Left-Wing Extremists Want to 'Reconquista' Southwest-White Supremacist 'Loonies' Influence Debate

Left-Wing Extremists Want to 'Reconquista' Southwest
By Jeff Golimowski and Katherine Poythress
CNSNews.com Senior Staff Writer and Correspondent
July 03, 2007

(CNSNews.com) - A webpage featuring pictures of Uncle Sam in a 15th century suit of armor with the words "I want you to come back to Europe!" is one of the worst nightmares of the anti-immigrant movement.

"We're angry enough to say the problem is that Europeans forced their way into our continent, maybe they should go home," said Olin Tezcatlitoca, who runs the site. "This is outrageous for us who are indigenous people to be told we cannot migrate on our own land."

Tezcatlitoca is the leader of a tiny group called the "Mexica Movement," which advocates on behalf of "indigenous Americans," or those people without European ancestry.

"Kind of like the Jews wanted to take their land back after 2,000 years," said Tezcatlitoca. "We're saying we lost this land 150 years ago in a clearly unjust war, in a clearly racist war against our people."

Groups like Tezcatlitoca's are taking fire from mainstream pro-immigrant groups such as the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) and from observers of the immigration debate.

"It's a red herring, it's a logical fallacy," said Devin Burghart of the Chicago-based Building Democracy Initiative (www.buildingdemocracy.org).

The BDI mission statement says the group "counters organized racism, anti-immigrant activity, and other forms of bigotry through strategic research, community organizing, education and training around the globe." It means addressing extremists on either side of the debate and debunking what the group calls myths.

"Racist conspiracy theories permeate virtually entire anti-immigrant movements," said Burghart.

He said groups like the Mexica Movement are so small and so far out on the fringe that they are not worth talking about. But another group, Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan (MEChA), does get talked about, often in the context of a conspiracy to "reconquista," or reconquer, the Southwestern United States.

Born of left-wing radicalism in the 1960s, MEChA's constitution refers to continuing "the struggle for the self-determination of the Chicano people for the purpose of liberating Aztlan."

Aztlan refers to a legendary homeland for those of Mexican descent in the Southwestern United States and Northern Mexico. Other MEChA documents refer to plans for mobilizing Chicano youth for "self defense against the occupying forces of the oppressors."

Yet, according to observers on the left and the right, the modern MEChA movement is run by college students and focuses mainly on encouraging Latino high school students to go to college and the retention of Latino students already enrolled in universities.

Indeed, the group is so decentralized that Cybercast News Service could not even locate a national spokesperson. Several messages for campus organizers to comment on this article went unreturned.

Burghart said MEChA is being used as a bogeyman by the anti-immigrant movement.

"It's clear that what's happened is from whatever remnants [of 1960s radicalism] may have existed ... the idea has been racialized and blown up to the point that all brown skinned people have become co-conspirators," he said.

The problem has become so acute that NCLR includes a statement on its website distancing itself from the idea of Aztlan and the more radical elements of MEChA, or any separatist Hispanic movement.

Adding gasoline to the fire - sometimes literally - is the presence of ultra-leftist anarchist groups at many of the major demonstrations on the West Coast. These groups may lack a coherent political agenda, but they often refer to police and state authorities as rightists or fascists.

"It puts a great deal of pressure on law enforcement" when these groups show up, said Rick Eaton of the anti-racism Simon Wiesenthal Center.

"They've been taking advantage of both sides. They showed up at the Echo Park [pro-immigrant] rally... they've shown up at white supremacist rallies," said Eaton. "There's almost no talk about that ... but you can clearly see them if you look at the tapes."

The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), a liberal advocacy group that tracks fringe groups - and whose methodology has at times been called into question - said that the number of extremist pro-immigrant groups is a fraction of those espousing neo-Nazi and white supremacist ideology.

The center does concede, however, that the fringe has a disproportionate impact, especially in the anti-immigrant movement.

The SPLC's Mark Potock claimed that "conspiracy theories" about Aztlan originated among far-right "hate groups" and later worked their way into the wider debate.

For his part, Mexica's Tezcatlitoca said he'll continue to try and get his group's agenda into the national debate on immigration. He describes NCLR as a "mainstream organization which isn't working in the interests of the people" and views MEChA as being "more like college party clubs."

"We want to reframe this whole question, not about our people being illegals but about Europeans being illegal," said Tezcatlitoca. "It's something that European people should be ashamed of ... when they say 'Okay, how can we right this?' then we can have a real discussion."

(CNSNews.com) - Gordon Baum's phone has been ringing a lot more lately in response to the immigration debate. "It's really got people stirred up like nothing I've ever seen before," he said.

Baum is the CEO of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC), a group that calls itself "a responsible, effective voice and active advocate for the no-longer silent conservative majority." Others call the CCC one of a growing number of far-right fringe groups that mix white supremacist rhetoric with political discussion.

The fringe is becoming more vocal and having an increasingly significant impact on the immigration debate even though its members represent only an "infinitesimal" segment of the American population, according to observers on both the right and left.

Baum's group is based on a series of principles, among them that the United States is Christian country populated by European peoples, and it should stay that way.

"Diversity causes nothing but chaos and struggle," he said. "Go to Israel and ask them if the diversity with the Palestinians worked out."

Baum bristles at being accused of white supremacy. Yet he boasts that European peoples, despite representing only eight percent of the world's population, "carry the whole standards for civilization. We can be proud of that."

And, in contending that Latino immigrants won't assimilate into American culture, he also argues against the acceptability of African-Americans in the United States.

"Blacks have been here for about four hundred years," Baum said. "Have we really successfully assimilated them?"

Mark Potock of the liberal Southern Poverty Law Center, a sometimes controversial liberal advocacy group that monitors fringe organizations, said the CCC is not unique.

"The immigration debate has been very, very good to the radical right," he said. "In 2000, our hate group count was 602 ... the 2006 count was 844."

Potock argued that there is a difference between what he calls bona fide "hate groups" and "nativist extremist" organizations. The latter, he said, don't have an explicit, race-based philosophy but still espouse views close to those of white supremacist organizations, particularly about immigration.

Potock said these groups, which translate white supremacist messages into more acceptable language, are the real threat.

"The worry isn't so much that you get a few thousand more people in hate groups," Potock said. "The worry is, the ideology of hate groups start to infect the mainstream political discourse on immigration."

This skewing of the debate, according to Potock, is hampering the country's ability to have a legitimate discussion of immigration issues.

"I don't think that all people in this country who feel immigration needs to be lowered are racists or unrobed Klansmen," he said.

FBI Agent Stephen Kodak said the bureau's numbers match the SPLC's assertions. Although counting members in white supremacist groups is notoriously difficult, the bureau has seen some disturbing trends.

"We've seen a real increase in the neo-Nazi groups' recruitment efforts over the immigration issue," said Kodak. "They're using the anti-immigration sentiment to try to get new members."

Ira Mehlman, media director for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) - a mainstream conservative group that campaigns to reduce immigration - said the extremist fringe exists on either side of the immigration issue, "but that is true of any political movement."

Mehlman said it's unfair to lump the extremists in with either side of the debate.

"Mussolini made the trains run on time in Italy, but if my Amtrak train shows up on time, I don't wonder if the fascists have taken over Amtrak," he said. "There's nothing wrong with on-time trains - there may have been something wrong with Mussolini."

He added that most Americans are aware that their interests are at stake in the immigration debates and believe they have a right to express themselves the same way immigrants are doing.

"I don't think that most people are paying attention to a few radical crazies," Mehlman said. "Who cares what this handful of loonies think?"

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.