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TechnoratiLAUREL, Miss. - A day after the largest single-workplace immigration raid in U.S. history, Elizabeth Alegria was too scared to send her son to school and worried about when she'd see her husband again.
![[Danielle Martinez, 24, of Laurel, Miss., complains Wednesday, Aug. 27, 2008, about the unfairness of the immigration raid at the Howard Industries plant in Laurel which netted about 600 suspected illegal immigrants Monday. Martinez was assisting some immigrant families in removing their vehicles from the employee parking lot before they were towed.
(AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis)]](http://www.commondreams.org/files/article_images/immigrantmissppi.jpg "immigrantmissppi.jpg")
Nearly 600 immigrants suspected of being in the country
illegally were detained, creating panic among dozens of families in
this small southern Mississippi town.
Alegria, 26, a Mexican immigrant, was working at the Howard Industries transformer plant Monday when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents stormed in. When they found out she has two sons, ages 4 and 9, she was fitted with a bracelet and told to appear in federal court next month. But her husband, Andres, wasn't so lucky.
"I'm very traumatized because I don't know if they are going to let my husband go and when I will see him," Alegria said through a translator Tuesday as she returned to the Howard Industries parking lot to retrieve her sport utility vehicle.
The superintendent of the county school district said about half of approximately 160 Hispanic students were absent Tuesday.
Roberto Velez, pastor at Iglesia Cristiana Peniel, where an estimated 30 to 40 percent of the 200 parishioners were caught up in the raid, said parents were afraid immigration officials would take them.
"They didn't send their kids to school today," he said. "How scared is that?"
One worker caught in Monday's sweep at the plant said fellow workers applauded as immigrants were taken into custody. Federal officials said a tip from a union member prompted them to start investigating several years ago.
Fabiola Pena, 21, cradled her 2-year-old daughter as she described a chaotic scene at the plant as the raid began, followed by clapping.
"I was crying the whole time. I didn't know what to do," Pena said. "We didn't know what was happening because everyone started running. Some people thought it was a bomb but then we figured out it was immigration."
About 100 of the 595 detained workers were released for humanitarian reasons, many of them mothers who were fitted with electronic monitoring bracelets and allowed to go home to their children, officials said.
About 475 other workers were transferred to an ICE facility in Jena, La. Nine who were under 18 were transferred to the custody of the Office of Refugee Resettlement.
John Foxworth, an attorney representing some of the immigrants, said eight appeared in federal court in Hattiesburg on Tuesday because they face criminal charges for allegedly using false Social Security and residency identification.
He said the raid was traumatic for families.
"There was no communication, an immediate loss of any kind of news and a lack of understanding of what's happening to their loved ones," he said. "A complete and utter feeling of helplessness."
Those detained were from Brazil, El Salvador, Germany, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Panama, and Peru, said Barbara Gonzalez, an ICE spokeswoman.
"We have kids without dads and pregnant mothers who got their husbands taken away," said Velez's son, Robert, youth pastor at the church. "It was like a horror story. They got handled like they were criminals."
Howard Industries is in Mississippi's Pine Belt region, known for commercial timber growth and chicken processing plants. The tech company produces dozens of products ranging from electrical transformers to medical supplies, according to its Web site.
Gonzalez said agents had executed search warrants at both the plant and the company headquarters in nearby Ellisville. She said no company executives had been detained, but this was an "ongoing investigation and yesterday's action was just the first part."
A woman at the Ellisville headquarters told The Associated Press on Tuesday that no one was available to answer questions.
In a statement to the Laurel Leader-Call newspaper, Howard Industries said the company "runs every check allowed to ascertain the immigration status of all applicants for its jobs."
Gov. Haley Barbour recently signed a law requiring Mississippi employers to use a U.S. Homeland Security system to check new workers' immigration status.
The law took effect July 1 for businesses with state contracts and takes effect Jan. 1 for other businesses. Mississippi lawmakers once used laptops made by Howard Industries, but it's not clear whether the company has current state contracts.
Under the law, a company found guilty of employing illegal immigrants could lose public contracts for three years and the right to do business in Mississippi for a year.
The law also makes it a felony for an illegal immigrant to accept a job in Mississippi. A message was left with the district attorney's office after hours seeking comment on whether he would use the law to bring state charges against Howard Industries or the workers.
The Mississippi raid is one of several nationwide in recent years.
