFTA, TPP on Western North America

As people across the world honor the twentieth anniversary of the Zapatista Liberation Army rising up in response to the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), resistance continues, most notably against resource extraction and other infrastructure. Meanwhile, what some call “NAFTA on steroids,” the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is currently pending agreement involving the North American countries and others scattered around the Pacific. And rather quietly, a transportation project called the CANAMEX Corridor is underway to facilitate trade along a north-south corridor of western North America. This corridor runs from a port on the Pacific coast of Mexico, through Arizona, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, Montana, and north near the Tar Sands in Alberta, Canada.

Opposition to the CANAMEX Corridor is necessary not only because it is a major piece of the physical infrastructure needed to facilitate this trade. Its function in international trade is also used to justify the damage brought by its imposition locally, throughout the corridor. CANAMEX, designated as a High Priority Corridor shortly after NAFTA was implemented, already exists in the form of highways, but requires improvement and expansion to effectively facilitate trade.

The trade corridors of North America, CANAMEX being one of them, are extensions of NAFTA. They function as the infrastructure, such as roads, rail, ports, etc., that perpetuates the harms caused by so-called free trade. Among the effects of NAFTA since its implementation have been dramatic unemployment and displacement in Mexico due to subsidized US agricultural products such as corn, and a shift in privatization/ownership of Mexican land by private interests. One of the worst environmentally damaging projects in the world is the Tar Sands extraction in Alberta, Canada, which is in operation at its current level largely due to the NAFTA obligations to supply oil to the US. CANAMEX would also be an important corridor of TPP trade due to its Pacific seaport in Guaymas, Mexico, and its proximity to the west coast in general.

The impact of CANAMEX involves displacement of people and destruction of sacred sites and the environment, thereby affecting indigenous communities and various others. Trade transportation infrastructure is necessary for free movement of goods across borders, but along with it must come heightened border security in response to displacement caused by the impacts of trade agreements. Because it requires fuel, trade infrastructure is one of the primary reasons for resource extraction and is an extension of colonialism. Additionally, it is justified and imposed locally in the form of development and sprawl with compounded reliance on energy and resources such as water.

A project increasingly being used to circumvent the obstacle of lack of funding for these trade corridors is called a public-private partnership (P3), which is an arrangement that is essentially privatization but with some state control. Having been utilized throughout the world, P3s in North America seem now more than ever to go hand-in-hand with trade infrastructure development and neoliberalism in general.

In simple terms, neoliberalism involves trade liberalization, privatization, and relaxation of state power in effort to allow for a free market economy. It is important to frame opposition to the practice of neoliberalism and its trade pacts, privatization, etc., by foremost addressing state collusion and repression, in addition to its form as an extension of colonialism and capitalism. State repression against resistance makes possible the ease with which these colonial/neoliberal projects expand.


Trade and Resource Extraction

In December 2013, tens of thousands of Mexicans demonstrated against the recent decision by the president to open oil and gas reserves to foreign investment, the implications of which, due to NAFTA and TPP, are predictably negative for the people. Up in the north, Nez Perce, Umatilla, and Warm Springs tribal members, and Rising Tide members, among others, have partially stalled attempts to transport massive pieces of equipment called “megaloads” to the Tar Sands in Alberta over the last couple of years with various protests along the route from ports in the northwest US to the Tar Sands. By no coincidence, Interstate 15, which is part of CANAMEX, will possibly be used to transport megaloads north from where the 90 meets it in Montana. Expansion of trade transportation infrastructure is dependent on resource extraction and vice versa. Trade corridors provide the infrastructure for the movement of this type of equipment and could additionally facilitate future extraction at the tar sands in Utah, which is not very far from the CANAMEX Corridor. Rail may possibly be a significant mode of transportation of crude oil in the near future, especially with obstacles, largely due to grassroots resistance, to the construction of pipelines.

The CANAMEX Corridor is one expansive piece of the physical infrastructure of NAFTA and potentially the TPP. Even though the TPP does not seem primarily to emphasize trade as much as one might assume, it is undoubtedly the case that increased trade traffic will have an impact along the corridor, in the form of prioritization of transportation projects, and shifts in policy.

