Free Republic

U.S. Border Patrol agents seeking to secure the nation's border in some of the country's most pristine national forests are being targeted by illegal aliens, who are using intentionally set fires to burn agents out of observation posts and patrol routes. The wildfires also have resulted in the destruction of valuable natural and cultural resources in the National Forest System and pose an ongoing threat to visitors, residents and responding firefighters, according to federal law enforcement authorities and others. In the Coronado National Forest in Arizona, with 60 miles of land along the U.S.-Mexico border, U.S. Forest Service firefighters sent...

International treaty used in motion to dismiss molestation case By Daniel Silliman dsilliman@news-daily.com Published: June 13, 2007 11:05 pm Even the defense attorney admitted it was a long shot. Citing an international treaty, Stephen Mackie argued charges of aggravated child molestation, aggravated battery and cruelty to children should be dismissed because police didn’t tell the accused man he could seek advice from the Mexican consulate. According to the Vienna Convention, signed in 1963, “foreign nationals” have to be advised of their right to seek legal council from their country’s consulate, when they are arrested. Mackie said the requirement -- sort...

For the first time in five years, President Bush will attend the Senate Republicans' weekly policy lunch today as he pushes to revive his moribund overhaul of the nation's immigration laws. But even before he set foot in the Capitol, several Republican senators issued a terse warning yesterday: Don't expect much. In the days after the sweeping compromise on immigration collapsed on Thursday, opposition, if anything, appears to have hardened among some senators who had once been willing to consider the deal. The bill's vociferous critics have also had a long weekend to throw dirt on its grave. .... Republicans...

Location is at the Cobb Galeria- Here is from the AM750 websight: News/Talk 750 WSB’s Chris Krok – host of KrokTalk – Atlanta’s only late-night local talk show says “Stand Up” and let Congress know that you are opposed to Amnesty for illegal immigrants. Krok is taking his protest to Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss THIS Thursday, June 7th! Krok, armed with a bullhorn and protest signs, will be marching against the Immigration Bill that’s before Congress. Lawmakers say opposition to the bill is subsiding because citizens have stopped calling them. Krok says join him and show them you’re opposition to...

He has never called for the deportation of all illegal immigrants, but Lou Dobbs believes the U.S. could pull off such a feat if it really wanted to. The CNN anchor, whose stance against illegal immigration has helped raise his ratings but also fueled criticism, speaks to Lesley Stahl for a profile to be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, May 6 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network. Dobbs is against amnesty programs for illegal immigrants and the president's guest worker proposal, so Stahl wonders whether Dobbs thinks the government could deport all illegal immigrants. "I've never called for...

The New York Times is always ready and willing to serve as lead public relations staffers for the open-borders movement. On May Day, the day of mass illegal alien protests across the country, the paper saw fit to print a front-page sob story decrying rising illegal alien deportations. "Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials, facing intense political pressure to toughen enforcement [read: do their jobs], removed 221,664 illegal immigrants from the country over the last year," the Times reported ominously. That's "an increase of more than 37,000 -- about 20 percent -- over the year before, according to the agency's tally."...

Republican presidential hopeful Sen. Sam Brownback said yesterday he no longer supports the immigration overhaul bill that he helped pass in the Senate. "I would not vote for the same bill," Mr. Brownback told reporters yesterday morning, saying that after the bill passed the Senate he had a chance to study its effects and decided it led to too much immigration. It's a major reversal for a man who is listed as one of seven original sponsors of the bill, along with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, and Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican, who spearheaded the bill... He said...

...the explosive growth of the U.S. Hispanic population over the next couple of decades does not bode well for American social stability. The dimensions of the Hispanic baby boom are startling. By 2050 the Latin population will have tripled, the Census Bureau projects. It's the fertility surge among unwed Hispanics that should worry policymakers. Hispanic women have the highest unmarried birthrate in the country - over three times that of whites and Asians, and nearly one and a half times that of black women, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Social workers in Southern California... are in...

EL PASO, Texas -- For all the tough talk in Washington on immigration, illegal aliens caught along the Mexican border have almost no reason to fear they will be prosecuted. Ninety-eight percent of those arrested between Oct. 1, 2000, and Sept. 30, 2005, were never prosecuted for illegally entering the country, according to an Associated Press analysis of federal data. Those 5.2 million aliens were simply escorted back across the Rio Grande and turned loose. Many presumably tried to slip into the United States again.

BISBEE — After nearly two years of declining numbers, illegal border-crossings took a sudden jump last month in Cochise County, law enforcement officials say. Gustavo Soto, a spokesman for the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector, said agents at the Naco, Douglas and Willcox stations apprehended just over 13,000 illegal immigrants last month, a 30 percent increase over March 2006. Prior to the spike, Border Patrol apprehensions in the county had been down 13 percent since the current fiscal year began on Oct. 1. That decline followed a 45 percent drop during the previous year. Sgt. Taron Maddux, spokesman for the Bisbee...

