Wednesday, December 4, 2002

Meddling Mexicans Say Snit Will Cost City Consul, agitators upset about awards given to local officers Associated Press - December 4 The Mexican Consulate in Portland has joined Latino activists in warning the city could lose convention business and trade because of medals given to two police officers who killed a mentally ill Mexican immigrant [who was attacking them]. -- Latino leaders also said that Police Chief Mark Kroeker's role in awarding the medals undermines confidence in community policing. -- Gale Castillo, executive director of the Hispanic Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, said the dispute has become an "international incident." -- And Multnomah County Commissioner Serena Cruz said the controversy could lead to Latinos inside and outside the United States concluding Portland is unfriendly to them. Chief Mark Kroeker Past Features   ABP Updates  Poll on Militia American Border Patrol Plans Live Video Feed From Border Saturday

EFE New INS rules keeping illegals from attending college ...According to Stuart M. Phillips, director of student services at the CVTC Gordon County Campus, regulations prevent the community college from registering non-citizen students without a Green Card. -- The change in policy was ordered by the INS, which sent the institution new regulations after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that also prevent the community college from accepting students with tourist visas. -- CVTC, whose central campus is located in Rome, Georgia, is not regulated by the Board of Regents of the University System of Georgia...

Sachem Quality of Life Organization - New York Mexican Consul issuing sham ID cards on Long Island Click above for details, and for information on how you can voice your objection to this.

Deseret News Mexican consul bemoans tactics used to catch lawbreakers Arnulfo Ibarra still can't bring himself to tell his four children where their mother's been for the past week-and-a-half. -- He only knows he'd never have taken her to the INS office in Salt Lake County if he'd known the visit would end with his wife's arrest for entering the U.S. illegally from Mexico. -- While acknowledging such arrests are technically legal, Mexican Consul Martin Torres criticized the manner in which INS officials sometimes dupe or bully immigrant families. -- "That's what they do. They trick them, because by bringing his wife what he did was basically give her up to immigration authorities," Torres said. "This is, of course, rough play, and things shouldn't be like that, but those are the tricks that INS uses sometimes to make it easier upon themselves to get numbers and justify their existence."

Associated Press Legislators decry license loopholes Republicans are threatening to block an ambitious plan to reform the Division of Motor Vehicles unless key changes are made. -- The party's support will only come if the plan to increase vehicle registration fees by $8 is removed, Republican Senate President John O. Bennett said Tuesday. -- The plan includes new computer software that can verify immigration status, Social Security numbers and other personal information provided by driver's license applicants.

Intelligencer Journal Cocaine bust nets illegal alien Police arrested a Lancaster Township man Tuesday on drug charges eight days after collaring his alleged partner at the same Penn Township business where they worked. Janer J. Maldonado was charged with delivery of cocaine and criminal conspiracy. -- Lancaster County Drug Task Force detectives arrested him at Manheim Auto Auction, 1190 Lancaster Road, Tuesday after an Immigration and Naturalization Service agent learned he worked there.

Greenville News (South Carolina) Mauldin police to be given Spanish lessons With Mauldin's Hispanic population growing by leaps and bounds, Police Chief John Davidson knows the possibility that one of his employees will be called upon to assist someone who doesn't speak English increases every day. -- That's why he is working with city officials to finalize plans to begin in January training 15 people to speak conversational Spanish. -- While the INS doesn't calculate figures for South Carolina, the agency has estimated that more than 6 million undocumented immigrants [criminals] reside in the United States...

Newsday / Baltimore Sun Mexico's ambassador wants 'better border deal' with U.S. ...Our nations share much more than a 2,000-mile-long border. We share the opportunity to create new wealth for our citizens through unprecedented economic interaction. We share the responsibility to protect our citizens from harm. We share a Mexican and Mexican-American community that is a vibrant part of the U.S. economic, social, political and cultural landscape. Most important, we share a deep commitment to democracy and freedom. -- The time has come to relaunch the dialogue that will allow us to give concrete meaning and content to our partnership. [Mexico is a neighboring country. It is not a 'partner'.]

Los Angeles Times (Published) Help Solve Mexico's Problems in Mexico The cornerstone of Mexico's economic programs seems to be coercing the U.S. to act as a sponge for millions of uneducated and unskilled Mexicans by encouraging them to enter the U.S. illegally -- so as to relieve internal social pressures. Mexico has made it a foundation of its economic programs to pressure the U.S. to offer massive social services to Mexican nationals living here, including illegal aliens.

Financial Times - UK US under pressure over Mexican trucking The US government faces a legal challenge at home and trade threats in Mexico over its announcement last week of new rules for Mexican trucks wishing to enter the US. -- George Grayson, an expert in Mexican politics at William & Mary College in Virginia, said trucking should be viewed in the context of more general problems for the relationship between the US and Mexico. -- "While the Mexican and American leaders agreed to keep talking about immigration, there was no announcement, [and] the Mexican leaders came away with a disappointment that the Bush administration didn't deliver," Mr Grayson said.