Citing the problem of bottlenecks in trade ports on the US west coast, CANAMEX-proponents favor trade products entering North America through western Mexican ports such as the Port of Guaymas, the southern-most tip of the CANAMEX Corridor, which is due to double in size in the next couple of years, making it the second largest seaport in Mexico. The benefits (for capitalists) of receiving trade shipments there, rather than in the US, are multiple aside from avoiding the bottleneck problems. Dockworkers in Mexico have lower wages, lesser benefits, and fewer safety measures than union workers in the States.



In his commentary as the Arizona-Mexico Commission’s CANAMEX expert, Jim Kolbe stated that trade with Asia will likely continue to increase and CANAMEX is meant to facilitate the movement of those goods into Arizona. This was discussed years prior to official TPP talks. Certainly if the agreement goes forth, trade with Asia will grow even more.

Currently, talks on the TPP involve Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, the United States, and Vietnam. Not only are Chinese wages lower than Mexican wages, but the wages in Vietnam are half to a third of that of Chinese workers. The ramifications of this could involve increased unemployment and lowering of wages in Mexico and the US. Clearly some of these countries, or specifically their corporations, could easily take advantage of some of the other countries. For example, aspects of the TPP would make it even easier for companies to wreak environmental havoc wherever they choose; saving money on measures that would otherwise limit pollution.

There are various benefactors of the broadening of trade pacts and expansion of infrastructure. Describing the web of connections behind these neoliberal projects would take pages and could look a bit too much like conspiracy theory. We do not need a conspiracy theory to see how neoliberalism works and to understand that certain powerful individuals, corporations, and their organizations are going to have their hands in projects that promote their causes. Elsewhere, I have drawn connections between NAFTA, the Council of the Americas, North American Business Council, Security and Prosperity Partnership, North American Competitiveness Council, UPS and other corporations, McLarty Associates and its member Jim Kolbe who is part of the Arizona-Mexico Commission and the new Arizona Transportation and Trade Corridor Alliance which encompasses the Governor’s CANAMEX Task Force. Exposing these networks can be useful to show that these projects are being imposed by a wealthy few.

On a more local level, certain organizations and businesses are seeking expansion of “inland ports” consisting of multi-modal transportation nodes and foreign trade zones (FTZ) especially along trade corridors like CANAMEX. In regions zoned as FTZs, businesses get tax breaks and duty exemptions and deferrals. The placement of these FTZs will serve to justify infrastructure for this trade traffic to and through these areas. The presence and authority of the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in these foreign trade zones have unknown implications for migrants within them.


Trade and Border Security

On May 21, 2010, protesters locked down at the Border Patrol Headquarters in Tucson, Arizona with demands for self-determination for indigenous people, to regularize (“legalize”) all people, and for an end to NAFTA, among many related general and specific demands, which were and continue to be lacking from other similar actions. Involving members of Indigenous Nations of Arizona, migrants, people of color and white allies, it represented a more cohesive and radical analysis of the interlocking impacts of border security and trade.



Despite NAFTA being sold as a way to increase job opportunities in all three countries, the timing of beefed-up border security such as Operation Gatekeeper in the San Diego area, launched in 1994, indicates that the US government knew that NAFTA would cause an upsurge in migration from Mexico to the US due to the economic impact. On the surface it seems contradictory for Arizona to promote further NAFTA (and TPP) trade while enforcing immigration law. Yet capitalists and their government collaborators simultaneously want goods to move freely across borders and they want people moving across those borders to be criminalized and limited, thereby making them more exploitable. Governor Jan Brewer, for example, enthusiastically signed SB1070 and is promoting CANAMEX through the Arizona-Mexico Commission and the new Transportation and Trade Corridor Alliance.

This is not to imply that SB1070-style immigration enforcement is the preferred type. In fact, many would prefer some level of legalization, particularly guest worker programs, but either way it would be a “solution” with an emphasis on border security, and certainly not something that addresses the root causes of mass migration.

Border security will increasingly militarize O’odham communities in Arizona, coinciding with the invasive development and construction of trade infrastructure (roads, ports of entry, foreign trade zones) involved with CANAMEX. In Arizona, various freeways, or possibly toll-ways, comprising (or in close proximity to) the CANAMEX Corridor might be built through or along reservations and/or sacred sites, such as the Loop 202 Freeway extension in Phoenix, slated to cut through South Mountain which is sacred to O’odham. Construction of the wall, border-patrol harassment (and reckless driving), check-points, cameras, drones, severe limits on movement across the border for ceremonies (or for any reason), are some of the impacts of border security on O’odham and others living near the border—repercussions that would only worsen if/when Comprehensive Immigration Reform were to pass as proposed. CIR fans clearly ignored the escalating detriment it would create for border communities and recent/future border-crossers, and have largely failed to even mention the root causes of mass migration such as NAFTA.

