Minutemen take show on road
CARAVAN: The illegal-immigration foes begin a cross-country trip in a bid to drum up support.
10:00 PM PDT on Wednesday, May 3, 2006
By SHARON McNARY
The Press-Enterprise
Minuteman Project co-founder James Gilchrist led a cross-country caravan from Los Angeles on Monday to recruit new members among those who were turned off by recent pro-immigrant demonstrations.
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| AP photo |
| Genevieve Peters, left, a Minuteman supporter, argues with Monica Morant in Los Angeles. Minuteman Project co-founder James Gilchrist kicked off a cross-country caravan in Los Angeles on Monday to recruit new members. |
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The tour began in Los Angeles' Leimert Park, a famed black cultural center. The destination rally in Washington, D.C., on May 12 will feature Ted Hayes, a longtime advocate for the homeless who says that large-scale illegal immigration takes jobs from black Americans.
Calling from a mobile phone in an RV rolling on Interstate 10 nearing Blythe, Gilchrist said the marches bolstered the Minuteman Project. Demonstrators, he said, "were sitting under a Mexican flag claiming that the U.S. is theirs. That's just upsetting Middle America."
He said, "Every time our adversaries did something like that, our volunteers doubled overnight and our donations tripled."
Nativo V. Lopez, a spokesman for the March 25 Coalition that organized the recent boycott and large marches, said the Minuteman caravan was an effort to regain the limelight following heavy coverage of pro-immigrant demonstrations.
"They are appealing to the base, nativist prejudice of a minority of Americans," Lopez said.
Gayle Nyberg, of Murrieta, said she and Penny Magnotto, of Perris, planned to join the road trippers early Monday in Los Angeles, but their 1986 Pace Arrow RV, freshly painted for the tour with red and blue stripes and white stars, clipped a car at a gas station and had to join the caravan later in Indio.
About 10 vehicles are in the caravan, Magnotto said. She said she often checks out the window to make sure she is not being followed by some of those who have threatened project members.
"If I'm going to die on the highway trying to save my country, so be it," Magnotto said. She estimates the trip to Washington and back will cost about $3,000 in gas and expenses.
A rally was set for Wednesday in Phoenix, and another in Crawford, Texas, President Bush's hometown, on Saturday. The caravan will pass through Arkansas, Tennessee, Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia on the way to Washington, D.C.
The group has been critical of Bush's support for immigration law changes that would permit large numbers of undocumented immigrants to stay as guest workers or permanent legal residents.
Reach Sharon McNary at (951) 368-9458 or smcnary@PE.com
Online at: http://www.pe.com/localnews/inland/stories/PE_News_Local_P_caravan04.1.8624c30.html
