This is a new element in the Minutemen’s definition of the border. The distance from Houston to Brownsville, Texas (on the United States, Mexico border) by automobile is 356 miles. The distance from Houston to Laredo Texas (also on the border) is 350 miles. Long-time Houston area activists plan on observing the Minutemen.
:::more below the fold::
Houston, July 9th
Jimenez and CRECEN leader Teodoro Aguiluz threatened to file a lawsuit if they observe the Minutemen doing anything illegal.
The Minutemen in Texas originated out of a series of meetings this year in Goliad County, where landowners have become alarmed by the illegal immigrants being smuggled along the area’s rural roads. Ranchers and other owners began holding meetings, and area law officers attended.
Background: Oral History Interview with María Jiménez, Tejano voices, 1998,
The Central American Resource Center, or CRECEN. and The Official Minuteman Civil Defense Corps
Many volunteers complained that their lives have been ‘turned upside down’ by the surge in illegal immigration. They told of having illegals kicking down doors, damaging their property, and stealing livestock.
Minutemen organizer Chris Simcox said he plans to have four chapters of the group patrolling the Texas-Mexico border in October. A Minuteman action in Arizona in April had mixed results.
But several civil rights leaders at the rally said the Minutemen go a lot further than that. Che Lopez compared the volunteers at last night’s rally to the Ku Klux Klan.
“Just basically racially profiling people. Pulling them out of their cars. Intimidating them.”
“During the second meeting, someone in the back shouted: ‘Can’t we just shoot ’em,’ ” in reference to illegal immigrants, Carrizales recalls. “Then others started to feed on that.”
I find it not too surprising that this action is being conducted in Houston. Obviously this action has little to do with border observation. But I suppose if they held their demonstration in a large Metropolitan area nearer the border (San Antonio, or El Paso perhaps, or even Austin) their demonstration would be met with even more resistance. After all, in Texas…
Sunday’s news, Houston Texas, July 11th
U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Houston, who organized Saturday’s meeting of law enforcement officials, said she is concerned that the Minutemen’s plans to expand their activities to a diverse city such as Houston could become confrontational.
“I will say, as a member of Congress, I do not claim the Minutemen are criminals,” said Jackson Lee. “I do claim they are acting in an unauthorized way and may be characterized even as militia. When that occurs in a population, what you have is a mixture of confrontation that makes the jobs of these law enforcement individuals more difficult.”
I post this diary in memory of Esequiel Hernandez, Jr., 18, a high school age goatherder from Redford, Texas who killed in a Texas border control/protection incident , on May 20, 1997.
I’m Anglo. This is a story more fittingly told to you by a Tejana o Tejano. Much nuance is missing and I do not speak the language required to tell this very well at all. I feel a great admiration and sympathy for those men and women who leaves homes and families behind and come here, to Houston, to these United States, to work and to send the money they make back home. What i know if this story can perhaps best expressed in the opening lyric of the following song, by a musician who grew up in Bellaire, a city that lies completely within the city of Houston.
The man outside he works for me, his name is Mariano
He cuts and trims the grass for me he makes the flowers bloom
He says that he comes from a place not far from Guanajuato
Thats two days on a bus from here, a lifetime from this room.
Mariano, Robert Earl Keen
this is a great post bay on an important topic. how long will it be before the self appointed fascist police start going door to door, house to house, lookin for illegal immigrants?
well the backstory to this is how much the business community profits from the labor. witness george bush’s support of a what’s basically a revival of the bracero program. the fact is the minutemen won’t stop day labor, by interdicting the labor. they have to dry up the jobs.
the business republicans don’t want that.
This is just so sad. Fear and hate and self righteousness… deadly combination.
Hopefully Man Eegee will comment on this… he’s done a few diaries on the immigration situation and people dying of thirst in the desert in an effort to come here and other things.
It’s just insane how these people are not only allowed to, but encouraged to dehumanize entire groups of people, and to perpetuate the fear and the hate. Hopefully more and more in cities like this (and everywhere, really) will stand up and call them what they are.
Yes I welcome all comments! It’s interesting too, in the very first diary at Booman Tribune(this is only my second) Man Eegee was the very first person to comment. So he would be doubly welcome!
The story is sad but certainly not unhopeful although still unfolding. I’ve got a pretty good idea (and am hoping) that the minutemen are going to seriously get “the business”. Obviously controlling the Southwestern border is not the issue as its 350 miles from here.
Bayprarie, thank you for this diary. Never feel awkward about speaking out against injustice just because you’re not a part of the group being oppressed. Think of all the Gay-Straight Alliances and the strength they represent by working together.
The progressive community must unite with the Latino activist groups like CRECEN and Derechos Humanos to show some solidarity for our people.
Many Democrats have muted their voices (see Rep. Lee try to take the middle ground in her comment?), rather than expressing outrage at blatant racism and scapegoating. It’s one of the reasons they are losing Latino support and they will continue to lose it if they don’t stand up for equal treatment of all human beings.
Paz
Thank you for your kind words and encouragement.
I didn’t note the reaction of Mayor Bill White in the blockquotes, but i considered it. His reaction seems very non-chalant to me at this time also and his name is not even mentioned in the story, only “Mayor” is used. Mayor Bill White was a deputy energy secretary in the Clinton Administration. Mayor Bill White is a Democrat.
come back but dont have to wear hoods anymore. I wonder when they get the brown shirts.
I know how some of those who attended the Minuteman meetings felt, having lived in the backcountry of San Diego county for many years. Illegals there tore down fences, damaged out building to sleep in them and often left water running all night after refreshing themselves from our well. I even posted signs that asked them to refrain from damaging property and made sure there was always water and some canned goods available for them. I felt it was important that they felt they were being treated like human beings. I only once had to call the sheriff’s office because there was the beginnings of a problem and that problem turned out to be the anglo coyote who was leading them through the mountains and desert.
It can rub that last nerve raw, yet many of these minutemen are in fact racist, bigots who use fearmongering to promote their resolve to keep the ugly non american from infiltrating our shores. I would say that their movement to Houston has nothing to do with protecting our borders and a tremendous amount to do with trying to intimidate day laborers, who may be here illegally.
As someone so succinctly stated earlier, if you want to stop the movement of illegals looking for work, you need to stop the businesses that profit from illegal workers.