CANAMEX-promoters are selling their development projects as ways to increase job opportunities, as did those hyping NAFTA in the ‘90s. However, the so-called free trade pushed by neoliberals has contributed to a hike in out-sourcing of jobs from the US. Rather than blaming the companies moving their facilities to countries with cheaper labor while continuing to pay their CEOs extravagant sums, it is the migrants who are scapegoated for the loss of jobs in the US. And while migrants are also blamed for taking advantage of welfare in the US, criminalization of migrants essentially acts as a form of welfare for the rich in that it maintains a permanent underclass of exploitable undocumented workers making wages, goods, and services cheaper. Without state repression, this situation would look far different.


Trade, Colonialism, and Sprawl

Unist’ot’en, Wet’suwet’en, and their allies continue to resist the imposition of various pipelines being planned to cut through unceded Wet’suwet’en Territory in northern British Columbia to link the Tar Sands to the west coast for trade with Asia. Down south in Mexico, the Council of Ejidos and Communities in Opposition to La Parota Dam (CECOP) and guerrilla group Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias-Liberación del Pueblo (FAR-LP), continue to resist La Parota hydro-electric dam intended to provide water and electricity to the Port of Acapulco. There are numerous other examples of opposition to the slew of negative impacts of the Athabasca Tar Sands project, against the Keystone XL Pipeline and countless other pipelines, movement of megaloads, development of the Utah Tar Sands, numerous fracking sites, and on and on. These and other forms of resistance are met with state repression. The physical infrastructure of neoliberalism such as highways, mines, pipelines, dams, etc. embody the continuation of colonialism. The plunder results in destruction of indigenous ways of life, displacement of people, and detriment to their health.

Every community the trade corridors cut through is affected by it. To the extent that people are even aware of the intentions meant for their local area, decision-makers may simply promote whatever benefit to the economy that might supposedly be brought by trade traffic. There are bigger plans at work, however. In the so-called Sun Corridor, expanding development, trade infrastructure and policy changes are justified by supposed population growth in general, and promises of prosperity that ideologues of regionalism are using to entice state leaders to embrace CANAMEX. The growth is forecasted by academics and others associated with organizations such as the Brookings Institute, the Morrison Institute working with Arizona State University, and companies such as AECOM promoting the concept of the Sun Corridor. The Sun Corridor is the name for this so-called megapolitan or mega-region consisting of Phoenix and Tucson (and possibly Prescott and Nogales), and making up part of the CANAMEX Corridor. ADOT and other transportation committees have taken this concept of the megapolitan, an economic integration of nearby metropolitan areas that are expected to reach 10 million residents by 2040, as inevitable. The Federal Highway Administration website also includes megapolitans in discussion on planning.

Increased sprawl in the so-called Sun Corridor is generally unpopular. Various communities oppose highways due to environmental impacts on the air, animals, plants, climate, and health. Additionally there are concerns about accidents involving dangerous cargo, and noise pollution. While highways are thought of as a way to improve movement, to the local community they often has the effect of a wall, dividing neighborhoods (not to mention demolishing homes and other places of importance) and often involving actual walls (which helps with noise pollution, but one would rather have a view of the mountains than of a wall). In the case of the Loop 202 Freeway extension, the above issues apply, along with concerns regarding threats to the O’odham way of life and sacred sites. Even if this proposed road isn’t part of the official CANAMEX Corridor, it is meant to support Sun Corridor sprawl and trade traffic.

Often the issue of sprawl or the requirement for expansion is framed as a problem of over-population primarily blamed on immigrants. This blame often functions to shift the responsibility away from massive resource-extraction projects that use water, energy and other resources (a never-ending cycle); use of fuel in trade-related shipping; irresponsible and inefficient planning and expansion; etc. This expansion and required resources is pushed by neoliberal academics and consultants, and even small-time real estate developers, resulting in over-consumption. Applying the label of “sustainable” or “green” to their projects makes it seem that they are doing this responsibly. Water is a particularly volatile issue, threatened by pollution from energy extraction, use of massive amounts in these projects, climate change, and the requirements of supporting the consumption involved with sprawl.


