Arizona Vigilantes Threaten
Peace at the BorderAnti-Mexican bigots are creating a dangerous situation along the US/Mexico border that threatens the peaceful co-existence between Mexicans and the U.S descendants of immigrants from Europe. White vigilante ranchers of Cochise County have been conducting armed illegal arrests of Mexican undocumented workers crossing to the United States in the border region near Agua Prieta, Sonora and Douglas, Arizona. A coalition of white ranchers led by two brothers, Don and Roger Barnett, have recruited a large number of xenophobes from throughout the United States and they are now amassing in the border region. Dangerous Flash Point Developing
Roger Barnett has said the he and his group arrested over 174 Mexicans in just one weekend and thousands over a two year period. He told USA Today that he is "prepared to kill Mexicans" if he has to. The illegal actions of the armed vigilante ranchers and their inflammatory racist rhetoric has alarmed the government of the Republic of Mexico as well as Mexican-American and Chicano human and civil rights groups in the United States.
The Mexican government recently filed an emergency "complaint" with the U.S. Department of Justice through its embassy in Washington D.C. and the Mexican Secretary of Foreign Affairs, Rosario Green, has retained attorneys in the United States in order to file suits over human and civil rights abuses of its nationals. The tensions are escalating and may reach a boiling point in the next two weeks when the vigilantes are schedule to meet and conduct violent actions against the immigrants in the region.
Recently the vigilante ranchers sent out an inflammatory flyer inviting militia types and other bigots from throughout the U.S. to come down to Cochise County to "hunt" for Mexican immigrants on their ranches. They offered free board on their land to any "tourist" wanting to have "some fun in the sun." The call has been answered by some of the most vehement racist and anti-Mexican bigots in the country that include among others, Glenn Spencer of the Voices of Citizens Together and leader of a group called American Patrol and by Barbara Coe, who heads a group opposed to immigrants from Mexico and that has sponsored anti-Mexican immigrant signs erected along major U.S. highways in California.
The vigilante coalition has scheduled a large meeting at the Windemere Hotel in the town of Sierra Vista which is about 70 miles southeast of Tucson in Cochise County. The meeting where an assortment of militia, anti-immigrant, Klux Klux Clan and other white supremacist groups are expected to attend, will take place on Saturday May 13th at 4:00 P.M according to the newspaper The Arizona Daily Star. The Windemere Hotel can be reached at 1-800-825-4656. The Sierra Vista Chamber of Commerce web site is at: http://www.sierravistachamber.org and the Sierra Vista City Hall web site is at: http://208.55.147.179 La Voz de Aztlan is encouraging their readers and subscribers to contact both the Sierra Vista Chamber of Commerce and the Sierra Vista City Hall to express both outrage and concern.
The situation developing in Cochise County Arizona is very dangerous for Mexicans, Chicanos and other Latinos both in Mexico and in Aztlan. It does not take much to fire up the simmering explosive hate that now resides inside many Anglos and white European immigrants against Mexicans and La Raza as a whole. The brutal beating of a mother of three children, Alicia Sotero, by the Riverside County Sheriffs was just one example of the heinous nature of this hate. The killing spree in Pittsburgh of three immigrants by Richard Scott Baumhammers, on Friday April 28, 2000 is an example of what could happen on a larger scale to Mexicans in the Southwest. The attack by the deranged racist bigot is reminiscent of the film "Falling Down" in which Michael Douglas starred as a failed aerospace engineer that used Chicanos as scapegoats for his own personal inadequacies. In the real case of Richard Scott Baumhammers, a failed attorney, the police found a three-page manifesto indicating he was trying to form a political party opposed to immigration, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reported.
As citizens with legal and historical rights to live in peace on this land, we must be ever vigilant of our collective safety. The Jews in Nazi Germany were caught unprepared and they paid a heavy price. We as La Raza should not make this same mistake. We must stand up against the enemy that is threatening to annihilate us. We must defend our community with courage as we have done throughout our history. Our youths who presently only do battle with " the other barrio" must awaken and realize who the real enemy is. Wake Up Raza! The real enemy is in the form of the Glenn Spencers, the Roger Barnetts and the Barbara Coes of this land who would round us up and throw us in "gas chambers" if only they could.
