Guest Column
April Fool's, Minutemen will arrive tomorrow
By Ernesto Portillo Jr.
Arizona Daily Star Tucson, Arizona
March 31, 2006
Tomorrow is April Fool's Day. Tomorrow the Minutemen
return to the border.
You make the connection.
It's been a year since the Minutemen made their big splash in Tombstone.
The national and international media, especially television, loved the
group. The television news cameras couldn't get enough of the Minutemen,
mainly angry guys wrapped in U.S. flags and packing heat on their hips.
Off its members went to play border watchmen, sitting in lawn chairs and
pickup trucks along small portions of the 2,000-mile, U.S.-Mexican border.
The Minutemen proclaimed their work a success in deterring illegal
immigration.
However, as we say on the border, "no es la verdad," which is Spanish for
"it's not the truth."
"There is simply no credible evidence that the Minutemen have deterred any
Mexicans from leaving home, coming to the border and trying to gain entry
until they succeed," said Wayne Cornelius, director of the Center for
Comparative Immigration Studies at the University of California-San Diego.
"At most, would-be migrants and the people-smugglers who assist them find
these groups to be a fleeting obstacle that they can easily detour around,"
said Cornelius, who has studied Mexican immigration for 36 years.
But that doesn't deter the Minutemen from making more truth-challenged
assertions. One of the most creative claims is that the Minutemen forced the
nation to focus its attention on illegal immigration.
The truth is, the nation had long been talking and arguing about immigration
before the Minutemen appeared.
About 15 years ago, as a reporter in San Diego, I reported on border
demonstrations by activists who wanted the federal government to enforce
border laws. They were led by a nice woman, Muriel Watson, a widow of a U.S.
Border Patrol agent. She and others lined their cars facing south into
Tijuana with the headlights on. It made for good television news.
The Minutemen are a Johnny-come-lately to border sideshows.
"Immigration would have been a big issue whether or not the Minutemen had
ever existed, because numerous Republican politicians have chosen it to be
the wedge issue of this election year," Cornelius said.
Ironically, it's the Minutemen who have made illegal immigration a wedge
issue within the Republican Party.
Republicans thought they could use illegal immigration against the
Democrats. But the issue has pitted Republicans against Republicans.
Many in the party are bitterly split with President Bush, some Republican
leaders and the party's historical business base, all of whom support a
guest-worker program. The Minutemen and their supporters want to seal the
border, make felons out of undocumented immigrants and not allow a
guest-worker program.
In the past year, the Minutemen claim they have grown to more than 6,500
members. They have spawned copycat groups across the country. Minutemen have
been hailed by some state governors and federal lawmakers.
But the group's role in a reasonable debate on immigration reform is
questionable. At best, they brought more television cameras to the border.
At worst, they escalated the ugly rhetoric used to demonize undocumented
immigrants.
"Vigilante groups are bit players in the current immigration debate,"
Cornelius said.
Last April when the Minutemen launched their first border watch, they were
nearly outnumbered by the media. Don't expect as many reporters Saturday.
The media knows it's April Fool's Day.
http://www.azstarnet.com/allheadlines/122479
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