Neoliberalism and Public Private Partnerships

The public-private partnership (PPP or P3) is becoming increasingly more common in North America. Researching the P3s being discussed locally or globally for an infrastructure project is definitely a useful way to follow the money. It should be clear, however, that this type of arrangement is not in and of itself the problem (see most other imposed projects prior to P3s), but the problem is that it carries with it new and more insidious problems.

The main organizations promoting CANAMEX – the Arizona-Mexico Commission (the “godfather” of CANAMEX) and the new Arizona Transportation and Trade Corridor Alliance (TTCA), which is said to encompass the Governor’s CANAMEX taskforce – are both entities comprised of public and private members, with overlapping membership between the AMC and TTCA. The weight of their influence is uncertain, as they are not official decision-making bodies although there is also overlap with government committees. Sometimes an organization like this is referred to as a P3 or a “P3 Unit.” An example of a better-known P3 Unit is the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), exposed in 2011 for its facilitation of collaboration between private prison companies and state legislators, resulting in the proliferation of SB1070-type anti-immigrant laws.

P3s more often refer to business arrangements between the state and private companies, often to build infrastructure and/or to manage a utility or service. P3s have been implemented across the world, primarily in cases where countries are indebted to neoliberal institutions. A lot of water privatization programs across the world are actually P3s. Along the lines of austerity measures, these arrangements in North America are not unlike structural adjustment programs (SAP) mandated in countries in debt to the World Bank or IMF. But while SAPs are largely involuntary, public-private partnerships in North America for projects such as transportation, are being promoted voluntarily as “innovative financing” by many government officials in cahoots with private interests. Compared to total privatization, an arrangement in which the government remains in so-called partnership with private interests makes the scenario easier to stomach for the residents affected, yet the private interests profit while the state government, or more specifically taxpayers, are left in debt to the companies for decades.

Arrangements such as these have been increasingly pushed by neoliberal organizations such as the Security and Prosperity Partnership and its successors, partly to promote the idea that the private sector is more efficient in projects such as for infrastructure, partly because various businesses want to make a buck, and because the funding is not available for these projects that are supposedly needed. The needs of the public are being defined in many ways by private interests such as construction businesses, real estate developers, trucking companies, banks; and in the case of international trade corridors, investment firms, and especially neoliberal think-tanks and consulting services, who often have ties to NAFTA and SPP and/or big banks. A little web research into who the members of P3 organizations are, and who is attending or sponsoring P3 conferences, reveals how steeped in the trend various public officials and big construction companies are.

If a company or companies see dollar signs in a particular project, this project is likely to be prioritized by the state, as in the case of trade transportation, for example. Many people do not even know about the plans for CANAMEX and its freight truck traffic, yet the roads that would facilitate this trade flow are being promoted (by politicians) as useful to the residents of the area in question. New transportation legislation like MAP-21 and institutions such as the Federal Highway Administration encourage and help facilitate public-private partnerships for transportation projects. Private conglomerates can potentially take advantage of loans (such as TIFIA loans) and tax breaks that the state would access. Sometimes in conjunction with, but often in lieu of toll roads, the private companies would receive availability payments, which ultimately come from taxes.

This information became relevant in Arizona when a business conglomerate proposed a P3 to build the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway extension in Phoenix in 2012. Legislation is in place in Arizona for a range of P3 arrangements and Arizona Department of Transportation is salivating for a good P3 deal in transportation.

These public-private partnerships, along with the so-called free trade pacts, are the brainchildren of neoliberalism. Often in discussion on neoliberalism, the political Left presents false dichotomies between privatization vs. the commons (held by the state), and regulation vs. deregulation. While regulation might mean keeping private interests from doing more damage, it encourages a reliance on the settler state to protect the people, meanwhile diverting attention from the ways in which the state has perpetrated harm against the people from its beginning, and has hardly been neutral regarding the interests of the rich. Although perhaps ideologically inconsistent, in practice neoliberalism relies on collaboration between state and the private sector to provide privileges to those private interests in the form of defense and security (police, military, prisons, border security), tax breaks, subsidies, access to information, prioritization, and promotion of private plans. While lobbying dollars and such likely have a lot to do with it, this is not corruption; it is the role of the state in this latest form of capitalism. Capitalism has always involved power and force; neoliberalism just comes in a different form. In this sense, it does not matter the extent to which a project is privatized or neoliberal if it harms people, but the focus is on neoliberalism because it is the primary modern economic form particularly in relation to infrastructure.


