I've had it.

I've had it with illegal aliens, illegal immigration, and the complicit attitude of US immigration policy!

My 16 year old has been looking for a summer job for the last 3 months, what he's found has been surprising. Not only are there no summer jobs available, there are no jobs available, period, for someone with no experience.

So you say he's not looking hard enough? That the jobs are there, you just have to find them. HA!

All the entry level, low skill jobs that would normally be taken by teenagers and young adults during the summer are being taken by illegal immigrants, at least here in Texas. The few places that don't hire illegals have to contend with 10 or more applicants for each open position.

So who is this hurting you ask? Just a few teenagers who will be back in school in a couple of months? Just a few teenagers that will contribute little to the overall economic picture? WRONG!

You know the answer. It's hurting everyone. Teenagers would spend almost every penny they earned, contributing immensely to the overall economic health of the US. They would be in the malls, movie theaters, and restaurants spending their hard earned pay, leaving their parents free to spend their money on something else.

The illegal aliens? They used to maintain a low profile. Now, they don't bother. They can be seen everywhere; mowing lawns, planting trees, roofing & framing houses, working at the lube shack, pouring concrete, gathering at several official and unofficial day worker hang-outs in the mornings (when it would be extremely easy for immigration to swoop in and arrest them.)

Where you don't and won't see them is out spending their money (except for at Wal-Mart.) You don't see them at Bennigans, Chilis, Tony Romas, Cinemark, the mall, car dealerships, etc.

They don't have any money to spend on the US economy because they're sending everything except a small subsistence back to Mexico.

The illegals are not here to help us or the US economy. Anyone that says they are here to take jobs that US citizens don't want is being disingenuous.

They're siphoning off millions of dollars a year from the economy. Not only by taking jobs, but a host of other ways; education benefits, medical assistance, government assistance, thievery, robbery, drug dealing, you name it, they're involved in it.

And what is the Department of Homeland Security™ doing about this? They're putting on a dog and pony show.

They're outlining major new methods of monitoring ports of entry, airports, etc. with biometrics, fingerprinting, radar, facial recognition technology, and who knows what else, while at the same time doing nothing to monitor thousands of miles of open space where, apparently, it is relatively easy to cross into the US.

It seems to me that simple reconnaissance flights over that vast unmonitored territory would be able to identify these border violations and put a stop to, or at least slow, this illegal invasion of our country.

The Department of Homeland Security™ is largely ignoring the issue. Illegal entry into the US continues unabated across our borders.

What can we do about it? Other than mew weakly and post articles like this on the large wasteland that is the internet?

Contact your elected officials and let them know what you're thinking. Let them know you will hold them accountable. It's all in our hands.

Poll Shows Elites Differ from
People on Immigration

he gap between the opinions of the American people and their leaders on immigration is "enormous" and growing, according to an analysis of survey data collected by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations.

The poll found that 60 percent of the American public regards the current high levels of immigration to be a "critical threat to the vital interests" of the country, but only 14 percent of the nation's leadership agrees.

The data was analyzed by the Center for Immigration Studies in Washington, D.C., in its report, "Elite vs. Public Opinion: An Examination of Divergent Views on Immigration."

The survey was based on interviews with 2,800 "ordinary Americans" and a cross-section of 400 "opinion leaders," including members of Congress, the Bush administration, business executives, union leaders, journalists, academics, and leaders of major special interest groups.

CIS found that the large 46-point gap between the people and the elite is wider than the 37-point difference found in a similar survey in 1998.

"The poll results indicate that there is no other foreign policy related issue on which the American people and their leaders disagreed more profoundly than immigration.," said the report. "Even on such divisive issues as globalization or strengthening the United Nations, the public and the elite are much closer together than they are on immigration."

On the issue of illegal immigration, the divide was even slightly larger. The survey found that 70 percent of the American people said reducing illegal immigration should be a "very important" foreign policy goal. But U.S. elites care little for enforcing their own laws. Only 22 percent of the elites interviewed agreed, creating a gap of 48 points.

The public ranks illegal immigration sixth out of 69 foreign policy problems they are most concerned about, while elites ranked illegal immigration at 26th.

Steve Camarota, co-author of the report, said the divergent views explain recent political events.

"It explains why broad interest group support for an illegal alien amnesty, including the business community and labor unions, has not translated into the passage of an amnesty," he said.

Republicans and Democrats are currently engaged in a bidding war to see which party can promise to deliver a bigger amnesty for illegals. Politicians hope that using government to give favors will translate into political support among immigrants at the ballot box. Both President George Bush and House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt, D-MO, have announced they will push for amnesty programs.

The poll showed that only 27 percent of the U.S. public believes the president's handling of immigration issues is good or excellent.

Most Americans surveyed, 55 percent, said immigration should be reduced. Just 27 percent wanted immigration levels kept the same. In stark contrast, only 18 percent of surveyed elites want immigration levels reduced, while fully 60 percent want the current high levels to remain the same.

Co-author Roy Beck said that continued "deep public dissatisfaction with current immigration policy" is an issue "just waiting for a candidate to champion."

Confronting Illegal Day Labor Issues in Your Community

This information is adapted from the FAIR Immigration Reformer's Guide to Legal Success. To order the full manual for $40, email publications@fairus.org.

