Posted on 07/08/2005 9:57:29 AM PDT by Graybeard58
WATERBURY -- For an organization just three months old, the Connecticut Citizens for Immigration Control has been stirring up its share of controversy across the state.
The nonprofit organization has drawn fire from immigration-rights activists for its hard-line stance against amnesty for illegal aliens and for tightening U.S. borders. One of its founders, Paul Streitz of Darien, volunteered on the overnight shift of the Minuteman project, an event that drew lay people from all over the country to watch the U.S.-Mexican border for illegally entering immigrants.
CCIC will hold its first meeting in the Waterbury-Watertown area in Oakville Tuesday night at the Oakville American Legion post in Watertown. Michael Cutler, a former Immigration and Naturalization Service agent who has testified at Congressional hearings on immigration, will speak.
"Basically, we want to influence legislators and we want to influence government officials to strengthen and enforce our immigration laws," Streitz said. He said he feels strongly about illegal immigration because he fears the country is "on the road to becoming a third world nation" as jobs are outsourced or worked by illegal immigrants who use public resources without paying taxes.
The group has stayed less than quiet during its short existence. It held its inaugural meeting April 18 in Danbury, a city dealing with a racial tension that is partly due to a recent influx of Ecuadorian immigrants. The CCIC meeting came just days after Mayor Mark D. Boughton called for the deputization of state troopers to help with serious crimes committed by illegal immigrants, a request seen by some as discriminatory against all immigrants. Streitz said about 100 protestors showed up at the meeting along with 160 attendees.
In its most recent publicity-garnering move, the organization demonstrated outside Sen. Joseph Lieberman's office June 25 in Hartford against an immigration bill that, among other things, may help many illegal aliens gain amnesty. One participant held a sign featuring Uncle Sam, as whom he was dressed, with the words, "Illegal immigrants: I want you out of my country." The event's flier featured Lieberman, along with bill co-writers Sen. Edward Kennedy and Sen. John McCain, dressed in stereotypical Mexican outfits as the "Three Amigos."
Streitz said his group needs to be "in your face" in order to grab attention for a problem that is as "taboo, like talking about sex in the 50s."
"Our emphasis is on the employers," Streitz said about the goals of his group. "We want to see the employers not hire illegals. We don't think that just deporting a lot of illegals will really solve the problems. ... If there were no jobs available here, they would go back."
"It is illegal, a federal crime to employ illegal people in the United States and we want those laws enforced," he added.
The meeting will be held at 6:30 p.m. July 12 at the American Legion post at 62 Bunker Hill Road in the Oakville section of Watertown.
ping
Wish I could go but I don't get out of work till 8 pm. If they have a meeting in the New Haven or Middletown area I will try my best to go.
Protect our borders and coastlines from all foreign invaders!
Be Ever Vigilant!
Minutemen Patriots ~ Bump!
If anyone is comming from New York, I'd love to hitch a ride.
Connecticut bump
BTW, I do hope you now see the wisdom of President Bush decision to close Groton. It will cause hardship, but also opportunity.
Remember as Yankees, we should be independent ,and not dependent on federal spending.
What??
Where did you ever dream of opportunity in closing Groton?
In what? Operating one of the 50 Superfund sites already there?
By creating 20 more by closing it?
Thanks, Race! I'll see what I can do. It's right up the road - might be able to convince my husband to go with me.
Regardless, President Bush has decreed that the Groton base must be close. So we must close ranks and support him. Remember, as Freepers we live by two mottos:
"Our honor is our loyalty"
and
"Faithful unto Death"
Lose the SS slogans.
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