CANAMEX Development

The naming of the concept of the CANAMEX Corridor goes back at least to 1993 just prior to the passing of NAFTA, followed by the designation as a High-Priority Corridor by congress in 1995, and implementation of the Arizona Governor’s CANAMEX Task Force in 1998. The Arizona-Mexico Commission (AMC), now along with the TTCA, seems to be the main promoter of the corridor.



The route given for CANAMEX, which is subject to change, involves Mexico Federal Highway 15 in Sonora connecting the Port of Guaymas with the US border in Nogales; State Route 189, Interstates 19, 10, and US Route 93 (and now Interstate 11) in Arizona; Route 93/Interstate 11, Interstates 515 and 15 in Nevada; Interstate 15 through Utah, Idaho, and Montana; then a complicated route involving the following highways in Alberta and British Columbia: 4, 3, 2, 216, 16, 43, 2, and 97.

For a while, it seemed like there was some sort of hiatus on the project, likely due to the economy. However, things picked up in 2012. Currently the primary project within the CANAMEX Corridor is Interstate 11, which is in the study phase. It is meant to provide transportation for freight traffic for which the US Route 93 between Las Vegas and Phoenix is inadequate. In fact, many news articles seem to refer to Interstate 11 interchangeably with the often-unnamed trade corridor stretching from Mexico to Canada.

The Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21) designated this route as Interstate 11 in 2012. Part of what would be Interstate 11, phase one of the Boulder City, a.k.a. the I-11 Loop, is currently in the works. Phase two will connect with the Hoover Dam Bypass which was completed in 2010. A public-private partnership involving a toll road had been a possibility for the Boulder City Bypass in Nevada but this idea was abandoned mid-2013. Instead a gas-tax increase would fund the construction. Public-private partnerships, possibly including tolls, are being discussed for implementation of other parts of Interstate 11. In fact, despite this being a priority corridor, some experts have stated that most new projects would require a P3 or won’t be built at all due to lack of funding.

The Arizona Transportation and Trade Corridor Alliance (TTCA), in conjunction with Pima County, is talking about southern Arizona connectivity, and therefore Interstate would not only connect Las Vegas with Phoenix, but extend through Tucson and Nogales.

Ports of entry along the borders will likely be expanded for easier movement of goods, in addition to seaports such as the Port of Guaymas in Mexico which is the southern tip of the CANAMEX Corridor, due to double in size in the next couple years. The Corridor also involves rail, fiber optic telecommunications, and possibly pipelines.

The CANAMEX Corridor is an important part of NAFTA (and possibly TPP) trade, and as such, is a weak point of globalized infrastructure according to the strategic campaign Root Force. The promise of economic prosperity is used as justification for the imposition of trade infrastructural projects throughout the corridor. Discussion on these “NAFTA Super-Highways” has been dominated by right-wing conspiracy theorists concerned about US sovereignty. It is important to shift the debate towards indigenous sovereignty and solidarity, towards an end to capitalism rather than just a reaction to economic integration, towards an end to resource extraction projects, towards an end to state repression and the state in general.

See stopcanamex.blogspot.com for more info.

Designed to Kill: Border Policy and How to Change it (Crimethinc)

This article is from the Crimethinc. reading library. I imagine it'll be printed in Rolling Thunder. It is definitely worth a read, really well written, and covers so much ground regarding the issues. If this piece of writing had existed 5 years ago, i probably wouldn't have felt so compelled to start my own writing on such subjects.

There are a few things I would've said differently, but one thing i especially wish it would've addressed more was the way the border impacts indigenous communities on the border. I think this is such an important piece of the puzzle, especially when so many anarchists and other anti-authoritarians support others' fight for Comprehensive Immigration Reform which would only contribute to more border militarization.

