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How to make a profit in the illegal alien business

From Vdare.com:   Memo From Middle America | Refugee Industry Profiteering So Gross Even TIME Magazine Has Noticed

There’s more than one way to skin the American people. Illegal immigration isn’t just about cheap labor, growing the welfare state, and strengthening the ethnic lobbies. The so-called charities and nonprofits are also part of the scam.

They don’t just want your moral praise—they want your tax dollars. Indeed, without the government, few would even exist.

You might think that a government-supported charity is a contradiction in terms. After all, the whole point of charity is that it’s voluntary. But in the eyes of the Main Stream Media, those sanctimonious social workers and religious hypocrites whose salaries you pay aren’t greedy capitalists but “humanitarians.”

Good work if you can get it.

Catholic Charities U.S.A. has been at this for a long time. As VDARE.com’s Brenda Walker reported recently:

“…Catholic Charities gets billions of taxpayer dollars for refugee resettlement and general immigration services, which puts it into the category of a smallish government agency. For example, in 2010, 62 percent of Catholic Charities’ budget was funded by the unwilling taxpayer. The feds and the Catholic bishops are partners.”

Government dependence has only increased since 2010. As of November of 2013, the group’s total revenue was $4.39 billion. Of that total, more than 66%—$ 2.916 billion—came from the government.

Government agencies that have contracts with Catholic Charities include: the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Justice, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Labor, and the Department of Homeland Security. [President’s Budget Proposal 2014, Catholic Charities]

So much for passing around the collection plate.

Needless to say, Catholic Charities is hardly a neutral observer in the immigration debate. Not surprisingly considering its financial self-interest, the group supports amnesty.

But don’t worry—treason is ecumenical. Protestant groups aren’t letting the Catholics get all the government funding.

For example, Baptist Child and Family Services (BCFS) sounds like a Red State charity out of Richard Dawkins’s fever dreams, but it’s actually the government contractor that snagged a $50 million deal to purchase the Palm Aire Resort hotel in Texas. BCFS was to make it into a resort hotel for illegal alien minors. [Feds to Open $50 million resort for illegal children – complete with tennis courts, sauna & pools (updated), by Kristinn Taylor, Gateway Pundit, July 16, 2014]

After the story was posted on the Drudge Report, BCFS withdrew its bid because of the negative attention. But don’t worry—it has plenty more government contracts where that came from. [UPDATE on BCFS: Using the word “Baptist” in the Government organization title doesn’t make it a Church, by Mara Zebest, Gateway Pundit, July 17, 2014]

As Time Magazine reports,

“…This obscure charity has emerged as one of the biggest players in the federal government’s response to the influx of more than 57,000 unaccompanied children who have trudged across the southern border so far this year. It runs two of the largest facilities for temporarily housing immigrant children, as well as six permanent shelters in California and Texas. Since December, BCFS has received more than $280 million in federal grants to operate these shelters, according to government records. On July 7, two days before [BCFS president Kevin] Dinnin met Obama in Dallas, the Department of Health and Human Services awarded BCFS $190,707,505 in a single grant.

[This Baptist Charity Is Being Paid Hundreds of Millions to Shelter Child Migrants by Alex Altman and Elisabeth Dias, Time, August 4, 2014]

In fact, BCFS is garnering obscene revenue from the “refugee crisis.” According to Time, BCFS is

the largest recipient of money disbursed to contractors to temporarily house unaccompanied children until they can reunited with family members or placed in foster care.

While the BCFS is getting 40% of the grant money for “sheltering unaccompanied children,” other “charitable” groups getting money include Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

kevindinninIn the end, your tax dollars go into the pockets of people like Kevin Dinnin [pictured right] President and CEO of Baptist Child and Family Services Emergency Management Division (email him). He receives a salary of at least $477,799 annually. The organization’s entire payroll amounted to $33 million.

This isn’t unusual. Time’s Altman and Dias report:

The median salary for the CEOs of nonprofit organizations like BCFS was about $285,000 in 2011, according to a 2013 survey by Charity Navigator.

Altman and Dias also explain why the government is so secretive about all this:

To shield vulnerable kids from angry opponents of immigration and the media spotlight, the government declines to disclose the locations and activities of many of the facilities operated by BCFS and similar organizations.

But while the Left says it aims to “shield vulnerable kids,” it is really protecting profiteers like Dinnin.

