Build two walls: A physical wall and a 'policy wall'

For years, I worked the southwest border as a Border Patrol agent and as a special agent. A wall, barrier, bulwark, fortification, or whatever it is called will work. A physical barrier limits narcotics trafficking through the porous border areas and will likewise funnel migrants to areas that the Border Patrol can focus enforcement and humanitarian efforts.

Migrants choose the path of least resistance when crossing the border, taking them through unforgiving deadly terrain with over 250 perishing in 2018 alone. The narcotics smugglers also traffic immeasurable tons of narcotics across the border unfettered. Every year, Homeland Security pushes new technology to the border. Technology simply does not stop all human traffic or narcotics smugglers from crossing north into the United States.

From my many years on the border, I know border walls work. But with a wall, there also needs to be robust efforts to curb the flow of economic migrants. A "policy wall" needs to be built that deters employers from hiring undocumented workers.

When I worked for the DHS Human Smuggling cell, the message south of the border was to get to the United States; jobs are waiting. I'm sure this message is still pushed in Central America. This message is a large part of the problem.

There are over 7 million undocumented migrants working in the U.S., according to the Pew Research Center. Immigration and Customs Enforcement can focus additional efforts on investigating employers that are knowingly and illegally hiring these over 7 million economic migrants. Stop this unlawful hiring, and you take that financial enticement away. Economic migrants do suffer from abusive employers as well. According to ICE, these employers "employ force, threats or coercion (for example, threatening to have employees deported) in order to keep the unauthorized alien workers from reporting substandard wage or working conditions."

Last year, ICE audited thousands of businesses to find out if they were complying with federal laws, many were not. ICE took additional steps by tripling worksite enforcement investigations in 2018 from those conducted in 2017. These investigations not only target illegal hiring but "often involve additional criminal activity, such as alien smuggling, human trafficking, money laundering, document fraud, worker exploitation and/or substandard wage and working conditions."

A "policy wall" specifically targeting scofflaw employers can work with support from Congress and President Trump. Perhaps an executive order focusing ICE enforcement efforts, coupled with an appropriations bill passed by Congress funding this effort, would send a clear message to employers that the uptick in worksite enforcement is not going to stop anytime soon.

For failing to follow the law, U.S. employers were ordered to pay over $100 million in civil fines and judicial forfeitures during worksite enforcement operations in 2018. And that $100 million could go a long way in securing the border. How much does that wall cost, again?

Jason Piccolo is a former Border Patrol agent, ICE special agent, and DHS supervisor. He is a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and author of Unwavering: A Border Agent's Journey from Hunter to Hunted.