Posted on 08/31/2002 2:20:36 PM PDT by Marine Inspector
SHERMAN OAKS — Glen Spencer of the American Patrol here envisions a day when his border watchdog organization staffs satellite offices all along the U.S.-Mexico border to coordinate and support the activities of "Hawkeyes."
The soon-to-be-formed group of private citizens will be made up of people who want to report illegal immigrants to the U.S. Border Patrol and document their findings in an online database, according to Spencer, a retired computer consultant from Sherman Oaks and the founder of the American Patrol.
The American Patrol plans to start accepting applications from people who want to be his "Hawkeyes" Sept. 1.
Imperial Valley residents who are part of American Patrol's database will be privately notified of the procedure for signing up. Those who do will be screened in order to "qualify sources of information," Spencer said.
After the "quiet rollout" for existing members of his database, the masses will be allowed to log onto an as-yet-unveiled Web site and fill out an online application form, he said.
Spencer was asked to estimate the number of Imperial Valley-ites already in his database. Talking on a cell phone while driving, he said he couldn't provide an exact total because he didn't have his computer in front of him. He did say Imperial County has its share.
Asked if he plans to open an Imperial County office anytime soon to recruit even more, he said, "Not yet ... one of these days."
Spencer's group has two bases, his office in Sherman Oaks and an office in Sierra Vista, Ariz., a small border town south of Tuscon with an airfield that's ideal for the patrol's "air force," Sherman said.
The airfield allows patrol members to fly west along the border to San Diego and over Imperial County while looking for illegal immigrants or east toward El Paso and Brownsville, Texas. Pretty soon the patrol's flotilla might include a helicopter.
"One guy said he is selling his yacht to buy one," Spencer said.
Once a Patrol member spots a suspected group of illegal immigrants he or she reports the information to the U.S. Border Patrol.
Once the online journals from "Hawkeyes" are up and running, the American Patrol will have illegal immigration data and a record of U.S. Border Patrol activity or inactivity.
Spencer was asked if the U.S. Border Patrol supports his plan when "Hawkeyes" might find and document negligence that could give the already embattled agency a black eye. He said some Border Patrol agents have privately supported his plan.
As for those agents who think he should leave the patrolling to them, Spencer stressed his group is not critical of agents but is of supervisors and administration.
The U.S. Border Patrol has not released an official statement on Spencer or his group.
With his expected reams of data and anecdotal journal entries, Spencer hopes to improve the efficiency of the U.S. Border Patrol, helping the agency allocate its resources better.
Spencer thinks the agency needs help because its aim of securing the border is growing more important every day.
According to Spencer, the border dividing the U.S. and Mexico could soon become a battleground in a reprise of 1848's Mexican-American war as Mexicans attempt to physically take back the land the U.S. took control of following Mexico's defeat at the hands of U.S. forces and the hastily brokered Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo more than a century ago.
To stave off the possibility of such a conflict, Spencer advocates a practically impenetrable border and an end to services for illegal immigrants already here. Some have called Spencer's organization a "hate group," intent on provoking conflict.
Spencer said his group has been deliberately smeared as a militant group of vigilantes by a number of immigrant rights groups.
Those are accusations, "which, of course, are not true," he said, although Spencer declined to be interviewed by a reporter this week from a Spanish-language newspaper. Asked if his "Hawkeyes" would get baseball caps or badges they could put on their coats if they signed up, Spencer said the American Patrol will issue identification cards but no caps or badges.
>> Staff Writer Aaron Claverie can be reached at 337-3419 or aclaverie@aol.com
US laws were specifically written to protect transient laborers from unfair labor practices, which were degrading and humiliating for farm workers, both domestic and those who worked via a legal work permit system.
Your initial post mentioned maids and gardeners.Cheap household help or "servants" are not considered a compelling national need and so the federal government does not have a clear cut policy to allow you to create your own class of inexpensive imported household slaves.The USA also does not have specific laws to allow the market economy system to be subverted by illegaly imported laborers to generate additional profit to meatpackers,construction workers, etc.
The farmworker strawman is exactly that, a strawman argument.
Any USA citizen who hires an illegal alien is part of the problem.I will drop a dime to the INS if I suspect your "maid" is illegal.I know some citizens by birth, and a few legal immigrants, who work in household cleaning, or other low skill positions.These are some of our hardest working and most vulnerable citizens.They deserve the full protection afforded by our laws. Employers who think the laws are for someone else,and are hiring illegals to save a few dollars, have no legal or moral excuse or defense.
I am not a fan of unions.But as long as employers, small and large, feel free to ignore the laws of the USA,in a shortsighted search for temporary profit, I can not call for their abolishment.
I have no household slaves. I never defended illegal immigration although in some cases an illegal can be better than certain legals. I'm talking about potential violence at the border ---with people getting shot at. You can't really say you could stand at the border and shoot some 60 year old woman trying to get to her maid job. Or could you shoot at some 35 year old man who just wants to pick onions and be paid? There's better ways to stop the problem than violence I should hope.
Luckily for me I don't have a maid so you don't need to call up INS on me. If I had one how would you know anyhow that they were illegal or not? Call INS on me anyhow saying you saw a Mexican on my property? What if it was just one of my legal friends? Or an illegal that I didn't hire but was on my property with my permission? The government has better ways at overcoming this problem and that's what I'd like to see happen instead.
Have you been to the Republican Party's website? What do you think of the leftist/socialist planks that they're including on health insurance tax credits for low-income workers, prescription drugs for low-income elderly and amnesty for millions of illegal aliens?
Since when are targeted tax cuts and amnesty in the purview of the so-called conservative, Republican Party?
Are you happy with this giant lurch to the left by the Republican Party?
Sarasdad is a lucky man.
BS, they break the law to increase their profit margin.
There are many farmers that use H2A visa holders and can compete in the market place. It's not about wages, it's about profit.
I get tired of the old "prices will rise without illegals" argument.
There are many farmers and companies that utilize the “H” visa, and they can still compete it the market place.
The folks using illegals, do so to increase their profit margin.
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