Designed to Kill: Border Policy and How to Change it

For a number of years now I’ve worked in the desert on the Mexican-American border with a group that provides humanitarian aid to migrants who are attempting to enter the United States—a journey that claims hundreds of lives every year. We’ve spent years mapping the trails that cross this desert. We walk the trails, find places to leave food and water along them, look for people in distress, and provide medical care when we run into someone who needs it. If the situation is bad enough, we can get an ambulance or helicopter to bring people to the hospital. We strive to act in accordance with the migrants’ wishes at all times, and we never call the Border Patrol on people who don’t want to turn themselves in.
During this time I’ve been a part of many extraordinary situations and I’ve heard about many more. Some of the things I’ve seen have been truly heartwarming, and some of them have been deeply sad and wrong. I’ve seen people who were too weak to stand, too sick to hold down water, hurt too badly to continue, too scared to sleep, too sad for words, hopelessly lost, desperately hungry, literally dying of thirst, never going to be able to see their children again, vomiting blood, penniless in torn shoes two thousand miles from home, suffering from heat stroke, kidney damage, terrible blisters, wounds, hypothermia, post-traumatic stress, and just about every other tribulation you could possibly think of. I’ve been to places where people were robbed and raped and murdered; my friends have found bodies. In addition to bearing witness to others’ suffering, I myself have fallen off of cliffs, torn my face open on barbed wire, run out of water, had guns pointed at me, been charged by bulls and circled by vultures, jumped over rattlesnakes, pulled pieces of cactus out of many different parts of my body with pliers, had to tear off my pants because they were full of fire ants, gotten gray hairs, and in general poured no small amount of my own sweat, blood, and tears into the thirsty desert. Read more...

Private Paramilitary-Style Training Camp Approved for Border

A company called Wind Zero got approval to build a huge private complex for paramilitary-style training, similar to the camp proposed by Blackwater (now Xe).

According to Narco News' $100 Million Drug-War Garrison Approved for U.S.-Mexican Border, the company's founder, former Navy SEAL sniper, U.S. intelligence agency operative and author Brandon Webb said in a YouTube video: 

Mexico is very close to civil war right now; it doesn’t take much to buy off somebody and next thing you know, the president is assassinated and then what? A civil war breaks out, and we have a million Mexican citizens crossing the border into the U.S., and it’s the same situation that you have in Afghanistan and Pakistan. You have all these refugees coming across and Pakistan’s like, “What do we do with this?”

It’s not outlandish for that scenario to happen. So how do you prepare for that? You got to train these guys, and that’s law enforcement and the military.

The article notes that there are likely to be plans to operate drones, aka unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) out of this facility.

Currently, under the oversight of the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection agency, about a half a dozen Predator B (Reaper) drones are now operating along the southern U.S. border and coastal regions of the U.S., from Florida through Eastern California.
And it seems the Mexican government itself is operating UAVs, or drones, over the U.S.-Mexican border. A recent news story revealed that a Mexican drone dropped out of the sky earlier this month and crashed onto an El Paso, Texas, street...

The U.S. and Mexican governments are already operating joint military missions targeting so-called “kingpin” narco-traffickers. As evidence of that reality, the Washington Post recently reported on a State Department cable made public through WikiLeaks that supports facts reported by Narco News in June 2010...

Would it be any surprise if the U.S. and Mexican governments, via private contractors and/or government operations, also are coordinating drone missions along the border?

(It's worth noting as well that Miami Police have recently purchased a drone for the use of keeping tabs on the residents as well.)

About the training "camp" Narco News continues: 

Beyond its usefulness as a drone operations and training center, the planned Wind zero camp also will offer plenty of other features necessary for training special operations soldiers and/or paramilitary forces.
The camp, which would be developed in three phases at a cost of up to $100 million (some $15 million for Phase 1), also will include numerous shooting ranges allowing for some 57,000 rounds of ammunition to be fired off daily; a mock-up of an urban neighborhood for practices assaults; a 6-mile dual-use race track for teaching defensive and offensive driving (and for private-pay recreational use); and enough housing and RV camper space (along with a 100-room hotel) to accommodate a small battalion of warriors.

The article states that residents of the town, in addition to the Sierra Club have opposed this project, but, "Wind Zero marshaled the support of numerous law enforcement agencies in the region that would be able to make use of the facility for training purposes."

