United Farmworkers of America, AFL-CIO flags at the meeting.
Posted on 07/28/2005 7:20:59 AM PDT by SwinneySwitch
PHARR — Once a powerful and militant organization in the Chicano Liberation Movement, the Brown Berets made it known Wednesday that they will oppose the Minuteman border watch group with physical force if necessary.
"We want to send the message ‘think twice before you come here,’" said Pablo Delgado, a Brown Beret leader, at a press conference at the Hidalgo County Democratic Party headquarters.
The Minutemen have said they will come to Texas in October, although it is still unclear whether South Texas is in their outreach plans.
Hidalgo County Democratic Party chairman Juan Maldonado said the party does not condone the actions of the Brown Berets; however, because the group asked him for a platform, he agreed to let them speak at the press conference.
"We do not need the Brown Berets armed against the Minutemen," Maldonado reiterated after Delgado spoke. He said the people of South Texas are more "evolved" and "civil" than that.
The Brown Berets, primarily active in the late 1960s and early 1970s, are likened to the Black Panthers.
Further fueling the Brown Berets’ anger was the news of Bill Parmley’s resignation from the leadership post of the Texas chapter of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps on Monday. According to the Victoria Advocate, Parmley claimed the Texas chapter lacked structure and members from his area near Goliad had "racist tendencies."
A volunteer with the Minuteman group confirmed that Parmley resigned in an e-mail to national organizer Chris Simcox. But she said she had been told to say that Parmley "found it was taking too much time from his business." Simcox did not return an e-mail and telephone request for an interview Wednesday.
However, Jim Gilchrist, with the defense corps’ sister organization, The Minuteman Project, which primarily focuses on cracking down on illegal immigrant employers among other issues, said Parmley had a lot to explain.
Gilchrist suspected that Parmley was deliberately trying to sabotage the group and saying such things out of retaliation. If the Texas group is a bunch of racists, he said, Simcox will get to the bottom of this and oust them.
News of possible racist tendencies couldn’t have come at a better time for the local opponents of the civilian border patrol.
The Minutemen "are nothing more than a group of zealous over-enthusiastic racists that want to promote these types of immigrants as being terroristic," Maldonado said.
Even before the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, he said, there was an unfounded fear held by some in the United States that Mexicans were taking over the country.
"The Minutemen project that fear," he said. "For all the strides that we have made toward equality, the Minutemen are the epitome of hate, fear and ignorance. We are unified to stop this racist movement from entering our region."
"When will they begin patrolling the Canadian border?" asked Juanita Valdez-Cox, state director of La Union del Pueblo Entero. According to the project’s official Web site, www.minutemanhq.com, the answer is soon. Volunteers to patrol the United State’s northern border with Canada are being recruited.
At the end of the press conference, Maldonado was the first to sign a petition denouncing the border watchers. The Democratic Party plans to send the petition to Gov. Rick Perry to get him to do the same.
The petition also points out the need for more money to hire Border Patrol agents, a point deputy Mexican consulate Ernesto Herrera touched on privately with reporters after the conference.
"It isn’t in the scope of the private citizen to do the job of the government," Herrera said. "The Mexican government thinks the U.S. has the institution, the department in charge of protecting the border…. They (the Border Patrol) know the limits. They know that everybody, undocumented or not, has human rights. It’s not something you leave behind when you cross the border."
Cari Hammerstrom covers law enforcement and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4424.
Amazing. What if the Klan asked him for a platform?
No one has the "human right" to enter a country illegally.
Ping!
Please FReepmail me if you want on or off this South Texas/Mexico ping list.
The "government" isn't doing squat.
Let the games begin.
Farmworkers = Farm Workers
Soooo, Pablo is the law in "them parts?" Or perhaps Pablo has decided that with so many illegals around American Citizens do not have the right to assemble?
What with the illegal activities of the folks with LULAC that assaulted the Minutemen in California and threats of violence from the brown beanies in south Texas, I believe Americans are now beginning to see the true nature of our "economic saviours from south of the border."
Not a single suprise in this report. And by the way Pablo, you are in fact "sending a message." Not the one you think but America is getting it LOUD AND CLEAR.
Obviously, the immediate and over-riding fear is that fundamentalist Muslim enemies of the U.S. will enter through our unguarded borders. It is true, however, that longer term, ethnic strife, including terrorist bombings, is a very real possibility given the current rate of third-world immigration and the lack of assimilation.
"It isn’t in the scope of the private citizen to do the job of the government," Herrera said. "The Mexican government thinks the U.S. has the institution, the department in charge of protecting the border…. They (the Border Patrol) know the limits. They know that everybody, undocumented or not, has human rights. It’s not something you leave behind when you cross the border.""
I don't really care what the Mexican government thinks. This isn't their country.
People do have intrinsic human rights. Calling the border patrol on them to have them sent back to their own country doesn't violate those.
Threatening US citizens who are volunteering to look for criminals and report them is violating their rights.
Are they going to start threatening neighborhood watch groups next?
"Hidalgo County Democratic Party chairman Juan Maldonado said the party does not condone the actions of the Brown Berets; however, because the group asked him for a platform, he agreed to let them speak at the press conference."
If you don't condone their actions, you don't give them a platform from which to recruit people to perform those actions.
Those were Muslims you moron, not Mexicans. It is not my worry that Illegals are going to “take over” ‘the country. I am more worried about them bilking our country for untold amounts of money while, in the long run, legal immigrants and citizens will suffer the consequences. There is much more that worries me about them, but I don’t have the time to type it all here
"When will they begin patrolling the Canadian border?" asked Juanita Valdez-Cox, state director of La Union del Pueblo Entero.
When we start having mass migrations from Canada. Are there 15,000,000 illegal Canadians here leaching off our system?
We are unified to stop this racist movement from entering our region.
Again, these groups like to think they can tell AMERICAN CITIZENS where they can or cannot go or assemble, yet we, as AMERICAN CITIZENS, can’t voice our opinions about foreigners illegally coming to our country. Typical hypocrisy from the true hateful and racists idiots.
Sounds like a threat to me. Another fascistic movement bent on subverting our borders.
Link to story about racial unrest in the late 60's and early 70's in the Rio Grande Valley area...
http://www.latinoreligion.com/index/mn16879/%22Missed+Understandings+in+Ethnic+Reconciliation%22
"...with physical force if necessary."
Uh, guys, Texas ain't exactly the place to try this.
The Mexican jihad has begun!
ping
He asserted they also have made comments about shooting illegal immigrants or letting them die from dehydration."
And for another viewpoint:
Simcox said Parmley told him Wednesday that his words had been exaggerated and taken out of context in media reports.
"He didn't mean to cause problems for us," Simcox said. "He regrets it turned into an issue."
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