SAN DIEGO -- More than one-third of 18,000 people arrested in a nearly yearlong federal crackdown on illegal immigrants were not the people authorities targeted, according to government figures. The so-called "collateral arrests" involved people picked up by immigration agents while seeking fugitives such as drug smugglers, thieves, drunken drivers and others who flouted deportation orders. When tracking down fugitives, authorities visit a suspect's last known address and often find other immigrants, who are then asked to prove they are legally entitled to live in the United States. Supporters of such tactics say the government is just doing its job...

Organizers expect several thousand people at an immigrant rights rally on Saturday, saying many illegal immigrants are angry about a White House plan that would grant them work visas but require them to return home and pay hefty fines to become legal U.S. residents. Immigrant rights advocates say many of the area's illegal immigrants feel betrayed by President Bush, who they had long considered an ally. "People are really upset," said Juan Jose Gutierrez, president of Los Angeles-based Latino Movement USA, one of several organizers of Saturday's rally. "For years, the president spoke in no uncertain terms about supporting immigration...

Family shares dream Scholarship to help students study veterinary science By John Finnerty The Daily Item March 31, 2007 MILTON — Carly Snyder had hoped to pursue a career in animal sciences, but abandoned that dream because she was daunted by the years of higher education required, her mother Alice Snyder said Friday. The 20-year-old Milton woman was an animal lover who had an Appaloosa horse named Tizzy when she was younger. And had owned both a chocolate Labrador retriever and a Rottweiler. Now, almost two years after Ms. Snyder was slain in her home by an illegal alien who...

Velazquez-Nava, 24, had a blood alcohol level three times the legal limit when the crash occurred early Wednesday on Pacific Coast Highway, police said. He is a native of Mexico who federal authorities said was in the U.S. illegally. The crash killed Clark, the director of "A Christmas Story" and the "Porky's" movies, and his son Ariel, 22. Velazquez-Nava suffered minor injuries in the accident.

A Mexican national accused of causing the crash that killed ”A Christmas Story” director Bob Clark and his son will face deportation proceedings once the charges against him are resolved, officials said Thursday. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement put an immigration hold Wednesday on Hector Velazquez-Nava, a 24-year-old illegal immigrant living in Los Angeles, said agency spokeswoman Virginia Kice. The action means Velazquez-Nava will be turned over to federal immigration officials and placed in deportation proceedings once his local case is completed. He was arrested for investigation of driving under the influence of alcohol and gross vehicular manslaughter, and was...

Last month, Mexican military officials in Matamoros, just south of Brownsville, Texas, stopped a tractor-trailer containing weapons and ammunition, along with a pickup truck fitted with armor and bulletproof glass. The weapons included 18 M-16 assault rifles, one equipped with an M-203 40mm grenade launcher. Also seized were several M-4 carbines, 17 handguns of various calibers, 200 magazines for different weapons, 8,000 rounds of ammunition, assault vests and other military accessories.

To build support for a border fence, legislators needed only one item — pandering on an issue that did nothing but provide red meat for their base. But to build the fence, the lawmakers needed two more items — legislation and funding. They got the legislation — the president signed the bill authorizing construction of the fence last fall — but if they yell, "Show me the money," they might not like the answer. President Bush addressed the fence in his budget, but of the $2.9 trillion he proposed, a tiny fraction, $1 billion, would go into the very barrier...

SAN LUIS RÍO COLORADO, Mexico: All along the U.S.-Mexican border, there are signs that the measures that the U.S. Border Patrol and other agencies have taken over the past year, from erecting new barriers to posting 6,000 National Guardsmen as armed sentinels, are beginning to slow the flow of illegal immigrants into the United States. For 10 years, Eduardo Valenzuela has been crossing the Mexican border near Yuma, Arizona, illegally, trekking over desert scrub and hopping on a freight train to get to his job with a construction company in Phoenix, Arizona. But on a recent afternoon, Valenzuela and four...

Imagine sending your kids off to school, but when they get to the bus they are told they can't get on because they speak English. That's right, English. It happened to a few children in St. Paul and now the school district is apologizing. Rachel Armstrong sent her kids to pick up the bus as usual Monday, but after the driver let the kids on, he told them he would not pick them up again. He even said he wouldn't take them home that afternoon. Armstrong left work early Tuesday, forced to pick up her kids from Phalen Lake Elementary...

olunteers with the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps are headed for the Arizona-Mexico border Friday to provide backup for National Guard troops in response to an incident near Sasabe in which the approach of armed men forced soldiers to retreat. About 11 p.m. Wednesday, soldiers with a National Guard Entry Identification Team - which provides additional eyes and ears for the U.S. Border Patrol and notifies them of suspicious activity - saw a group of armed individuals approaching them in the desert, said Mario Martinez, spokesman for the U.S. Customs and Border Protection's Border Patrol Office. The individuals came within 100...