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Texas group splits from Minutemen border watch organization
New groups plans to concentrate on Texas immigration.
By Juan Castillo

AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF


Thursday, October 05, 2006

The former leader of the Texas branch of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps said Wednesday that he and other members split from the national watchdog group last month to form their own private patrol organization opposing illegal immigration: the Texas Border Volunteers.

Mike Vickers, a Falfurrias veterinarian and rancher, had been state director of the civil defense corps since March. He said the new group, which he heads as chairman, will focus its efforts in Texas and form a political action committee to influence statewide elections and public policy.

The committee will ask the Legislature to approve Gov. Rick Perry's request for $100 million next year to continue state efforts to fortify the border. Vickers is the Republican chairman in Brooks County

"We didn't want to be under the leadership that really didn't understand how the Texas border works," Vickers said of the split from the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, which was founded by Chris Simcox in Arizona and claims to have 250,000 members, volunteers and donors nationwide.

The Texas Border Volunteers, with about 500 members, want to avoid confusion with what Vickers called more aggressive offshoot watchdog groups using the Minutemen or Minuteman name.

"This has been a problem for us," Vickers said.

Members, most of them military retirees, will undergo background checks, he said.

With an illegal immigrant population estimated at 12 million in the United States and with federal inaction on a comprehensive overhaul, the number of citizen watchdog groups patrolling the border for illegal immigrants has grown.

Though some laud the groups, others are highly critical, likening them to vigilantes or complaining that they interfere with the work of law enforcement officers.

Vickers, 57, stressed that the Texas Border Volunteers patrol only private property, including remote ranchlands used by smugglers and immigrants to skirt immigration checkpoints.

"We're not enforcers of the law; we just report criminal activity," he said, adding that the volunteers will work closely with the U.S. Border Patrol and local and state law enforcement agencies.

A spokeswoman for the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps said chapters remain active in Texas and that Vickers' successor had already been named.

jcastillo@statesman.com; 445-3635