The information presented here is intended to provide basic education, not specific legal advice. Before taking any action that may have legal consequences to yourself or someone else, consult a licensed attorney in your state.

Communities have become concerned about day laborer issues because of the proliferation of day labor "pick-up" sites-locations where workers gather waiting to be hired for short-term labor, usually by contractors or private individuals. These sites often spring up near home improvement centers and truck rental businesses, and they can result in hundreds of idle men congregating in a parking lot or on the street. Typically, these sites will raise quality of life concerns, such as public safety, health, and welfare, as well as facilitating widespread violations of immigration, employment, wage, health and safety, and tax laws.

Statements by government officials and academic studies indicate that 40 to 80 percent of male day laborers (day labor is an almost exclusively male phenomena) are not authorized to work in the U.S.

Complaints about casual day labor sites often begin when local residents and merchants object to loitering, public urination, litter, or sexual harassment problems. These complaints, if documented by photos or videos and written affidavits, can often be resolved through local and state misdemeanor laws. It is especially important to involve business owners who believe their businesses are being harmed by day labor sites, or even the local Chamber of Commerce.

Protest tactics often have significant immediate effects. In Marin County, California, the Marin Immigration Reform Association announced to the press that it would photograph and video both day laborers and employers at San Rafael day labor sites. The monitoring was done openly, with media coverage, and the documentation was forwarded to the INS District Director. As a result, the INS increased sweeps of the targeted sites.

Photos and videos of curbside hiring may be of interest to the IRS-especially if the photos include license plates of the cars that are stopping to hire day laborers. The IRS is not particularly concerned with whether the workers are here illegally, but it is very interested in whether taxes have been paid. It is a virtual certainty that curbside hires are being paid in cash and off the books and that the income is not being declared.

Another widely adopted approach, which has been upheld by state and federal courts, is for local governments to enact an ordinance to prohibit all solicitations of moving vehicles. The courts have held that regulations limited to vehicle solicitation serve a legitimate public purpose, are not unconstitutionally vague, over-broad, or content-based, and do not violate the First Amendment. A second approach, often included in the same ordinance, is to prohibit the use of privately owned commercial parking facilities for solicitation of moving vehicles without explicit permission of the property owner. FAIR can provide model ordinances.

Activists may also adapt a strategy that has been used to bring lawsuits against drug and crack houses, where residents have shown injuries to businesses or property based on public nuisance claims that are very similar to the concerns raised by the tolerance of illegal alien workers within city limits.

Hiring Halls

In some communities, local politicians seek to deal with the day laborer issue by creating hiring sites of their own. They hope to satisfy the demands of the community and merchants to get day laborers off the street corners, while not offending alien advocacy groups. A designated hiring site concentrates day laborers in a single location in a community, while permitting the aliens to go on seeking employment. Numerous open borders groups also have created hiring halls on behalf of the aliens.

The Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) makes it clear that any person who knowingly encourages an alien to reside in the U.S. illegally has committed a federal felony. The INA also makes it illegal to recruit someone for employment if you know he/she is an illegal alien and prohibits hiring a person without verifying documentation showing that the person is authorized to work in the U.S. Helping illegal aliens to remain in the U.S. is not protected by the First Amendment, and courts have ruled that it is illegal for non-profit and religious organizations to knowingly assist an employer in violating employment sanctions, regardless of claims that their convictions require them to assist aliens.

Taken together, these provisions prohibit a person or entity, including non-profit or religious organizations, from creating hiring halls dedicated to assisting people known to be illegal aliens in obtaining employment.

Local governments operating hiring halls often claim that they are not employers or recruiters and therefore are not required to verify the employment status of workers who use their facilities, any more than they are required to check the citizenship status of users of other municipal facilities.

In order to fight this argument in the courts, citizens must be able to show that government officials responsible for authorizing, funding, maintaining, or regulating the hiring had actual knowledge that hiring hall users or beneficiaries were illegal aliens or other unauthorized workers. The best way to do this is to write formal, registered letters of complaint to the members of the city council that authorizes the center, stating that the beneficiaries are illegal aliens, and including all evidence supporting that claim. (Since facts about legal residence cannot be established based on appearance alone, immigration reform activists can pose as prospective employers and hire workers from these hiring halls. Once the hiring has taken place, the employer must verify the legal status of the employee. If, as is often the case, the employees cannot produce valid documentation, that is evidence that the hiring hall and its operators are acting in reckless disregard of the law.) If the city council, planning commission, or other municipal body holds hearings or other public sessions, statements that operating a hiring hall facilitates violations of federal law should be entered into the public record.

Activists should verify whether the hiring hall has a policy of only servicing job seekers who are citizens or aliens with employment authorization. Hiring halls with screening policies should be of less concern, unless there is evidence that the screening procedure used is ineffective, perfunctory, or inconsistent.

Activists must also identify and document the amounts and sources of financial support used to pay for the hiring hall. Financial support could be in the form of direct funding or contractual arrangements with intermediaries, often non-profit advocacy organizations with strong open-borders political agendas. If Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds are used to pay for services to illegal aliens, statutes restricting the use of federal funds may also have been violated.

Most importantly, local government officials must operate in the open and hold open hearings about local issues. A city council meeting in which large numbers of citizens demand to be heard on these issues will almost always influence the decision the council makes.

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