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Immigration-reformers seek state of emergency

Kulongoski isn't considering that, a spokeswoman says

GABRIELA RICO
Statesman Journal


August 26, 2005

Never mind tsunamis, volcanic eruptions and earthquakes.

Gov. Ted Kulongoski is being asked to issue a state of emergency because of illegal immigrants in Oregon.

A state immigration-reform group wants Kulongoski to follow the lead of the Arizona and New Mexico governors who recently declared states of emergency in counties along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Although Oregon is about 1,000 miles from the U.S.-Mexico border, Jim Ludwick, the president of Oregonians for Immigration Reform, said the state is being harmed by illegal immigrants from Mexico.

They have bankrupted the Oregon Health Plan and made the state a magnet for the methamphetamine trade, he said.

"Illegal aliens are consistently in the news for drunk driving arrests and many times they are caught having multiple Oregon driver licenses," Ludwick wrote in an Aug. 20 letter to Kulongoski.

Anna Richter Taylor, a spokeswoman for the governor's office, said the letter had not arrived at the Capitol as of Thursday, but she said she was not aware of plans to declare a state of emergency.

"This is something that's not on the governor's mind right now," Taylor said. "It's not something that I'm aware of as an issue."

Last week, New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson declared a state of emergency because of crime and other problems caused by illegal immigrants and drug traffickers crossing through the state from Mexico.

Arizona Gov. Janet Napolitano followed suit and offered to authorize state police to aid in deportation.

Richardson and Napolitano, both Democrats, said they need emergency dollars for situations such as goading cattle back to watering holes frequented by illegal immigrants and storing bodies after smugglers' vans crash.

The Republican governors of Texas and California, also border states, have showed no signs of following their neighbors' examples.

Some Republican critics were quick to accuse the governors of political maneuvering. Napolitano and Richardson face elections next year, and Richardson is thought to be considering a run for president in 2008.

However, earlier this week, Homeland Secretary Michael Chertoff promised better communication with both states and said that resources will be added along the U.S.-Mexico border.

In Virginia, politicians are calling on Gov. Mark Warner to declare a state of emergency because of illegal immigration, but his spokesman called the request "much ado about nothing" and indicated that the Democratic governor has no intention of issuing such an order.

Ludwick said his group wants Oregon's Democratic governor to:


End the practice of state agencies participating with Mexican officials in outreach, identification and social-service programs to Mexican citizens living in Oregon.


Stop issuing Oregon driver licenses to illegal immigrants.


Order state police to help federal agents arrest illegal immigrants.


Require that people provide proof of legal status to get government programs and services.

"Arizona and New Mexico have been flooded with illegal aliens that bring in drugs, crime, welfare cheats and potential terrorists," Ludwick said. "Their public schools have been overwhelmed, prisons overcrowded, hospitals have gone bankrupt, social services inundated, and more illegals are on the way."

Mexico's Consul General for Oregon, Fernando Sánchez Ugarte, expressed frustration and called Ludwick's letter "a gross generalization that misrepresents the fact that the majority of Mexicans that reside in the state are only interested in obtaining a legal, decent-paying job that will allow them to support their families in a responsible and respectable manner."

The assertion that the matricular consular card offers some sort of gateway for illegal immigrants is "utterly incorrect," Sánchez said.

"It is used by the Mexican Consulate as a form of identification ... and can also be used to enter into Mexico, in lieu of a passport," Sánchez said. "This document is issued according to the Vienna convention of which Mexico and the U.S. are signatories."

Oregon officials said their responsibility is to reach workers, not to investigate how they got to be workers in Oregon, which is a federal issue.

State agencies participate in the "Carousel of Information," an information-sharing effort, during the Mexican consulate's outreach efforts.

"As far as our participation in the Carousel of Information, it is an effective way to make a person-to-person contact with a vulnerable segment of the population," said Steve Corson of the Oregon Consumer and Business Services department.

Enforcing workplace-safety and wage-and-hour laws is a state responsibility, he said.

"These kinds of things are not dependent on a resident's immigration status," Corson said. "Beyond that, we feel it's important to reach out to that population because they're there. They're in the workplace."

Denying a driver's license to illegal immigrants was debated but not resolved by the Legislature this year.

Lt. Glenn Chastain of the Oregon State Police said his agency follows the law as prescribed by the Legislature.

"State statute precludes and prohibits state resources from being used to enforce any immigration laws," Chastain said.

The Legislature has amended the law to allow police to arrest people with federal warrants for immigration violations but nothing beyond that.

Marion County Sheriff's Deputy Kevin Rau said it's impossible to say what amount of crime is committed by local illegal immigrants.

"We don't know if someone is illegal or not; we don't ask that," he said. "I don't think anyone can definitively know if someone is an illegal immigrant. ... There's lots of people in the United States from other countries."

Besides, Rau said, it doesn't matter to law enforcement.

"From our standpoint, we enforce the law equally, so immigration status to us is irrelevant," he said. "I'm not sure that us knowing would help."

Ludwick, the leader of the 5-year-old immigration-reform group, which has nearly 500 statewide members, said he had not heard from the governor about his request to meet.

"Honestly, I don't expect to hear from him," he said Thursday. "It would be nice if the governor called a group of people together to at least discuss it."

The Associated Press contributed to this story.