Where's the fence already?

In the boo-freaking-hoo department comes a nice little tale from North Carolina about 'immigrants' afraid of going to work for fear of arrest. Of course, the illegal immigrants that were arrested and being deported might have something to do with that. Why would 'immigrants' fear being arrested? (think on that long and hard)

Scared Smithfield workers stay home

By Jennifer Plotnick
Staff writer

TAR HEEL — The 21 Smithfield Packing Co. employees arrested by immigration officials while they worked Wednesday are in the process of being deported.

The 20 men and one woman arrested were moved Thursday from the Mecklenburg County Jail to Stewart Detention Center in Lumpkin, Ga., nearly 700 miles from Tar Heel.

Meanwhile, church officials within the region’s Hispanic community and spokespeople with the United Food & Commercial Workers union said the workers’ families didn’t know where they were and other immigrant workers were terrified of more arrests.

Production at the plant was substantially diminished Thursday as workers stayed away.

“There are hundreds of immigrant families who will have to decide, ‘Do I show up to work (Friday) and risk being arrested by immigration?’” said Eduardo Pena, a spokesman for the union, which became an unofficial hub of information for workers Thursday, he said.

The workers are going through “removal proceedings,” said Marc Raimondi, a spokesman with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Washington

Nowhere in this story does the author say illegal immigrants, so you can guess what the problem is? It's the government (ICE) and the plant /sarc. If people are given 60 days to fix a social security issue, it shouldn't be that hard (IF you are here legally that is) and should be corrected. The fact is that the 21 that were arrested did not fix their problems (or couldn't) and more will likely follow (along with terminations from the plant for employees not correcting in the allotted 60 days). Only at the end of the piece do you see someone saying anything about illegal activities:

“You feel sorry for the individuals, but at the same time, Smithfield would be crazy to employ illegally when the federal government is cracking down,” Huestess said. “They’ll find 500 new people.”

Elsewhere you get the feeling that this is all a misunderstanding and government crack-down. You can see the way the hispanic community feels on the issue and the way the author frames the issue in a few telling quotes such as:

“There are hundreds of immigrant families who will have to decide, ‘Do I show up to work (Friday) and risk being arrested by immigration?’” said Eduardo Pena, a spokesman for the union, which became an unofficial hub of information for workers Thursday, he said.

Now do you think the LEGAL immigrants are having the same tough time to decide on whether to show up? The people with their social security cards (or working papers) in order? I'd bet no, but of course, in this story (and much of the press) we don't hear that there are two distinct groups of people involved in immigration. No wonder immigration is such a screwed up issue; no one on the left wants to admit that we even have illegal immigration.

Open trackback weekend from Nathan Bradfield via StoptheACLU. Go visit others tracking.
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Reason to man the borders
Filed: Illegal Immigrant, law enforcement, North Carolina, Fayettevill Observer, LordNazh