The Arizona Republic INS officials charged Three top Immigration and Naturalization Service officials in Arizona were cited for contempt Monday after they failed to answer a subpoena in a dispute over the treatment of a Guatemalan teenager. -- Immigration Court Judge Scott Richardson had ordered INS chief counsel Patricia Vroom and two other agency employees into court to explain why they failed to obtain FBI fingerprint checks on Elmer Salik-Lopez, who entered the country illegally in January.

Associated Press Suspected illegals in fatal crash A van carrying 14 people slammed into a tractor-trailer rig early Wednesday, killing four people and critically injuring several others, authorities said. -- The passengers included children, Highway Patrol Sgt. Doug McCleve said. -- "At this point we believe at least some of them are illegal immigrants,'' McCleve said. Officials called the Immigration and Naturalization Service to help with interpretation and to try to determine their hometowns.

Access North Georgia MALDEF supports licenses for lawbreakers The Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund is defending a proposal pending in the state legislature calling for illegal immigrants to be allowed to obtain a Georgia driver's license. -- The agency says enactment of the legislation will increase public safety on Georgia highways. -- MALDEF was responding to comments made by a group opposed to granting licenses to illegals in advance of a state legisaltive hearing on the issue Friday in Gainesville.

Sham ID Cards

Pioneer Press Northlake accepts Mexi-sham ID cards The acceptance of an identification card for Mexican citizens living in other countries as an official form of ID in Northlake has been approved by the City Council. -- The Matricula Consular issued by the Mexican Consulate, look very similar to a driver's license. -- "The Mexican Consulate has built in security in issuing these cards, so we know we're able to believe the information on them," Mayor Jeff Sherwin said. [Is Sherwin kidding? Mexico is one of the world's most corrupt nations.]

Express Times DA proposes higher bail for illegals Northampton County District Attorney John Morganelli has asked county judges and district justices to set bail at a minimum of $25,000 in cases involving illegal aliens as defendants. -- Morganelli wrote letters to all of the judges asking for high bail because illegal aliens are an "inherent flight risk." He cited three cases when defendants in Northampton County cases fled after they were granted nominal bail or no bail. -- Morganelli believes illegal aliens who commit crimes should not be released....

El Paso Times Activists target law enforcement Advocates concerned about law enforcement abuse plan an outreach this weekend to gain information from possible victims in the El Paso border region who did not file formal complaints for various reasons. --- Several complaints involved allegations about the Border Patrol working in collaboration with local law enforcement to target immigrants, he said. -- Fernando Garcia mentioned an alleged raid in Berino, N.M., that resulted in the deportation of several people who attended a meeting...

Letter to the L.A. Times (Published) Gap Between Region's Haves and Have-Nots Had The Times told the truth about illegal immigration and not subverted every attempt at stopping it, Los Angeles would be a great city, not one perched on the brink of collapse. (Other criticism of the L.A. Times conveniently edited out -- see original letter). -- Glenn Spencer - Voice of Citizens Together - Sherman Oaks (Letter was a response to this editorial).

Associated Press Border Patrol Seizes Nearly a Ton of Marijuana Border Patrol agents seized 1,865 pounds of marijuana from a sport-utility vehicle near Santa Teresa after the driver rammed a patrol vehicle. -- Agents estimate the marijuana is worth $1.5 million. -- The SUV was spotted crossing the U.S.-Mexico border about two miles west of the Santa Teresa port of entry Monday. When agents tried to stop it, it headed south toward Mexico, ramming the Border Patrol vehicle and disabling it along the way, agents said. -- The driver, identified as Saul Lopez of Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, tried to flee on foot, but was taken into custody.

Tucson Citizen Tightened border policy keeps Mexicans trapped here, claims Cato Does enhanced border enforcement cause more, not less, illegal immigration? That's the provocative thesis of a study recently published by the Cato Institute that might provide a sensible new start to the dialogue about a guest worker program. -- Daniel Griswold, the study's author and associate director of the institute's Center for Trade Policy Studies, looks at migration patterns when the Mexican border was freer, from the end of the bracero program in 1964 to the enactment of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act.

Tucson Citizen Isabel Garcia's klan teams up with MEChA Two Tucson groups have raised $3,000 to $4,000 in cash and goods to aid the indigenous communities in Chiapas, Mexico. -- The Tucson groups involved were Coalicion de Derechos Humanos Alianza Indigena Sin Fronteras and Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan. -- "New levels of political and corporate brutality are being inflicted upon indigenous people in Chiapas and they need our help more now than ever," said Scott Zambrano, local coordinator of the fund-raising effort.