On May 12, federal immigration officials swept into Agriprocessors, the nation's largest kosher meatpacking plant, in Iowa. Nearly 400 workers were detained and dozens of fraudulent permanent resident alien cards were seized from the plant's human resources department, according to court records. In December 2006, 1,297 were arrested at Swift meatpacking plants in Nebraska and five other states.
Associated Press Writers Shelia Byrd in Hattiesburg, Emily Wagster Pettus in Jackson and Eileen Sullivan in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.
60 Comments so far
Show All"They passed the law when the majority of immigrants names changed from Smith, O'Reilly, MacDonald and Fitzgerald to Reinitz, Finklestein, Cohen and Katz."
Truth, you almost got it right, but rather than jews - I think they really bristled against poeple with names like Vanzetti, Yuchenko, Kucinich, Yugovic, Yablonski, Glockenreither, - and were still pretty suspicious of names like "O'Reilly".
Many Jews were lumped together with other Eastern Europeans along with Russians, Hungarians, et al.
My Great-grandfather was listed as German and my great-grandmother was listed as Hungarian on passenger manifests.
But the fact is the same, it was only when immigration shifted from Britain and Northern Europe to the East and South that they passed a law.
American Agri-business used NAFTA to get rid of Mexican import tariffs of food products. The small Mexican farmer could not compete against ADM and was forced to stop farming. Lacking opportunity at home, they then traveled to the U.S., and found employment in American Agri-business, the same people who forced them off their land.
Same thing happened in 1880 with Italians. After the native american genocide in the plains states were completed, cheap American wheat flooded the Italian market, forcing Italian farmers off their land, and causing them to immigrate to the U.S.
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"Billy" Howard started making pole-type transformers for the electric utility industry back in the '70's. His advantage was that he was employing non-unionized former agricultural workers - competing against Westinghouse in Athens GA - Jefferson City MO, General Electric in Hickory NC, and McGraw Edison in MO, all of which were unionized facilities with a higher standard of living for factory-assembly workers. Interestingly, all of these competitors were working out of facilities in the South, having moved there from the North to take advantage of lower labor costs. GE then moved production to Mexico, the Athens workers have accepted pay cuts - but Billy Howard continues to dominate. When you see the roster of products on the Howard Industries website, you can perceive that he has moved into businesses that are an unlikely combination: larger power transformers, fluorescent ballasts, medical equipment, personal computers, trucking. The technological unrelatedness of these product lines tells us that his one advantage is cheap labor, making essentially me-too product lines, contrributing nothing to the various technologies, except low cost. The immigration problem is surely complex, involving humanitarian questions of how people should be treated - and an odious notion of "foreigners" being some lower order of existence. It is a question: can we raise the whole world to an educated state of birth control by sending our jobs away? Or, are we simply rushing to a third world bottom by denying employment to the US people? The "winners" appear to be European and Asian countries that have followed a policy of raising barriers against foreign competition to shelter and develop their domestic industries - because full employment is a legitimate duty of government. I simply don't know about immigration in Europe and Asia; I can't comment on that. Milton Friedman's theories have proven to be valid for an imaginary world, perhaps of global population less that,3 billion people. Until that halcyon era, we had better sort out a policy of penalties for exporting jobs. - and recognize that Sam Walton was a jerk in his monomania about low price.
"There were no immigration laws then". You guys are right, there weren't. We didn't ask the Native Americans for permission to move here and they didn't offer visas. That's known as illegal immigration.
As for no support for immigrants: when my great-grandparents came over from Eastern Europe in the 1890's they settled into a Jewish neighborhood in what is now The Bronx. There they had support and community to fall back on as they were discriminated against so they wouldn't take "American" jobs. My great-grandmother worked in a sweatshop and my great-grandfather worked as a painter because those were jobs Americans didn't want and they needed the labor.
Our government, alarmed at the horde of swarthy immigrants, passed the first immigration act in 1924.
They passed the law when the majority of immigrants names changed from Smith, O'Reilly, MacDonald and Fitzgerald to Reinitz, Finklestein, Cohen and Katz.
First it was the Irish, then it was the Japanese, after that came the Eatern Europeans, next were the Jews and now it's Mexicans who send nativists into a fever pitch.
This is all very nice.
Enlighten us, how many BILLIONS of third world escapees should the United States take because of what we did or did not do sometime before most of our grandparents' were born?
Perhaps I should ask a more succint question, how worried are YOU about losing your exploitable, illegal gardner?
