Silvestre Reyes

Silvestre Reyes
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Texas's 16th district
Incumbent
Assumed office January 3, 1997
Preceded by	Ron Coleman
Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee
In office January 4, 2007 – January 3, 2011
Preceded by	Peter Hoekstra
Succeeded by	Mike Rogers
Personal details
Born	November 10, 1944 (1944-11-10) Canutillo, Texas
Political party	Democratic
Spouse(s)	Carolina Reyes
Residence	El Paso, Texas
Occupation	Border Patrol Sector Chief
Religion	Roman Catholic
Military service
Service/branch	United States Army
Years of service	1966-1968
Battles/wars	Vietnam War

Silvestre "Silver" Reyes (born November 10, 1944) is the U.S. Representative for Texas's 16th congressional district, serving since 1997. He is a member of the Democratic Party. He was Chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence between 2007 and 2011.

Early life, education and career

Reyes was born in Canutillo, Texas, in 1944 and is the first of 10 children. He graduated from Canutillo High School and received his Associate's Degree from El Paso Community College. He attended the University of Texas at Austin before serving in the United States Army in 1966. In 1967, Reyes served as a helicopter crew chief in the Vietnam War. In 1968, Reyes suffered complete hearing loss to his right ear when mortar landed near his foxhole during combat.

In 1969, Reyes joined the U.S. Border Patrol where he served for over 26 years. From 1984 - 1995 Reyes served as the Sector Chief for the McAllen and El Paso Sectors of the Border Patrol. In 1993, while serving as the Chief Patrol Agent of the El Paso Border Patrol Sector, Reyes led the Border Patrol to strategically position agents on the border to intercept undocumented immigrants in a strategy later termed "Operation Hold the Line". This operation was the predecessor to a similar operation dubbed "Operation Gatekeeper" in Southern California. Such tactics were not without controversy, as placing Border Patrol Agents in high visibility positions placed them at tremendous risk from rock and firearms assaults from the Mexican side of the border. Immigrant-rights groups also protested the strategy, as it was effective in deterring undocumented aliens from crossing in protected urban areas such as El Paso and San Diego, California and as such "forced" them to cross through desolate parts of the Southern United States, such as the deserts of the Imperial Valley in California and the Sonora desert in Arizona. Reyes gained enormous popularity in the 16th Congressional District due to the Operation's success in reducing undocumented immigration.

U.S. House of Representatives

As a senior member of both the Armed Services and (formerly) Select Intelligence Committees, Reyes is a key member of Congress on Defense and military issues. He is credited with the recent success of Fort Bliss and White Sands military bases in the most recent Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) decisions by the Department of Defense. On December 1, 2006, Reyes was tapped by Pelosi, the prospective Speaker of the House, to be the new chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.

Reyes was a key player in the 109th Congress because of his Immigration and Border Patrol experience. He was instrumental in leading the opposition to the House immigration proposal proposed by James Sensenbrenner, H.R. 4437. Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi selected Reyes to present and lead the debate on a Democratic substitute to replace the Sensenbrenner legislation, which was voted down on a party line vote.

Reyes has served as chairman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus. In 2002, he considered running for the United States Senate, but decided against such a move. In 2005 he missed 94 votes in the House, the ninth most of any member.

On March 27, 2009, Reyes was tapped by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to lead a high-level Congressional Delegation to meet with President Felipe Calderon of Mexico. Reyes led the delegation and was accompanied by Ike Skelton, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and Howard Berman, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. The three high-ranking Chairman discussed Mexico's efforts to combat drug-related violence and assessed U.S. efforts to assist the Mexican government.

In his role as Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Reyes was a deciding factor in whether legislation on the floor of the House extending provisions of the FISA would include retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies which participated in the NSA's warrantless wiretap program. Although he initially supported immunity for telecommunications companies, saying that immunity was necessary and the companies hadn't done anything illegal, eventually after being contacted by pressure groups, the version of the legislation he introduced did not contain provisions for telecom immunity, despite Republican threats to torpedo any bill that did not contain telecom immunity.

In a December 2006 interview with Congressional Quarterly, Reyes said that al-Qaeda, an exclusively Sunni group, was composed of "both" Sunni and Shi'te members. He then instead asserted al-Qaeda is "predominantly probably Shi'ite." He also avoided answering the question whether Hezbollah, a Shi'ite organization, was Sunni or Shi'ite.

In the same interview, Reyes said he favors sending more troops to Iraq: "on a temporary basis, I’m willing to ramp them up by twenty or thirty thousand ... for, I don’t know, two months, four months, six months – but certainly that would be an exception." Yet, a month later, when President George W. Bush proposed sending approximately 21,500 more troops, Reyes said to the El Paso Times, "we don't have the capability to escalate even to this minimal level."

Committee assignments

• Committee on Armed Services
  • Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces (Ranking Member)
  • Subcommittee on Readiness

Caucus Memberships

• Congressional Arts Caucus

• Congressional Hispanic Caucus

Awards

ASME honored Reyes with the ASME President's Award on April 3, 2008. ASME President Sam Zamrik presented the award in recognition of Reyes' "outstanding contributions in promoting diversity in the science, technology, engineering, and math fields" as the co-founder of the Congressional Diversity and Innovation Caucus.

Political campaigns

In 1995, Reyes retired from the U.S. Border Patrol and announced his candidacy for the U.S. Congress against Ron Coleman in the Democratic primary, but Coleman later retired. After winning a primary runoff, Reyes was easily elected to the House of Representatives as a Democrat in November 1996. He was most recently re-elected by a wide margin in the November 2008 General Election, where he won with over 82 percent of the vote.

External links

• U.S. Representative Silvestre Reyes official U.S. House site
• Silvestre Reyes for U.S. Congress official campaign site
• Biography at WhoRunsGov.com at The Washington Post
• Biography at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
• Voting record maintained by The Washington Post
• Biography, voting record, and interest group ratings at Project Vote Smart
• Congressional profile at GovTrack
• Congressional profile at OpenCongress
• Issue positions and quotes at On The Issues
• Financial information at OpenSecrets.org
• Staff salaries, trips and personal finance at LegiStorm.com
• Campaign finance reports and data at the Federal Election Commission
• Appearances on C-SPAN programs
• Profile at SourceWatch
• U.S. Congressman's Family Member Kidnapped in Juarez, June 2008
• Reyes the Rainmaker: Electronics and earmarks on the border, Tom Barry, Newspaper Tree, September 17, 2009

United States House of Representatives
Preceded by Ronald D. Coleman	Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from Texas's 16th congressional district 1997–present	Incumbent
Political offices
Preceded by Peter Hoekstra Michigan	Chairman of House Intelligence Committee 2007–2011	Succeeded by Mike Rogers Michigan
United States order of precedence
Preceded by Joe Pitts R-Pennsylvania	United States Representatives by seniority 131st	Succeeded by Steve Rothman D-New Jersey