Sessions to tour Arizona-Mexico border Tuesday

ASTRID GALVAN
The Associated Press

U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday will take a tour of the U.S.-Mexico border during a visit to Arizona.

Sessions will tour what is mostly rough terrain along the international border in Nogales, Arizona, about roughly 70 miles south of Tucson.

Sessions has made immigration enforcement a key Justice Department priority, saying he will speed up deportations of immigrants in the country illegally who were convicted of federal crimes.

He’s defended federal immigration authorities who make arrests at courthouses, a practice advocates and the California Supreme Court Chief justice say impedes on people’s access to justice.

Sessions is visiting the once-busiest area for illegal border crossings and drug smuggling in the country. But over the past few years, traffic has shifted to the Rio Grande Valley in Texas.

The Tucson Sector of the Border Patrol, which comprises most of Arizona, saw about 65,000 a! rrests last fiscal year, roughly half the amount it saw in 2012.