Some More Token Immigration Raids
by Jeff Davis
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has bestirred themselves to make a few more token immigration raids, with the usual squawking from liberal and Hispanic groups.
The Associated Press reports “Federal immigration agents raided Pilgrim’s Pride poultry plants in five states Wednesday in a crackdown on an alleged scam to provide fake identification for illegal immigrant workers….More than 100 people were expected to be charged in the raids at the nation’s largest chicken producer.”
Now this is really interesting. The poultry and meat-packing industries have long been among the major immigration offenders in this country, employing hundreds of thousands of illegal Mexicans, and at relatively good wages of $12 and $13 per hour, so that on the rare occasion when some Armour or Hormel or other plant gets raided, the next day there are lines of Americans forming up outside the plant, looking for a job to keep their families fed.
The Associated Press article also notes “The raids were part of a long-term investigation, officials said. Plants were raided in Mount Pleasant, Texas, Batesville, Ark., Live Oak, Fla., Chattanooga, Tenn. and Moorefield, W.Va.. Ray Atkinson, a spokesman for Pittsburg, Texas-based Pilgrim’s Pride, said the company went to ICE agents with information about identity theft at the Arkansas plant. Atkinson said the company uses a federal database to check identity documents of new employees, but that wouldn’t stop a person from using a real, but stolen ID. Atkinson said no criminal or civil charges have been filed against the company, which has about 55,000 employees and operates dozens of facilities mostly across the South and in Mexico and Puerto Rico. ‘We knew in advance and cooperated fully,’ Atkinson said.”
In other words they made a deal to escape punishment for their criminal activities. Most likely those jobs will be filled by more Mexicans, of which there is an unlimited supply still pouring over our unsecured borders.
The same article continues “The poultry raids were the largest of several immigration enforcement actions taken across the country Wednesday. Agents arrived before dawn at a Houston doughnut plant and arrested almost 30 workers suspected of being in the country illegally. Robert Rutt, the agent in charge of the Houston ICE office, told the Houston Chronicle some of the people arrested lived at the Shipley Do-Nuts dough factory, a four-block plant that includes a dormitory for workers. In Buffalo, N.Y., federal law enforcement officials announced the arrest of a local businessman and nine associates accused of employing illegal Mexican immigrants in seven restaurants in four states. Authorities also arrested 45 illegal immigrants during the early morning raids in western New York, Bradford, Pa.; Mentor, Ohio; Wheeling and New Martinsville, W.Va., and Georgia.”
Arresting the employers is definitely a step in the right direction. Maybe someone in ICE has decided to give Americans a final glimpse of what enforcement of the immigration laws looks like, since all three Presidential candidates prominently feature amnesty for illegals in their political programs.