Thread: Watching America Slip Away

Exclusive: Watching America Slip Away
Renee Taylor

Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc.
Date: August 10, 2007
Why are life-long residents of a once close-knit, thriving Arkansas community now afraid to drop by the local convenience store after sunset? FSM Contributing Editor Renee Taylor explains how illegal immigration is destroying this town and many others just like it.


Two tomato processing firms based in Monticello, Arkansas – Candy Brand, LLC and Tomato Shippers, LLC – as well as four local Bradley County, Arkansas, residents – Charles Searcy, Randy Clanton, Dale McGinnis and Brooks Lisenby – are the subjects of a lawsuit filed by the Southern Poverty Law Firm, Montgomery, Alabama, on behalf of three Mexican migrant workers: Rosalino Perez-Benites, Luis Alberto Ascienco-Vasquesz and Pascual Noriego-Narvaez. The lawsuit recently was filed in the U.S. District Court, Western Division, El Dorado, Arkansas.



The lawsuit contends that the plaintiffs were hired out of Mexico on an H-2A visa to work in the tomato fields. The plaintiffs allege the defendants did not pay them the prevailing wage for migrant workers – $8.01 in 2007 and $7.58 in 2006. Their suit covers a time period of 2002 – 2007. They further allege their employers did not reimburse them for travel, visa and other hiring fees.



The Little Rock attorney for the defendants, Michael S. Moore, stated there was no basis for the claim, and has filed a motion for a more definite statement from the plaintiffs. He has also requested a jury trial.



Known for its pink tomatoes, Bradley County, with Warren as its county seat, is a quiet rural community in Southeast Arkansas, first settled in the 1800s. The family names from those days still grace the thin Warren phone book and until a few years ago, it was a tightly knit community where residents felt “at homeâ€

Kudos to author Renee Taylor for writing a piece that describes not only Bradley County, Arkansas, but a thousand other small towns over the nation. She has perfectly captured the hated transformation of our proud little southern community where my family settled in 1832.