Anti-illegal immigration groups grow in Florida
Posted on Monday, March 31 @ 12:49:31 EDT
Topic: State Laws Immigration illegal legal
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 ALIPAC NOTE: We would like to thank and encourage our allies in Florida and encourage all ALIPAC supporters in Florida to work with these groups on the local level.
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World War II veteran Enos Schera monitors ''the invasion'' from his
Miami home in the predominantly Cuban-American suburb of Westchester.
Information is the former Marine's weapon.
Surrounded by stacks of paper, old televisions, VCRs and radios,
Florida's ''grandfather of immigration reform'' -- as other activists
have dubbed him -- tracks crimes committed by immigrants, failing
public schools and politicians' positions.
Schera's Citizens of Dade United is among a growing cohort of
anti-illegal immigration groups in Florida trying different tactics to
drive out undocumented immigrants. They have turned to legislators in
Tallahassee for help in the wake of Washington's inability to find a
solution.
''I feel like a little guy at the bottom of the dam with my finger
plugged in the dike,'' said Schera, 80, vice-president of the group.
``I know what's going to happen if I pull my finger out, only instead
of a trillion tons of water it will be a trillion tons of people.''
After mounting a somewhat solitary fight for three decades in
Miami, the city with the nation's highest percentage of foreign-born
residents, Schera now has company.
In Haines City, the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps organizes teams
of Floridians to help patrol the Arizona-Mexico border for immigrants
trying to sneak in. In Jupiter, Floridians for Immigration Enforcement
protest outside an ''illegal immigrant hiring hall'' and sometimes post
videos on Youtube.com of those who come to hire workers. In Fort Myers,
Citizens Against Illegal Immigration hold candlelight vigils to honor
U.S. citizens killed by illegal immigrants.
Topics: State laws, groups, organizations, fighting illegal immigration, citizen activists, day labor, legislation, Florida, FL
Mon, Mar. 31, 2008
BY CASEY WOODS
The Miami Herald
Now, the groups are lobbying the Florida Legislature on illegal
immigration. Among measures: Require state government contractors to
participate in a federal program to verify new employees' immigration
status and make it a crime to harbor or transport an undocumented
immigrant.
''People call us hate-mongers and racists, but this isn't about
racism at all; it's about the rule of law,'' said state Minuteman Civil
Defense Corps director Bill Landes, 52, in Haines City.
Immigrant advocates, who call anti-illegal immigration groups
''nativists,'' say the anti-immigrant rhetoric can have dangerous
results, evidenced by a reported rise in hate crimes against Hispanics.
FBI statistics indicate a spike of almost 35 percent from 2003 to 2006.
The Southern Poverty Law Center recently released a report saying
the number of ''hate groups'' grew by 48 percent since 2000, an
increase it attributes to growing anti-immigrant sentiment.
''I think what's happened in many cases is that some of the real
vile . . . propaganda against Latinos and immigrants specifically,
really begins in white supremacist hate groups,'' said the Center's
Mark Potok. ``But what we're seeing as a phenomenon is that those
allegations make their way out of hate groups and then go into the
anti-immigration movement.''
The leaders of the nascent Florida groups are generally older men
-- several of them veterans -- who often feel the country's soul is
threatened by the influx of mostly Hispanic immigrants.
They seethe every time they have to ''press 1 for English'' when
they call a government office. They reel off figures about
overpopulation and immigrants on welfare. Many believe that Mexican
immigrants want to reclaim California and the Southwest.
With an estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants living in the
United States, the frustration has been climbing steadily on both sides
of the immigration debate.
In the Minuteman group's early days in 2005, members considered
regular boat patrols off the Florida coast to search for immigrants
attempting to arrive by sea, but now the group's sights are set on
Tallahassee.
Landes feels a fresh urgency every time he looks at his nephew, a
5-year-old who was taken from his dying mother's womb when she was
seven months pregnant. A truck driver crashed into her car. The man was
using a false license and Landes is convinced he was illegal -- though
he has no evidence.
Landes, a disabled construction contractor, finances his activism
by collecting cans and taking the occasional odd job. He said Florida
Minuteman Corps membership has jumped from 57 in 2006 to more than 300
at eight chapters. The leader of a new chapter in Miami-Dade, declined
an interview.
Membership began to swell for such groups in 2006 -- a backlash to massive marches by immigrants in major cities.
''Most of the public watching this saw millions of people on the
street demanding rewards for doing something wrong and thought that
there is something seriously wrong in this country,'' said Ira Mehlman,
media director for the national organization Federation for American
Immigration Reform, or FAIR.
As with many other activists, Schera, whose son and a grandson
followed him into the military, feels the world around him has changed
in ways he cannot accept -- starting with the Mariel boatlift when
125,000 Cubans arrived.
Asked if he has Cuban friends, Schera points to Heberto Casares.
Casares, 88, sold a short-wave radio to Schera, an amateur ham
radio operator, and they became friends. Schera, an electrician, helped
Casares build his first house.
Casares disagrees with some of Schera's views -- for example,
Casares thinks translating government documents into Spanish or other
languages makes sense -- but he doesn't worry about his friend's more
controversial views.
''I can't break my head about why he does all this and all that as
an activist,'' Casares said. ``I see the good part about Enos.''
Schera claimed several political victories in early 1980s,
including an ordinance that declared English the official language of
Miami-Dade County. That measure was later repealed as Cuban Americans
gained political power.
'We have bigger issues now than the `English-only' fight,'' said
Dave Caulkett, 59, of Floridians for Immigration Enforcement or FLIMEN.
Caulkett and other activists attended an October summit in Orlando
organized by FAIR, an event that gave birth to the loose lobbying
coalition now in Tallahassee.
With the failure of federal immigration reform, local and state governments have become the new battlefront.
Oklahoma and Arizona have passed the most restrictive laws. An
Arizona law yanks the business license of employers who hire illegal
immigrants. Oklahoma's law, used as a model for a Florida bill, makes
it a crime to hire or transport undocumented immigrants.
Caulkett also runs a website, www.reportillegals.com where, for a $10 fee, he will report a suspected ''illegal alien'' to immigration.
Caulkett's group spends most Saturday mornings protesting outside
Jupiter's El Sol Neighborhood Resource Center, a non-profit that
matches day laborers with employers looking for workers.
''Shut down the Jupiter illegal alien hiring hall!'' Caulkett yells with carnival barker's flair.
Protesters hold signs that read ''Mow your own damn grass!'' and ``Hiring an Illegal? Smile for the camera.''
One of the group's early attempts at taping would-be employers --
to post the video on Youtube -- ended in a December altercation. One
employer, now facing simple battery charges, allegedly tried to take
away the camera and pushed Caulkett.
Inside the center workers seem bemused by the weekly demonstration.
''They accuse us of all sorts of terrible things, but we just want to work,'' said day laborer Jose Alvarez, 41, from Guatemala.
For every emotional story of an immigrant in need, activists counter with a tragedy.
Russell Landry, head of the Fort Myers-based Citizens Against
Illegal Aliens of Southwest Florida, has held candlelight vigils for
Americans killed by undocumented immigrants.
Landry, a disabled former Marine, was touched by a mother's
telephone call. She recounted the story of her daughter, a 19-year-old
honors student who was killed by a drunk driver, an undocumented
immigrant who had been deported several times before.
''It's very frustrating, because people don't seem to get involved
because they haven't been directly affected,'' said Landry, 47, who's
planning to move to New Hampshire. ``I don't know what it's going to
take for more people to stand up for our country.''
To Discuss this article with our online activists visit...
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