Minutemen demonstrate to support immigration laws
By Harold Reutter
harold.reutter@theindependent.com
http://www.theindependent.com


Eight G.I. Minutemen braved biting cold winds Monday afternoon to hold up signs expressing support for Immigration and Customs Enforcement actions.
One of those Minutemen, Mark McCaffery of Grand Island, said Monday's demonstration was partly in reaction to last week's release of a report on the impact of last December's ICE raid on the Grand Island Swift plant.

"ICE didn't come here to tear families apart," McCaffery said. "It came here because of an investigation of an illegal documents ring."

During the nationwide Swift raids, a total of 1,282 people were arrested, with 65 workers being arrested for criminal offenses. The remainder were workers who were arrested for working in this country illegally.

The U.S. Attorney office in Nebraska has reported that three people at the Grand Island plant were convicted for using illegal documents. Another 258 people were arrested at the Grand Island plant.

The report released last week was prepared by The Urban Institute and commissioned by the National Council of La Raza.

The report questioned the harmful effects on children when parents are arrested as the result of worksite raids by ICE. Grand Island was one of three cities studied for the report.

While release of that report was the immediate cause of Monday's demonstration, McCaffery said, members of the Minutemen and its supporters have been holding monthly demonstrations since last June.

McCaffery said all the demonstrations have been along the same section of State Street, just east of the lane that serves as the State Street entrance into the Grand Island Mall area.

At least one person held a sign asking motorists to honk if they also supported ICE enforcement actions and a number of people did honk horns while McCaffery talked about the organization.

He said people who were concerned about illegal immigration began meeting this past April. At least some of the people became interested in the Minutemen organization in response to the December 2006 ICE raids.

McCaffery said he contacted people who wrote letters-to-the-editor following the ICE raid on the Grand Island Swift plant.

He said his own interest in the Minuteman began even earlier as a response to the May 2006 march by Hispanics who were asking federal representatives for immigration reform.

McCaffery said local Minutemen have been guided by Minutemen in Omaha, who have told them how the organization operates. He said the organization's tenets are fairly simple: Follow the country's immigration laws and no amnesty.

McCaffery said Minutemen support a variety of initiatives such as the 287 (g) program, which allows the Department of Homeland Security to enter into memorandums of agreement with state and local law enforcement agencies that permit designated local officers to perform immigration law enforcement functions.

Local law enforcement officers could perform such functions after appropriate training.

Examples of enforcement actions include corrections officials who check the immigration status of non-U.S. who are arrested and placed in jail or Department of Motor Vehicles officials who check for use of illegal documents to obtain driver's licenses.

McCaffery said G.I. Minutemen would like to see more enforcement of immigration laws in the Tri-Cities region.

McCaffery said the Minutemen do not believe in having illegal immigrants paying fines and facing other sanctions in return for being put on a "path to citizenship." He said Minutemen believe in "attrition through enforcement."

If immigration laws are vigorously enforced, some people would be arrested and deported, McCaffery said.

Attrition will happen when other illegal immigrants return to their native countries to "avoid being caught up in the legal system," he said. Others will return to their home countries if vigorous enforcement leads to an inability to find work in the United States.