T _ _ _ ___ T E L L E R
I dare you to respond "below", where I set the record into an assemblance of collectively agreed upon reality, which some might consider even truthful. Do you know what that means ?
____ enliven August 29th, 2008 12:51 pm ____
You have no concept of the actual global responsibility for our long standing & continuing economic disaster capitalism with the sick propping up of despicable dictators, who keep our fruit prices low, while egregiously torturing their own people and the entire hemisphere.
Of course they run into the "illegal" arms of Uncle Sam -- he gave them an engraved invitation, right on their backs !
Namaste
Again, because our rich prop up their "dictators" (The two biggest sending countries are Mexico and Brazil, neither of which are "dictatorships") you seem to be arguing that the rich must be "punished" with a ready source of serfs. Kind of cool, no, if you are rich....And screw you, I suppose if you are a working class man or woman seeing your wages and benefits eroded because of the threat of being replaced with an illegal.
But hey, namaste, I am sure you enjoy your underpaid gardner:)
How lame your perception is, perhaps you were an unknowing victim of bright sizing ( all those smarter than you left ) ?
The rich contrived to create the exodus, to create the enslavement and lower paying wages -- so the punishment would be to force the rich to pay higher salaries, stop the flow of immigrants -- EXACTLY the opposite of what you thought that I said:
________ "arguing that the rich must be "punished" with a ready source of serfs."
How bogus your misplaced race hatred and bigotry is for immigrants, which I imagine has much to do with where they come from. You likely wouldn't care if equal numbers of Swedes came in, as they'd not be competing with you for the shrinking pool of 'working class jobs'.
The rich eliminated the tele_help jobs, moving them electronically to India -- not even in the same hemisphere as "illegals", and not even remotely having anything to do with "illegals" taking jobs from Americans. Those workers in India are in fact perfectly legal, while in fact costing much less to corporate infrastructure balance sheets, than the previous Americans who held those jobs before outsourcing ( aka downsizing "costs", maximizing profits )
Haven't you heard that the Global elitists are pushing us EVERYWHERE toward elimination of the middle class ?
Namaste
I think it's about time that the illegal aliens all across the county were evicted from the United States! I know for a fact that if the same jobs were offered to citizens they would take them in this economy, even if they were minimum wage. We don't need to outsource any more of our labor!
"because of what we did or did not do sometime before most of our grandparents' were born"
TruthTeller, you're joking, right? "Because of what we DID"? Do you truly believe that the CURRENT economic (i.e., trade "agreements") and military (i.e., invasions, occupations, US-backed governments/military, military "aid,") policies of this country aren't creating chaos for millions of people as we speak? Please.
Please place the blame for illegal immigration in our country squarely where it belongs. On business for buying people in government to allow them to exploit these poor people and have the average American subsidize their wages and the Latino governments, especially Mexico that refuse responsibility for their own citizens.
If you support illegal immigration, you support corruption, slave wages for the exploited, depressing wages for the American worker, adding costs to our taxes to support these illegals and based on present evidence producing a permanent underclass because illegal immigration simply produces more illegal immigration.
Time for the lies to stop.
Let me see if I understand you:
BECAUSE American business owners and industrialist/capitalists are VERY VERY BAD, and exploit the third world,
THEREFORE we should "punish" these business owners and industrialists by allowing in illegal aliens who selfsame business owners can exploit by hiring at half the salary of there former, American, workers.
This is punishment? Rip off the third world and get handed a bunch of slaves?? Cool, where do I sign up for some?
Thanks for bringing a bit of common sense to this problem.
Absolutely right. This is an issue of illegal aliens being a ready labor pool that allowed depression of wages and destruction of the unions. It is not the fault of the aliens that they did this, anyone can understand their motives but this argument is not about:
Who was here first. (Native Americans then Europeans then Mexicans)
Who benefited from them coming. (Oligarchs and agribusiness)
How they got here (half and half overstaying visas and illegal entry)
Their race (60% latino, 30% asian, 10% european)
This is about getting rid of cheap foreign labor that did not obey the laws on the books today; labor that destroyed the entry level position for citizens. We, we progressives, need to be in the vanguard of sending these people home so that they can force change on their own countries and at the same time rebuild the low end of our economy so that people that DO have the right to be here can get jobs.
We need to move to work on getting these folks home. We need a wall to keep new ones from coming in. We need to prosecute the poo out of employeers who hire them. And we need to help them get some traction in their own countries. Maybe it is time to leave GATT and NAFTA to protect their economies from our gravity.
