Posted on 12/14/2006 8:15:55 AM PST by WestTexasWend
First it was the chaos. Then it was the confusion as to who was arrested and where they would be taken.
Now, the Spanish-speaking residents of Cactus, Dumas and other neighboring communities who escaped Tuesday's raid because they either are here legally or do not work at the Swift meat plant, face an even bigger problem: what is going to happen to the more than 100 children whose parents were rounded up and arrested?
"Right now the children are being taken care of by relatives or friends of those who were deported," said Orlando Gajardo, spokesman for the St. Peter and Paul Catholic Church in Dumas.
The church is actively helping the families of the hundreds of suspected illegal immigrants who were busted Tuesday morning by U.S. immigration agents at the Swift and Company plant in Cactus, which is about 60 miles north of Amarillo.
"But we are worried about their future," Gajardo added. "We are afraid that if they are not reunited with their parents soon, some may end up in foster homes."
The children of those busted, whose ages range from a month to 18 years, are for the most part U.S. citizens, according to residents and volunteers helping the families of those arrested.
"Their parents may be here illegally, but those children are American citizens," said Eric Perez, a Dumas resident who owns El Jacalito, a combination of a convenience store and a Mexican fast food restaurant.
"Many of those children were left without their father and mother," said Lorena Adame, an El Jacalito employee who, like her boss, witnessed the early morning raid because the store is across the U.S. 287 from the meat plant. "There were many cases in which both parents were arrested."
Like others, Adame, Gajardo and Perez don't know for sure how many Swift workers were arrested Tuesday and how many children had a parent or both parents busted.
Some estimate that the number of workers arrested may be as high as 520, and the vast majority were either natives of Mexico or Guatemala.
"We don't have official figures but we are told that 220 Guatemalans were arrested," said Jose Barillas-Trennert, the Guatemalan Consul in Houston. "We're obviously worried because we don't know what is going to happen to our fellow citizens and because we don't know what is going to happen to their children."
Immigration authorities have been secretive about the number of arrested and where they were taken, Barillas-Trennert said.
In Cactus and Dumas it is widely believed that the arrested were bused to detention centers in Amarillo and Lubbock, the Guatemalan consulate has been told, also, that some of the detainees might be taken to New Mexico and other states, the Consul added.
Although the fate of the children of the detainees is the main worry for the immigrant community in Cactus, Dumas and surrounding communities, some fear another major headache - burglaries.
"We already heard stories that the homes of those who were arrested were burglarized Tuesday night," Gajardo said. "The thieves went looking for money, jewelry and other valuable objects."
Cactus Mayor Luis Aguilar and Police Chief Tim Turley could not be reached to comment on the unconfirmed reports.
An additional worry, though flatly denied by Gajardo and Perez, is that some immigration officers knocked on some doors looking for suspected illegal immigrants.
However, in Grand Island, Neb., where Swift also owns and operates a meat packing plant, The Independent, a sister publication of The Avalanche-Journal, filmed some agents going inside the house of a suspected illegal immigrants, said Editor Bill Dunn.
Dumas resident Socorro Rodriguez, whose wife Mercedes has been helping the families of those deported, said the immigrant community in the area was shocked and saddened by the massive immigration raid.
"I've been here for 47 years and I've never seen anything like this," said the 65-year-old Mexican immigrant. "And we are also very upset because the agents chose one of the most sacred days for Mexicans: the Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe.
"If the (immigration) agents had been planning this raid for a long time, why couldn't they wait a little longer, like January," he added. "They spoiled our Day of the Virgin of Guadalupe and our Christmas."
Hasta la vista illegal aliens and take your anchor babies with you
The Regan bill had a lot of criteria they had to meet, one of which was they could not be collecting any public assistance another they had to speak English and they had a waiting period.... also, they were supposed to start cracking down on employers -- then -- and never did. Had they done so we wouldn't be discussing this right now.
Cry me a river.
You're correct. Anderson Cooper did a program last summer and showed one of the towns in Mexico almost empty except for children left behind until their parents could smugle them into the country.
Thanks for the ping. Bumping many outstanding FReeper comments.
wow. I guess my suggestion of a border minefield would be considered uncouth.
I think just as with the price of a head of lettuce, the difference to us, the consumer, would probably be negligible, and if the American worker is making more money they can afford to pay more. We've just become to Walmarized on prices.
Child abandonment....
It sounds like you WANT our country to become Mexico.
Do you support a wall?
I have NO PROBLEM with immigration. What I take issue with is them coming here, and trying to act like they're still in Mexico. They aren't coming here to become Americans. They're coming here to turn US into a Mexico that pays them better wages.
The kids won't have to stay with relatives for long. Unlike American identity thieves, the illegal invaders will probably be allowed to simply leave the country rather than serve a prison sentence.
dittos on that
It is the illegal aliens who are deliberately having children just for the purpose of using them as anchors---any discomfort suffered now is the fault of the illegal aliens.
Reagan gave them amnesty with the understanding that rules would then be enforced. It failed miserably. Now you purpose the same and think it will work?????????
The only long term solution is to enforce the law. Otherwise, America's destruction will be a forgone conclusion.
Exactly right, but politicians still have a "falta de huevos" in this area.
I read on another thread that the raids were occurring, not because the people are illegal, but because they were using stolen identity papers. Evidently there was a big push to break up some identiy theft ring that was selling papers to illegals. It's kind of like the war on drugs, they really want the dealers, but if they can't get them, they get the users.
Just arrest them for the identity theft. Thats a felony in most cases.
Sorry kids, Mom and Dad stole someones identity.
We can't tolerate theft even if we think we can tolerate them jumping the border illegally.
Also note that a lot of cities and states are attempting to make their own laws to keep illegals out since the federal government has done such a piss poor job of protecting our borders. They want to keep crime rates down, schools and hospitals from closing but the ACLU is stopping them at every turn. Do you agree with the ACLU?
I found it quite disturbing that one article noted that houses of the people who were arrested had been robbed. Is this the kind of people you want as American's? They knew who was arrested, they robbed from their own the minute they knew they were away. I have a neighbor who's ill and been living with his daughter for a couple months, we don't take his stuff, he's got stuff right there on his porch, we appreciate that it belongs to him. Some of these illegals are nothing but a bunch of thieves, they steal from this country, they steal from each other. If you want to fix the immigration system, let's cut off illegal immigration from Mexico and get a diverse population of background checked legal immigrants from all over the world. Your proposal is to accept that all these people broke the law, therefore we should keep them. That is the worst possible option.
I thought yours was a liberal position on illegal immigration until I decided to go to DU to see what they are saying. They are saying the same thing there that we are saying here (with a little more emphasis on the big bad company owners). They, like we, think the illegals should go back from whence they came, the employers who look aside and hire anyway, should go to jail. Alot of them even understand that it's identity theft that creates horrible problems for Americans.
I am curious, you said to "turn off the spigot". How would you propose to do that? The best way to turn it off is to go after employers who then are afraid to hire illegals and the illegals will go home and fix their own country after they've seen how a country should be run.
The people coming here through illegal channels have caused this to their own families.
Perfect!
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