http://www.newsobserver.com/1154/story/503817.html

Kristin Collins, Staff Writer

Grass-roots groups in North Carolina are taking a new tack in their fight against illegal immigration.

They're targeting businesses they suspect of hiring illegal workers -- the contractor whose crew speaks only Spanish, the factory owner who hires more Mexicans than whites, the cleaning service whose Hispanic janitors don't have bank accounts.

The campaigns are mounted by groups such as the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, an Arizona-based group best known for reporting illegal crossers at the Mexican border. A spokesman said the group has two newly appointed chapter leaders and is seeking more as it works to expand in North Carolina. Their mission here will be to confront business owners they suspect of hiring illegal immigrants.

Another Raleigh-based group, the political action committee Americans for Legal Immigration, is promoting a Web site, www.WeHireAliens(DOT)com where anyone can anonymously accuse a business of hiring people without proper documents.

Researchers estimate that roughly half the 600,000 Hispanics living in North Carolina are here illegally.

A host of people from North Carolina have anonymously complained on the site that they have been passed over for jobs in favor of illegal immigrants, taunted by Mexican co-workers and threatened by their bosses when they noted illegal hiring. While many claim to have seen falsified Social Security cards and other evidence, others base their allegations on overheard conversations, second-hand accounts or hunches: "The workers sent to my house did not speak English," one person wrote about a Triangle electrical business. "I am from CA and can tell an illegal from a legal."

William Gheen, a former political consultant who founded Americans for Legal Immigration, oversees the Web site, which he said is democracy in action.

"The laws our elected officials passed are not being enforced," Gheen said. "You can expect more people to take more and more things into their own hands, as long as the government fails in its responsibilities."

Gheen, who lives in Raleigh but says his group works nationwide, defended the postings, which he says have been sent to immigration officials. Businesses identified on the site are not notified.

Claudia Cooper, who owns Guglhupf Bakery and Cafe in Durham, said she was shocked to learn that an employee claimed she hires illegal immigrants to save money. She said that all her workers present Social Security cards and other documents. She doesn't investigate whether they're falsified.

Cooper, herself a German immigrant, said she was "sick" at the suggestion that she pays Hispanics less than other workers.

"I know immigration is a really hot topic, and it is important that it gets dealt with," Cooper said. "But what I find really outrageous and scary are these assumptions, that they can just throw us in the middle of it and say, 'They do it so they can save $2.' "

If the Minuteman membership drive is successful, the tactic won't stay confined to cyberspace.

In California and Arizona, the group's supporters are known for protesting at sites where Hispanic workers congregate, as well as photographing and confronting their employers.

Carmen Mercer, vice president for the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps, said that two North Carolina chapter leaders were appointed last week at a training session in Atlanta. She said one lives in Matthews, near Charlotte, and another in Cashiers, in the mountains.

Mercer, who lives in Tombstone, Ariz., said the group is pushing to expand nationally and that it would like to establish four or five chapters in North Carolina.

She said those who join the group go through a background check and telephone interview, to ensure they aren't racist. Then, they are trained to go to any business they suspect of hiring illegal immigrants and hand them information about immigration laws.

The group's leaders hope to appeal to those who believe that illegal immigrants take American jobs, burden schools, spread disease and commit crimes.

But some supporters are concerned about the new tactics. Reagan Sugg of Greensboro, a Minuteman who participated in one of the group's border operations, says he's uncomfortable with the group's new philosophy.

"I'm not going to picket an employer just because I suspect he's hiring illegals, because unless I'm given permission to inspect documents, I don't know," Sugg said this week. "I don't think it serves the cause to participate in activities than can be perceived as harassment."

Mark Potok, who monitors hate groups for the Alabama-based civil rights group, Southern Poverty Law Center, said the rapidly growing anti-immigration movement will almost certainly become more visible in states such as North Carolina, where Hispanic immigration is transforming communities. He said many of the groups, including the Minutemen, have traits reminiscent of the militia movement of the 1990s.

"They encompass a scary combination of bigotry, of conspiracy theories and of a real affinity for weapons," Potok said.

He said claims being made about Mexicans who cross the border illegally -- that they carry diseases such as leprosy and tuberculosis, that they are prone to gang rape or child molestation -- are similar to claims made about immigrants throughout history.

Marisol Jiminez-McGee, advocacy director for El Pueblo, a Raleigh non-profit that represents Latinos, said she worries that all Latinos will soon be suspects.

"If I choose to be speaking Spanish, does that mean that I become a viable target for the Minutemen?" she said. "These are not things that are going to offer real solutions to our broken immigration system."

(News researcher Brooke Cain contributed to this report.)

Staff writer Kristin Collins can be reached at 829-4881 or kcollins@newsobserver.com.