Still, illegal aliens need to go home. End of story and that IS a progressive position.
ARREST THE BOSS. He is hiring people illegally. And don't tell me 300 poor country people are each so clever that they fool him.
Also, we need to make legal immigration easier, more sensible, more predictable. The employers are using the vulnerability of the undocumented workers to lower the going wages and working conditions.
But we wouldn't arrest the boss. No. For one thing, it would be only one body rather than hundreds to populate the privately contracted immigration jails. For another, the government/employers really want the undocumented workers here working for low wages and undermining unions and uppity workers. The arrests here and there are to scare the immigrant population as a whole into compliance with anything the boss wants, I think.
What do the unions think about arresting the employers who are super-exploiting the undocumented while denying jobs to citizens and those who got their green cards?
Joe
Immigration to our country is easier than to any other country in the world. Why would you want to make it easier? Other than that we agree. Though I'd suggest that the increased enforcement is simply because over 80% of Americans oppose illegal immigration and most truly understand its enormous costs, economically, enviornmentally, educationally and socially.
Heck yes, lock the scumbag up, and hit the company with fines so bad that it is driven into bankruptcy.
I'd like a place on the beach somewhere around Cancun.
But somehow sneaking across the border and just moving into one doesn't seem like the way to get one.
Maybe if some of the bleeding hearts in here could move to Mexico, then defend "my right" to have a beach front property by explaining to the Mexican authorities how I can't afford a decent beach front property in my own country. Then perhaps they could go on to justify my presence by telling the Mexican authorities I am only there to do the jobs Mexicans don't want. Then perhaps I can have free health care and a drivers license courtesy of the Mexican government.
The first part of illegal immigrant is ILLEGAL.
Actually, Chiapas is presently FULL of illegal Central Americans doing "jobs that Mexicans won't do". If they way they are treated was the way we treat illegals in the US, the Mexican government would have a fit.
"Actually" ... Mexico's puppet government has treated undocumented immigrants how they do WITH THE SUPPORT of the US Department of Homeland Security, which has provided "technical aid and training to increase security at Mexico's southern border checkpoints" (http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/18/world/americas/18mexico.html).
The hatred toward immigrants - especially calling them "illegals" as though they were intrinsically bad and subhuman - is another sign of the moral decline of the US that has occurred since the country moved rightward. The US has so many laws to harm people and so few to help them, so many malicious citizens and so few helpful ones.
This country took in more new legal permament immigrants last year than the rest of the world combined, and will do the same again this year. And next year. Could you PLEASE cite one example of hatred toward legal immigrants either here or elsewhere in the MSM???? Just one, please.
And, guess what, those who are NOT legal immigrants are: Illegals. Not that one can blame them; they are making perfectly rational economic decisions. However, one can and should blame the scumbag American Citizens who hire and exploit them, and who, by hiring them illegally, depress wages for the entire working class.
You might have heard about the working class before. It is who progressives were once supposed to champion.
TruthTeller: "Could you PLEASE cite one example of hatred toward legal immigrants either here or elsewhere in the MSM???? Just one, please."
Feds join probe of Mexican slain in Pa. coal town
By Maryclaire Dale, Associated Press Writer
http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-07-30-3453636009_x.htm
PHILADELPHIA — The Justice Department said Wednesday it has opened an investigation into the fatal beating of a Mexican immigrant in a small northeastern Pennsylvania town.
The federal involvement comes less than a week after local officials in Schuylkill County charged three white teens in this month's attack in Shenandoah on Luis Ramirez, a 25-year-old father of two.
The case has been assigned to FBI agents in Allentown and the criminal section of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, the department and the FBI confirmed Wednesday. Justice Department spokeswoman Jamie Hais would not say what prompted their involvement.
District Attorney James Goodman said he did not oppose the federal participation.
"I have no problem with them getting involved," he said.
A Mexican-American advocacy group applauded the decision.
"It legitimizes our concerns, that Shenandoah -- while it might be a small, little town in Pennsylvania -- the significance (of the slaying) really rises to the national stage," said lawyer John Amaya of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund, which held a vigil Tuesday in Ramirez's memory.
Ramirez was attacked July 12 when he crossed paths with a group of teens who had been out drinking in Shenandoah, about 80 miles northwest of Philadelphia. He died two days later.
