Posted on 08/04/2005 4:19:52 PM PDT by 4.1O dana super trac pak
Gov. Mike Huckabee on Wednesday called last week’s federal roundup of 119 illegal aliens in Clark County "terribly planned" and wondered if it was "done for headlines." "Very little thought was given to what would happen to the children, who are by the way American citizens," Huckabee said on his monthly radio show. "I hope the next time the feds will operate with a little more common sense."
After the radio show Huckabee told reporters he would have at least given the illegal aliens a few days to gather belongings and figure out living arrangements for their children.
A spokesman for the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau in New Or- leans said later that the agency doesn’t know whether the 30 to 35 children left behind after the raid are American citizens. "Our goal was to arrest people who have broken the law," said the spokesman, Temple Black. "And, in fact, these people had actual U.S. citizens’ documents and U.S. citizens’ birth certificates and U.S. citizens’ Social Security cards. These are folks that were breaking the law and were here illegally, of course. Whether it would be appropriate to give people who were lawbreakers five or six days’ notice I would have to say, ‘ No. ’"
The July 26 raid took place at the Petit Jean Poultry Inc. deboning plant at Gum Springs, just south of Arkadelphia. Poultry plant officials said they had no way of knowing the workers were illegal, since the workers had provided identification and were hired through the state’s employment security division.
The U.S. attorney’s office in Fort Smith has said the raid grew out of an investigation into a multistate identity-brokerage ring in which U.S. citizens sold documents containing their identifying information to a person in Arizona, who mailed them to a woman in Arkadelphia for resale to illegal aliens in the Clark County area.
Black said, "We as an agency are doing our best to restore the integrity of the U.S. immigration system by trying to arrest those who violate immigration and employment laws. Just for the record, the governor has not contacted either our offices or the local offices or our headquarters to discuss this issue. And we’d be more than happy to meet with him to discuss the issue."
Huckabee spokesman Jim Harris later wouldn’t say whether the governor had called the federal immigration service to express his concerns or whether he planned to do so.
On his show on the Arkansas Radio Network, Huckabee said that "we have a team of people in Arkadelphia" trying to help the children left behind. He said that includes representatives of his office and of the state Department of Human Services. "There was a total lack of communication between federal authorities and local officials, particularly the sheriff," Huckabee said. "He has an absolute right to be informed of something like this."
Black said that federal officials informed the Arkansas State Police of the raid and asked that state police inform the sheriff. But Black said he didn’t know how soon before the raid state police were informed.
Huckabee said the person behind the document scheme should be prosecuted with the "most intense hand of the law" because that person is "making money on the backs of the poorest persons in our labor force."
He also complained that the federal officials should have given the state more time "to assume the responsibilities" for caring for the children. "I have a lot of sympathy for the kids," Huckabee said.
Speaking to reporters after the show, Huckabee said his staff has found it hard to gather information in Arkadelphia to help the children because people who could help fear deportation themselves. "It’s a big mess," he said. "People are scared to death that they are going to be rounded up."
Asked if he would have preferred the federal officials allow the illegal aliens to stay in Arkansas, Huckabee said there’s a difference between "an illegal person working at a job plucking chickens — that’s what he’s doing illegal — and a person who is robbing a bank. Is there somehow some public threat that we wouldn’t even let them get their children from day care, sit down with social workers and figure out what the heck we’re going to do with a 6-year-old?
" I mean if you can’t see the distinction on those things, I can’t help you. "
He added that the illegal aliens" shouldn’t necessarily be allowed to stay. But do we not have time to sit down and bring them in and say, ‘ Look, you’re illegal, but we’re at least going to let you have six days to gather your belongings and figure out what to do with your kids’? "I resent the implication that people are making that they are illegal and they ought to be dragged out like common thugs and hauled off to sit in jails.
" We’re now paying money to feed and house them in a jail space that we’re not putting meth [amphetamine] dealers in. "Is a chicken plucker a greater threat than a meth dealer or a terrorist or an armed robber?
" I don’t think so. "
Black repeated statements last week that during the raid the agency had interpreters who asked whether any of the 119 had children and none said they had. He acknowledged that the workers possibly feared that authorities would round up children, also.
Black said that none of the illegal aliens seized in the Clark County raid remain in Arkansas jails. He said authorities took some to the federal agency’s facility in Texarkana. He estimated that perhaps 80 of the 119 spent one or two nights in Arkansas jails.
He said 107 have returned voluntarily to Mexico. Two were mandated to return because of outstanding orders of deportation from the United States. The remaining 10 got notice to appear before a federal immigration judge to decide their status.
Black said his telephone has been constantly ringing because of press inquiries about the raid. He said Univision, a Spanish language television channel based in Los Angeles, had a crew in Arkadelphia working on a story about the raid.
From 1995 to 2000, Arkansas had the fourth-fastest growth rate of immigrants in the country, according to the U.S. Census Bureau.
Between 1990 and 2000, the estimated number of illegal immigrants in Arkansas increased from 5,000 to 27,000, according to the federal Immigration and Naturalization Service. The state’s total population approximates 2.7 million. According to the 2000 U.S. Census the Hispanic population in Arkansas numbers about 86,000.
During the most recent Arkansas legislative session, Huckabee backed a bill to let illegal aliens receive statefunded college scholarships and opposed a bill that would have denied state funds to illegal aliens. Both bills failed.
You are too kind towards Huckabee. The man is at best corrupt.
Protect our borders and coastlines from all foreign invaders!
Be Ever Vigilant!
Minutemen Patriots ~ Bump!
Don't forget that Tyson Foods is a big politcal donor and employs many of these foreign invaders!
Be Ever Vigilant!
Another idiot shows his true colors.
Do you have any facts to support that or is it just another falsehood that the anti-illegals seem to rely upon?
Depends on what they're doing on their off hours.
Huckabee doesn't have a chance of being electd nationally ~ Bump!
Why? Their parents will find their way back across the border and be reunited with them next week.
RINO....
RINOs are merely stealth democrats.. poseur's, ringers, shills, moles, OR useful idiots to democrats.. especially here on Free Republic.. also, moderation can be another way of saying COWARD..
I would hope the governor of any state would want the laws enforced across the board without any apologies.
I think the children of illegal aliens ,from Mexico could adapt to our culture, if their parents were not hell bent on raising them as peasants.We have many childless people who could provide good homes.Why should we send the children to Mexico where they will be taught to hate us and our culture?
Why is that our problem? Don't these kids have parents who are supposed to think about these things, or were the parents planning to use the kids as "anchor babies" simply to perpetuate their illegal immigration scam?
Send the kids back with their parents to wherever they came from. If they think their kids are American citizens, then let 'em hire lawyers and sort out their own d@mned mess they started in the first if they really care about it.
I fail to see how this is our fault!
fact hmm.. Socialism being slavery by gov't spreading as a cancer on this planet, proves man is corrupt.. There are no free lunches(fact) but mankind searchs for a free lunch not caring whom pays for that LUNCH.. Mexican insurgents are like that, parasites.. Americas freedom was payed for in blood.. not mexican blood but american blood.. Mexican insurgents could care less about giving their lives to "clean up mexico".. they want a free lunch..
"With immigrant workers comprising a large percentage of the overall workforce of the meat and poultry industries in the USA, immigration reform is of intense interest to processing plant managers. In total, an estimated 11 million workers in the entire U.S. manufacturing and service sectors are estimated to be in the country illegally."
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