Thread: Once In US, Mexicans say They're Welcomed by Employers

http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/index.php? ... der_hawley

Monday, June 20, 2005
Once in U.S. interior, Mexicans say they're welcomed by employers

CHRIS HAWLEY
Republic Mexico City Bureau

ZIMAPÃ?N, Mexico - On Highway 85 just outside this mountain town, there's a sign that says "Nuevo Laredo - 1,009 kilometers."
The U.S. border, it seems, is never far from anyone's mind in Zimapán, even though it's 627 miles away. And in this town known for its high migration rate, the determination to reach the United States has not diminished, even though everyone knows about the rising risks and costs that have accompanied a 12-year buildup in border security.

"I'm going back next year. It's gotten harder, but you can still get through," shoeshiner Alejandro Sánchez said as he dabbed brown polish onto a customer's boot under a palm tree in the town plaza.

"I've crossed five or six times already," he said. "The thing is, the employers there are still hiring us. The problem is on the border, but once you're in the interior (of the United States), then you're welcome."

Zimapán, 80 miles north of Mexico City, has a long tradition of sending people to the United States.

The town of 37,400 people has the seventh-highest migration rate of any municipality in Mexico, according to the 2000 census. Twenty-eight percent of households had at least one person who had lived in the United States between 1995 and 2000.

Just off Zimapán's main plaza, with its whitewashed church and vendors selling ice cream bars, three money-order stores dispense remittance money sent from migrants in the United States.

Tougher border security hasn't stopped the flow of townspeople north; it has just made the trip more time-consuming. "What you earn in a week there is what you earn in a month here," said construction worker Guillermo Nava MartÃÂ*nez. "Even though crossing has gotten more difficult, it's worth it to try anyway."

Nava MartÃÂ*nez spent 1998 and 1999 in Homestead, Fla., building houses. He plans to return next winter, probably through Arizona.

Some Zimapán residents said the illegal migration has become self-perpetuating. Back in the 1960s and 1970s, they said, U.S. labor recruiters used to come to the town and take seasonal workers to the United States legally.

"Now, there are so many people on the other side (of the border) who will do the work that the contractors don't come down here anymore," said Simón López, a 44-year-old house painter.

Most of the migrants said they didn't worry much about U.S. authorities once they were past the border. Sánchez's last job in the United States was with a construction company that specialized in contracts with law enforcement agencies in Georgia.

"I was illegal, and I built nothing but police stations," he said, laughing.

Most of the migrants said they didn't worry much about U.S. authorities once they were past the border. Sánchez's last job in the United States was with a construction company that specialized in contracts with law enforcement agencies in Georgia.

"I was illegal, and I built nothing but police stations," he said, laughing.

That's right, laugh you ignorant bonehead. You people have been getting by for way too long. It is time for that to come to a swift and certain end.