Reading up on O'odham border struggle

Far too often in my writing and my actions, I have marginalized O'odham experiences and struggles regarding the border and the effects of immigration enforcement on the reservation and in the city. I am not the only one, so in reading up on the issues, I am sharing the links below with you so you can also read up. These issues should really be central for so many reasons.

For one, the injustices that O'odham face are sometimes worse because they are invisible to so many. It is also part of an ongoing onslaught of colonialism (on the part of the Spanish then the Mexican State then the US) and white supremacy. We can see many patterns when looking at the historical and present forced removal of indigenous people from their lands in the US, and the way migrants (mostly indigenous) are also forced from their land by economic and other conditions. If we are concerned solely with racial profiling and legalization for the undocumented, we are perpetuating harm by allowing it to continue. Calls for comprehensive immigration reform do not tend to call into question the demand for border security. The government might legalize a bunch of people (maybe) but will there be more border walls? Won't there still be the conditions that have led to mass migration in the first place? I have more to say on this, but I will work on that later.

A quick note though, I included several documents on the border issues, but I also wanted to include some info on the south mountain freeway which you should especially know about if you live in Maricopa County. This isn't so much related to the border, but if it gets built on the reservation, it will displace people and put a border/barrier through their communities. If there is destruction to south mountain, it would disturb a sacred site. There are many to ignore the local struggles of people here, but you should know about it.


Websites:
O'odham Solidarity Across Borders Collective

O'odham Solidarity Project

Articles/Documents:
Fear of a Milighan Planet part 1 and part 2

Immigration, Imperialism and Cultural Genocide: An interview with O’odham Activist Ofelia Rivas concerning the effects of a proposed wall on the US / Mexico border Interviewed by, Jeff Hendricks

RESISTANCE AND COLLABORATION O’ODHAM RESPONSES TO U.S. INVASION by J.D. HENDRICKS

Traditional O'odham statement at the Zapatistas' Encuentro 2007

Shame on the New York Times for Fueling Border Misery By Brenda Norrell January 2010

Hate and Death on the Border By BRENDA NORRELL December 2009

O'odham: Surviving apartheid on the illegal border By Brenda Norrell November 2009

A Border Runs Through Them: The Struggles of the Tohono O'odham By BRENDA NORRELL November 2009

Indigenous Peoples Vow to Bring Down Apartheid Border Wall by Brenda Norrell November 2007

Indigenous Border Summit Opposes Border Wall and Militarization By Brenda Norrell October 2006

Video:
Tohono O'odham and U S Border Patrol (youtube video)

Imaginary Borders, Real Obstructions (youtube video)

Videos on the South mountain Freeway:
South Mountain Freeway Proposal - Public Comments pt 1 and pt 2

South Mountian Freeway Protest

Article on Freeway:
Sal DiCiccio’s Loop 202 Problem: Phoenix Councilman Would Benefit from Reviled Ahwatukee Freeway Extension

Breaking down the Mexican Drug War

It is interesting to see how quickly the debate about border security has become dominated by the issue of violence and drugs. I thought i was just hearing more about it because i became interested in the parallels between the drug war and the war on migrants, turning to narco news for information, which also resulted in me getting google news alerts on the merida initiative or plan mexico. I have several articles bookmarked, waiting for me to read so i can better understand the implications of the plan mexico and other responses to the violence and the drug trade.

The drug cartel violence has been in the news in the US more lately because Hillary Clinton went down to Mexico to talk about it, and Obama recently decided to send more agents down to the border. I believe that some people are mainly afraid of the violence touching US citizens. I believe there are other stronger political motivations for getting involved.

What i have made of it so far is that the violence has increased because the drug war in Columbia caused cartels to form or grow in mexico to transport the same cocaine, along with marijuana and other drugs. The political corruption in Mexico is well known. In fact, most people figure that in the war on drugs, it's just that one cartel has been favored over the others, leading to more access to resources and impunity and therefore more war over turf. Of course the mexican government would rather control the cartels, and several within the government probably want there to be no cartels. However, since illicit drugs are the number one source of revenue in Mexico, it's no wonder that so many people, from poor youths to police officers, to the president, and from what i hear even people in the US DEA, are involved in it.