On Friday, county officials filed homicide charges against two teens and ethnic intimidation charges against them and a third.
Amaya blamed the violence on anti-immigrant sentiment broadcast over the nation's airwaves.
"When we hear it spewed every night on CNN or radio talk shows, real people hear it and they take matters into their own hands," he said. "These children, they turn into monsters."
Shenandoah is less than 20 miles from Hazleton, which drew national headlines after it passed a law in 2006 cracking down on landlords who rent to illegal immigrants and companies that employ them. Hazleton is appealing a court ruling overturning the law, and Mayor Lou Barletta has made illegal immigration his signature issue as he runs for Congress.
The killing of Ramirez exposed long-simmering tensions in Shenandoah, a blue-collar town of 5,000 with a growing number of Hispanic residents drawn by factory and farm jobs.
Brandon J. Piekarsky, 16, and Colin J. Walsh, 17, were charged as adults last week with homicide and ethnic intimidation. Derrick M. Donchak, 18, was charged with aggravated assault and ethnic intimidation. All three played on the local high school football team last year.
Officials have said they may charge a fourth juvenile suspect in the case, but the county prosecutor declined to comment on any timetable for additional charges.
Ramirez endured frequent harassment, according to fiancee Crystal Dillman, who is white and grew up in Shenandoah.
They were tipped off by a union member? If it weren't for immigrants unions would not exist. Instead of trying to organize them and help protect them from exploitation, the union tossed them to the dogs. What a proud day to be union.
Because if illegal aliens, unions are so week today. The black janitors of Los Angeles once had a strong union. Now there are no more black janitors, and no more union either.
Spare me the nonsense. Unions have been on the decline for decades. Part of the reason was corruption of the union bosses. Too many people don't pay attention, though, so they probably think it's the fault of recent immigrants. Something tells me that all those union jobs at the steel mills aren't gone because of immigrants but because of sending our jobs overseas. What about all the autoworkers? Did they lose out to immigrants? No, again it's because of corporate greed, as well as the high cost of medical care in this country. Let's stop blaming the horrible state of our economy and job market on those at the bottom of the heap and place it where it belongs, at the highest level of government and the boardrooms of multinational corporations. They just love to see the little guys beating up on each other!
Peggy Peggy, I know you are upset about losing your illegal slaveforce, er excuse me, workforce on your farm. The threat of prosecution probably has you unnerved.
I put the blame for the decline of unions and the general screwing over of the American working man and woman on the scumbag human filth who HIRE illegals. No one else.
Spewing bile as you do, you do not deserve any response, but here you go. I am not afraid of prosecution. I have nothing to hide. I belong to a union as did my father before me. Stop trying to blame the desperate souls from other countries who are willing to face death in order to get to the US to earn enough money to support their families back home. Why not work towards getting rid of the agreements such as NAFTA, CAFTA etc which have destroyed so many economies in this hemisphere, including our own?
By the way, name-calling is really only used by those who have nothing of substance to say.
SIMPLY A M A Z I N G,
___ TO CONSIDER " I L L E G A L S " ARE BEHIND IT ALL ___
Hiring decisions are clearly top down, so you effectively blame corporate policy for "decline of unions and the general screwing over of the American working man and woman"
But what about those industry sectors can make scant or no use of "illegals" ?
★ All of the tele_help desk & similar jobs in India -- went there because of ENGLISH language facility and decreased cost basis ( OUTSOURCING US jobs = enhanced profit for global corporations ). So where's the connection with "illegals" ?
★ Blackwater hiring South American mercs for jobs fighting in Iraq, how did that relate to USA jobs & illegals ?
★ How many hospitals, pharmaceuticals, and clinics hire "illegals" to work as Doctors, Nurses, or researchers ?
★ How many Engineering companies hire "illegals" to be design stuff, when the paid wage is so much cheaper to let them stay in their own countries ?
The reason I ask, is how can so many industrial sectors and those Americans be so screwed as well, where there are no positions for "illegals"
The American unionized long shore man are soon to be completely bypassed ( most will loose their jobs ) with direct trucking from Mexican ports up through the new NAFTA corridor to Canada. How is this at all related to hiring "illegals", our Congress has signed new laws making those Mexican truck drivers legal agents while within "our" borders ?
The issue of erosion of US jobs IS directly tied to Unified Corporape American [ U C A ] policy, but only is indirectly tied to "illegals", as they are being manipulated as well as the rest of us, are not really separate, and convenient targets of rising rage & hate -- coupled to American's felt incapacity to fight back.
