Thread: Wisconsin: Rumors panic many Latinos here

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Rumors panic many Latinos here
Scared by rumors of immigration sweep
By Pat Schneider and Steven Elbow
Rumors of a federal crackdown on illegal immigrants in the Madison area spun out of control Sunday, causing fear and panic in the Hispanic community and keeping many children out of school today.

Mayor Dave Cieslewicz said that Mario Mendoza, a Spanish-speaking aide, was preparing a statement for Spanish-language media.

"There's no truth to the rumors," Cieslewicz said. "People should just go about their normal daily lives."

"We don't know how it started, but it ran like wildfire in the Latino community," said Luis Montoto, program director for La Movida radio, the area's only Spanish-language station.

School officials reported absences this morning as parents called schools to report they were keeping children home because of the accounts they had heard of Latinos being arrested.

Absenteeism for Latino students was at nearly 50 percent at Cherokee Middle School, 41 percent at Sennett Middle School, and 33 percent at Leopold Elementary School, spokesman Ken Syke said after making a spot check at the request of The Capital Times.

Absentee rates district-wide are ordinarily less than 10 percent.

Syke said the school district would be contacting parents of absent Latino students today to tell them that the rumors of raids were not true.

At one workplace employing many Latinos, a spokesman for Springs Window Fashions in Middleton said that perhaps a dozen Latino workers did not report today "as a result of the message out there."

Craig Hanson, the spokesman, said absences in any area were not heavy enough to cause production problems. The absences would be handled by the normal attendance guidelines, he said.

Pepe Villegas, a waiter at La Hacienda restaurant, said that after workers called Sunday to say they were afraid to come to work, owner David Herrera held a special meeting early this morning to reassure everyone that the stories of arrests were false.

"Only two workers did not come in," he said. "We are open."

At the radio station, Montoto said many first-shift workers, mostly with landscaping, factories and construction companies, would likely stay home today after hearing horror stories of vans rounding up illegals at local businesses, at highway stops and homes.

"It was all completely false," he said.

Montoto began dispelling the rumors when he went on the air this morning for his regularly scheduled shift at 6 a.m., fielding calls from workers scared to go to work.

"Most, I think, first-shift employees that have a lot of Latinos will see a lot of employees not show up today," Montoto said. "I think second and third shift will be all right. People are really upset right now."

Hundreds of calls: Monoto said he was busy Sunday evening scrambling to at least a half-dozen businesses, including Wal-Mart and Woodman's East, Copps on Park Street, La Hacienda restaurant and other Hispanic businesses, after receiving reports of vans rounding up employees. He was skeptical but felt he had to see for himself before he went on the air today.

"I got at least 200 calls last night on my cell phone," he said today.

Organizers of a April 10 demonstration against immigration policy changes, and a rally planned for May 1, are calling the message that spread through the community a "hoax."

"We don't know what happened," demonstration organizer Alex Gillis said today.

He and other organizers and community leaders drove around the city Sunday evening visiting the locations of reported raids and were not able to confirm that any immigration officers had been active in the city.

Still, the telephone calls with accounts of arrests and questions about what to do.

"We had 200 or 300 calls, it didn't stop until midnight," Gillis said. "It's been crazy."

He said that one Latino couple the group spoke to on the east side on Sunday evening swore they saw arrests with their own eyes, but their story could not be confirmed.

State and local police today said they knew nothing of a crackdown on illegal immigrants.

"We were surprised to hear it," said Madison police spokesman Mike Hanson. "We were not participating in anything."

Officials with regional Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices in Milwaukee and Chicago did not return phone calls. The service is now a bureau of the Department of Homeland Security.

"It spread like wildfire throughout the community," said Victor Arellano.

Arellano said his phone was ringing until the early morning hours today, but he had been unable to confirm any activity in the city by immigration officials.

Staying home: "When a community is on pins and needles, any rumor gains momentum on its own and runs wild," said Peter Munoz, executive director of Centro Hispano. He said today he hoped employers would not punish those who missed work."

Alfonso Zepeda Capistran said that news reports of stepped-up arrests by the Department of Homeland Security in areas of the country near the Mexican border may have ignited fears here.

"That may have caused people to panic," Capistran said. "Now a lot of people seemed to have stayed home from work and that will cause more havoc."

Snowball effect: Gillis wondered if there are people within the Latino community opposed to recent immigrations rights that might be working to discredit the movement by scaring people from reporting for work and testing the willingness of employers to accommodate absences for demonstrations.

Montoto said he thought several factors fed the panic.

First, he said, the rumors actually started about last Wednesday, when the federal government announced the arrests of nearly 1,200 illegal immigrants in 26 states at plants operated by IFCO Systems, a major producer of wooden pallets and crates.

"They have nothing to do with Wisconsin, but people got scared," he said.

A day later, he said, Madison area police officials announced a crackdown on unsafe and inattentive driving the Beltline, and La Movida aired numerous warnings about police on the highway.

"People might have gotten confused and thought it was about immigration," he said.

Having some knowledge about how the federal government conducts its immigration enforcement, he said he began telling people not to believe the rumors last week.

"We didn't think it would snowball like it did yesterday," he said.

He added that he thinks the storm has blown over.

"I don't think it's going to happen again," he said. "Honestly, we've learned our lesson."

E-mail: pschneider@madison.com. E-mail: selbow@madison.com
Published: April 24, 2006

HA HA! It's funny to see the illegals sweating. If they weren't criminals by virtue of entering the country illegally, they wouldn't have anything to fear.

:P Ahhh the Power of a little white rumor Now if anyone has a Green Dodge van and some spare time there they could start a mass stampeed just by driving by the schools and those questionable employers work sites just acting like your interested in the Illegals :P

It was stupid for the Mayor to try to quell the rumors. I've been saying for years, that the rumors will have them scatter like flies. It's a good way to weed out employees that don't show up to work or kids that don't show up to school. Shame on him for trying to ease their fears. They aught to be scared.

Good they should be scared. There are extimated 85.000 Illegals in this state of WI. And very few here seem to care.

After their rude illegal marching in our U.S. cities and streets they deserve every bit of nauseous fearful rejection. Now they should do what they need to do to fix the problem of THEIR illegality -- Move along and GO BACK HOME!

they should be scared after marching on our u.s. soil demanding rights that they're not entitled to. Get used to it illegals, you're going to be looking over your shoulder from here on out.

Makes me want to go down to the nearest large construction site and yell through a bullhorn:

"LA MIGRA!! LA MIGRA!!"

And watch all the cucarachas scatter like the coakroaches they are.