An important part of this is Los Zetas, "former Mexican soldiers from an elite US-trained Special Forces team who deserted to work in the more lucrative drug trade". They were trained as death squads, and in torture at the School of Americas. "While Los Zetas started out as the Gulf cartel’s private army, they appear to be diversifying their operations. The DEA reported this year that it believes Los Zetas are attempting to break free from the Gulf cartel to form their own cartel... Los Zetas have entered the immigration industry in southern Mexico with relative ease and little resistance from other more established Mexican cartels." This and more information can be found at "Wall of Violence" on Mexico's Southern Border by Kristin Bricker. See also: US created monsters: Zetas and Kaibiles death squads by Brenda Norrell.

Despite knowing that Los Zetas were trained by the US and now are involved in the violence of the drug war that the US is so concerned about, the government wants to provide more resources and training to the mexican army. This also despite the common knowledge of the corruption. Of course, this isn't so unusual since we know that Osama bin Laden and others were also trained by the US.

The bad decisions made under the guise of a war against drugs also fits the pattern of the previous failed attempts in the war against drugs in Columbia. Efforts have not been made to deal with the demand for drugs (legalization, decriminalization and/or treatment). I believe that everyone mainly wants drug cartels under control. Whether or not they really want to stop the drug trade is another story. In fact, there is much evidence that the US government, or at least certain individuals are directly involved in the drug trade.

What I am primarily concerned about is what the training, resources, and whatever else is going to the mexican army will mean for indigenous and rebellious communities in mexico. There are already too many examples of disappearings, murder, torture, imprisonment, and other abuses as it is. Zapatista communities have been invaded by soldiers claiming to be looking for marijuana plants, despite the communities having a policy against drugs and alcohol. See another case: Video: Plan Mexico threatens peaceful Mexican communities. See also EZLN Criticizes the Drug War.

I think it was John Ross's book Zapatistas: Making Another World Possible: Chronicles of Resistance 2000-2006 in which he described foreign investor's concern that the Mexican government get the Zapatistas under control after the uprising in 1994. US investors have a lot of stake in being able to exploit mexican people and resources. Something that could not continue if they were able to break free. It is likely not a coincidence that the huge uprising in Oaxaca occurred recently and now the US government is getting involved militarily to help maintain the stability of the the country. On a side note, i find it interesting that so many anti-immigrant folks would argue that migrants should go back to mexico to fight for a better country. I hope that if it came down to it, those people would protest any effort the US government makes to help the mexican government stop a rebellion. I don't see that happening.

The Merida Initiative will also benefit the military industrial complex by putting money into buying US-made aircraft and other technology, as Kristin Bricker describes in US Releases $90 million in Plan Mexico Military Hardware and Training.

This drug war is, in a way, already affecting people in the US. Sheriff Arpaio is giving as his primary reason for pulling over every brown-skinned driver, the fact that some undocumented immigrants are falling victim to those involved in drug and human trafficking in maricopa county. This is resulting in the undocumented immigrants who get caught up in the sweeps lingering in jail, detention centers, or being deported, in addition to getting abused, in some cases, by officers (although aside from broken arms, i'd call the whole operation abuse).

In addition, youth of color in the US may be further targeted in the drug war. According to Kristin BrickerGangs: New Target in the War on Drugs? "Since the US is the world's biggest drug market and Mexican drug trafficking organizations' primary source of weapons, US officials can't blame Latin America for all of its drug woes. So they're turning to gangs. The US government recently released three major drug-related reports: the National Drug Threat Assessment, the International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, and the National Gang Threat Assessment. In all reports, gangs figure prominently in drug trafficking. The International Narcotics Control Strategy Report is broken down by country, and gangs feature prominently in almost every country report."

So the question is, what can be done? Although i never thought of myself as someone who would put effort into the legalization of drugs, this seems like a reasonable way to stop the drug cartels. In fact, i'm seeing more discussions about drug legalization in mainstream media and apparently El Paso's city council are talking about it as well. We know that the economic situation, as well as the natural corruptness of those in power are the main problem. People in the US need to bring to light was is really going on here, stop the Merida Initiative, and all militarization on the border, and in our communities. We need long term strategies fighting neo-liberal projects, capitalism, and the state in Mexico and the US.



Further reading:

US Police Train Mexican Police to Torture

Estado Fallido en México: Una justificación para la militarización (babel fish translation)

Why Plan Mexico will Crash and Burn

Video: Plan Mexico threatens peaceful Mexican communities