True ORGANIZED power comes from uniting peoples together, and creating connections -- while the best recipe for human disaster ( max profiteering ) is to blame the victims, encourage hate and divisiveness. There is much more in common with what you call "illegals" and the avergae American, as we're all getting screwed by globalist gobbling domination of markets, resources, and ALL of humankind -- in the service of the richest < 0.1%.
When we purchase mass marketed goods, and consume like good shoppers "should" -- we are in the service of the perpetrators ( prepet_traitors ) -- we do much much more to feed the profits and power behind the Globalist Corporape Earth [ G C E ], than any 1 billion "illegals" could ever do.
It's a far better exercise of the power we have left, to
__ associate with those that share our same problems, and
__ focus on those moving the chess pieces of our lives around.
.
There are a few million people ( families ) that exercise & manage the Global profiteering
__ w/o constraint ( no moral compass: Global Eco-suicide, habitat destruction, actual life-cycle costs )
__ w/o concern for human suffering ( wars, DU, toxic health, starvation, genocide, veterans )
__ w/o equably sharing of the wealth created by "THE WORKERS"
__ w/o proportionately sharing of increases in PRODUCTIVITY created by "THE WORKERS"
__ w/o concern for the actual life consequences to the workers ( injuries, poisoning, retirement )
Considering the list above, how much of this is due to "illegals" ?
Perhaps greed is the more fundamental connection, and workers uniting is the only cure ?
Namaste
"★ How many hospitals, pharmaceuticals, and clinics hire "illegals" to work as Doctors, Nurses, or researchers ?"
You tell us. How many "illegal aliens" make it past State certification boards to be certified as "Illegal Doctors" here?
What a pitiful sense of pseudo-TRUTH you have.
I was hoping for something about how the "illegals"
____ lobbied US Congress for the NAFTA freeway from Mexico to Canada, and
____ how it is going to be directly their ( the "illegals" ) responsibility
____ for end-running and breaking up the longshoreman UNION
____ whose function will be eliminated for much of the sea cargo coming ( now indirectly ) into America.
But those pesky little facts that get in the way of your overblown conclusions,
____ how unsettling and disruptive.
Perhaps you now have an undiagnosed lack of Zoloft in your system ? I hope you do take good care of yourself.
There's always an abundance of hope for true believers …
____ and they really need it.
Namaste
The ICEmen cometh ... and are blaming the unions for this atrocity?
It is the political police that are 'illegal' under international and constitutional rules of law.
Who needs electrical transformers and medical equipment anyway? We can always borrow from our childrens future to buy these things from China and Russia.
To the Native Americans our "legal" ancestors were illegal immigrants.
But they are criminals. They are stealing taxpayer dollars, American jobs, and guess what? It's possible to legally immigrate the the USA! I don't care if you are white, black, poor, smart, or rich. If you are illegally in this country and make no effort to obtain citizenship, then you deserve the boot.
How many millions of dollars will all those pregnant women and their families cost the US welfare system?
I hope that in addition to being deported, the enablers (companies) behind these criminals are also disbanded or fined.
If you ever had a job, you might know about state & federal tax withholding.
Most workers actually pay their taxes, before they get a paycheck.
So exactly what stealing were you talking about, when they pay taxes and are then deported as being "illegals", with family members born in the USA ?
Namaste
Unless they are illegally in the country and paid 'under the table.'
Because well, it's not likely you'll get an SSN if you are illegal immigrant.
Perhaps you've heard of this? When someone is here illegally, stealing from America, they usually don't pay taxes either.
>So exactly what stealing were you talking about, when they pay taxes and are then >deported as being "illegals", with family members born in the USA ?
If their green card has expired, or they finagled some sweet deal with a corrupt employer, I still have no sympathy. A real American could really use that job, especially if the 'employer' were forced to offer at a living wage. I guess the 'stealing' I'm talking about is stealing opportunities and jobs from real Americans during a recession. The stealing of energy and hope when Americans can't get American jobs and are forced into protest, bitterness, or the welfare roles. The stealing of possibility because immigrants undercut living wages and thereby contribute to the stagnation of the currency, because who wants to pay minimum wage to Americans when you can pay an illegal under the table for 'cheap'?
Peace to you too, but get your facts straight.
some of the immigrants are being charged with identity theft because they had SSN that were not theirs, so they were paying taxes and most likely not filing tax returns.
The moon is a Harsh Mistress
Throwing rocks at corporatism
Love it ( your name too ).
Namaste
Most illegal aliens do not pay federal income taxes. Of those that do their use of services far exceeds what they pay. When you see someone say that they pay taxes and use no more services than they pay in taxes, they are referring to Federal taxes alone. They are well aware that each illegal costs Americans at a minimum $1200 per year per illegal.
They are a net deficit to the American citizen.
SO where do we find proof for your claims and asertions ?
Namaste
USAn,
The anti-immigration sentiment is just the shield for those who are closet racists.
Cause right now they say things like "illegal means illegal", but I doubt their ancestors had a visa to come to this country and then kill and steal the native people's land. In my view, that's what's really illegal, even if our so called justice system doesn't consider it a crime.
So if this people were really anti-immigration, they would be directig their anger towards the corporations who hire the economic refugees, or at least calling their representatives to ask them to reject NAFTA-like agreements.
Otherwise, why do we need to criminalize people who are running away from poverty just like the ancestors of most white people in this country did in the past?
I bet if these "illegals" were white, most Americans would be rallying behind them for their rights to be recognized.
Ladybug
"The anti-immigration sentiment is just the shield for those who are closet racists."
In the first place there is no anti-immigration sentiment. Where exactly have you seen it? In the second place there is no comparison between illegal aliens coming here to work for slave labor wages and our ancestors. When our ancestors came no one had to support them like we have to support the current illegals. Our ancestors broke no laws coming here. The color of these illegals (and there are quite a few whites and asians) has nothing to do with it.
To call people that oppose illegal immigration racist is simply supporting big business and their exploitation of these people. You are certainly doing the illegals themselves no favors in aiding in their exploitation. The facts are quite clear now.
Wow, once again I'm truly ashamed of this country our jack boot federal government and am one step closer to desperately finding a way out. Hell, the only reason most folks can afford to eat is because of these types of workers. Isn't it sad that we continue to waste billions and billions of dollars in Iraq, yet this country is plummeting in every respect. If instead of terrorizing these hard working folks, we instead invited them into the fold, businesses and corporations wouldn't be able to systemically supress workers wages. My god, the middle class works hard, sends their kids to college and in many instances the graduates are lucky to get a job at Lowes. This country has become a bad joke.
Are you joking? How many do you want to "invite" into the fold? And how many of these folks are "hard working"?
People who are so needy as to be forced to travel to another country----to a region or regions with cultures far removed from their own are always in serious trouble.
The trouble they face here as a result of those needy conditions having brought them to a criminal status is most likely not as severe as they would face "back home". 'Truth Teller' "speaks the truth"; the employers should be held as co-conspirators, but then so should those who "worked for the employer" in the hiring stages, the training stages, the "pay window", everyone who participated, at every level is just as guilty of exploitation; as the "boss". Everyone who witnesses the exploitation and do nothing about it are culpable. This shows a seriously flawed social system at large in the United States.
With the exception of a few Natural Disasters the many difficult and devastating conditions that humanity faces all over the Globe are created by humanity---and can only be corrected by the same sources.
In this case starting at the top of the "food chain" would be most effective.
Without the jobs these illegal immigrants are here for, they would stop coming here. When the establishment often quotes the mantra that these people are here to take jobs Americans will not they speak a partial truth. Most Americans cannot live on such small pay rates, nor would they tolerate the same treatment that the "illegals" are forced to by virtue of their status.
The changes need to start at the top.
Illegal means illegal. If you have immigrated here legally fine. But please don't start crying about how unfair this is, if you don't have a green card, or a visa. And my Irish , German, English, French, ancestors came here legally. The Mexican/Russian workers at my store have documents. I'll say it again. Illegal means illegal. I had to show documents proving my Citizenship too! And it should not take years, for the FBI to move on this kind of thing.
Oh come on...your ancestors came the same way mine did. They just showed up on U.S. soil coming off a boat. That's it. All they had was maybe a letter from a immigrant already here saying "come on over".
My great great great grandfather just showed up from Norway and settled on a "pre-emption" claim in Minnesota. That's a fancy description of being a squatter.
I like the irony of the RNC in St. Paul. The last time the RNC was in the Twin Cities was 1892. The anti-immigrant talk was hot there too. They didn't want recent immigrants to vote and the Yankee Republicans were horrified the local immigrants they saw in Minnesota didn't speak "our" language. They didn't look like "us" either. Many had blue eyes and blonde hair. Those immigrants were Germans, Swedes and Norwegians.
I should remind people that it was immigrants - many illegal (or legal only because laws were slackened to obtain cannon fodder for the civil war) that led the labor movements.
It was immigrants that literally brought us the weekend. I personally don't understand this ant-immigrant sentiment. Aren't we insulting the memory of our own Irish/Italian/Polish/German/Slav etc, etc, ancestors when we direct out hate at those coming here to seek the same opportunities our ancestors did?
There were no immigration laws at that time nor were there any government support for immigrants.
There is no anti-immigrant sentiment. None at all. There is plenty of anti-illegal immigrant sentiment. We can't afford to support them anymore, we can'rt afford to subsidize business 's cheap labor anymore, nor can we allow them to continue to suppress wages for the American worker.
The only place you will hear cries about "anti-immigrant sentiment" when speaking about what are plainly illegal aliens is from racist organizations like LaRaza, LULAC and MALDEF that get their funding from Corporations and Foundations. They all have very few members and certainly don't represent Latino Americans.
I have yet to hear anyone direct hate towards illegal aliens. Disgust yes, but not toward them, toward our useless government that refuses to enforce the law.
Hatred should be and is directed toward those human filth who HIRE the illegals.
If we had followed the European Unions example illegals would still be in their home countries. Working a steady job with sustainable wages and sleeping in their own beds. Corporate greed in the US of A rules. Cheap labor rules.
I do not know what planet you live on, but illegal immigration is a WORSE problem in Spain and Italy than it is here. The reaction to it makes the "Minute Men" in this country look like a bunch of kindergarden teachers, too.
Truth Teller You may have made a good point. Before the borders were opened, the EU pumped investments into poverty regions. Spain, Portugal, and Italy. These investment were directed to assist low income CITIZENS of these countries. Economic justification to stay put. I roam the world searching for information and never came accross news that there was significant migration from these three countries. I have seen reports that support your argument concerning illegals but we're kinda comparing apples and oranges. Citizens vs Illegals. If the illegals are recent it may be because of the success of the policy. They're going where the jobs are.
zaz, to the best of my knowledge you are right; there is no emigration FROM those countries. However, both Italy and Spain are being swamped by immigrants from North Africa and the former Yugoslavia. With xenophobic consequences magnitudes worse than in the US.
I would be strongly open into pumping investment into Mexico (as the principal sending country). But, I would want Mexico to make certain committments. I will surely be damned as a heretic by many on this board, but Mexico's government energy monopolies (PEMEX, CFE, Lyz y Fuerza) are a DISASTER. The gasoline subsidy is going to cost $19 BILLION this year. That is insane. The public education monopoly in Mexico is a disgrace, and the teachers' union is hopelessly corrupt. (I know a teacher who teaches near Sola de Vega, Oaxaca. She lives in Oaxaca City, and only gets home on weekends. WHY? Because, to get a job in the city, she would need to bribe her union boss the equivalent of a year's salary. This is the heroic "dissident" union people shower praise on here.) Private cartels in cement, television, telecoms, home construction and banking add literally billions of dollars to the cost of doing business in Mexico. Finally, Mexican labor law makes it nearly impossible to fire employees, which, needless to say, makes companies very reluctant to hire them in the first place.
If Mexico were willing to take on some of these challenges, I would have no problem at all with a "Marshall Plan" type aid package. However, without changes, that would just be money down the toilet.
I disagree Truth Teller. People are people. If I had my way the border would be open to all.
George's "Guest Worker program" was by far the most heartless solution: Let them come, use them up, send them home.
If you opened the border how would you support all the extra people? What would you do about the enviornment? Its already about to become a problem from all the immigration.
Sure, why not, no illegal is going to take your professional, degreed job away, nor will the threat of replacing you with one force you to accept half the pay you used to get.
As for the black janitors of Los Angeles, and millions others like them, what? Screw them?
Illegal means illegal. It is a myth that Americans don't want these jobs. There are millions of Americans out of work, that need a job. And the companies that hire illegal need to be need some jail time and fines. And it takes the FBI years to move on this?
I would REALLY like to see an article titled "Fear Grips Scumbag Employers of Illegal Aliens After Raid." The illegals need to be sent home. Those human filth who hire them, be they big plant owners, or lazy homeowners who do not want to cut the grass, ned to be sent TO JAIL.