Needless to say, secular groups are also getting in on the action. An outfit called Wolverine Human Services received federal funds to dump illegal aliens on the small town of Vassar, Michigan. [Wolverine Human Services on housing refugee teens in Vassar: ‘We can’t make everyone happy,” by Lindsay Knake, Michigan Live, July 9, 2014]

As these groups have learned, illegal immigration isn’t just government policy. It’s a moneymaking scam that eliminates the distinction between charities and business.

As Brenda Walker reported, one “deluxe detention center for illegal aliens” in Texas is run by The GEO Group, a private prison company. However, this “private” company relies on the same government sources for funding as supposed “charities” and religious groups.

Perhaps some of the people involved in these groups have good intentions. But the U.S. government does not exist to cater to their pathological altruism. And the government should certainly not be redistributing our tax dollars to these people and calling it “charity.”

In the face of this massive conflict of interest, what we need in dealing with these multimillion dollar “nonprofits” and their millionaire “charitable” executives is more cynicism.

These alleged charities are indistinguishable from the self-interested plutocrats of the Cheap Labor lobby—what VDARE.com calls the “Slave Power.”

Above all, these privileged recipients of state largesse have no business lecturing Americans, who provide their ill-gotten gains, about morality.

American citizen Allan Wall (email him) moved back to the U.S.A. in 2008 after many years residing in Mexico. Allan`s wife is Mexican, and their two sons are bilingual. In 2005, Allan served a tour of duty in Iraq with the Texas Army National Guard. His VDARE.COM articles are archived here; his Mexidata.info articles are archived here ; his News With Views columns are archived here; and his website is here.

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Immigration: Portland agency to expand in response to surge of unaccompanied minors at Mexico border

When word got out last week that unaccompanied children from Central America would be arriving in Oregon, demonstrators zeroed in on the Portland nonprofit tasked with finding them long-term placement....

Federal officials subsequently confirmed that 50 children had been placed with sponsors in the state...

Refugee Resettlement, which falls under the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, contracts with Morrison to temporarily house unaccompanied minors in this state. The 50 children the federal agency placed with sponsors in Oregon were among those apprehended at the border from Jan. 1 to July 7. By comparison, 211 went to Washington state, eight to Idaho and 3,150 to California during that period.

Most local officials closest to the issue have refused to talk....

But immigration experts estimate that hundreds of unaccompanied minors have been processed in the Portland area this year alone....

A review of job openings posted online last month shows that Morrison is opening a new Refugee Resettlement shelter in downtown Portland...

Morrison operates three locations for unaccompanied minors...

Morrison received nearly $3.7 million this year in federal grants to house unaccompanied immigrant children...

The Refugee Resettlement office has $868 million dedicated to unaccompanied immigrant children this year, and received an additional $44 million due to the surge.

Wait times

... In Oregon, immigrants had to wait 1,178 days on average -- or more than three years -- to get their cases resolved in court, based on data in October 2013. That was the second longest in the nation at the time, shorter only than Nebraska. Now immigration courts are speeding up hearings for the tens of thousands of Central American children caught on the U.S. border after criticism about the backlogged system, giving each child an initial court hearing within three weeks.
-- Associated Press

  Read more about Immigration: Portland agency to expand in response to surge of unaccompanied minors at Mexico border

House revives, approves border crisis bill – as Obama vows to ‘act alone’

The House late Friday revived and approved a Republican-authored border crisis bill after GOP leaders hurriedly resolved an internal battle that scuttled the vote a day earlier – but with the Senate on recess and the House soon to follow, there’s little chance of any bill reaching President Obama’s desk until the fall.

The president now is vowing to act unilaterally to address the illegal immigration issue....

In the absence of any legislation that all sides can agree on, the president threatened to act on his own to address immigration challenges, potentially during the five-week recess...

The new measure's price tag is now roughly $700 million, up from $659 million -- but still one-fifth of the $3.7 billion Obama requested, and a far cry from what the Senate considered....

Senate Democrats, though, were not able to muster enough votes to pass their bill either. House Republicans insisted they were the only ones still trying to do something about the border crisis.

“When it comes to the humanitarian crisis on our southern border, President Obama has been completely AWOL,” a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner said....

Many Republicans blame the Obama administration policies for that perception, particularly a two-year-old program that has granted work permits and relief from deportation to more than 500,000 immigrants brought here illegally as kids....

Fox News' Chad Pergram and The Associated Press contributed to this report

Read more about House revives, approves border crisis bill – as Obama vows to ‘act alone’

Poke the Bear

Americans are the most generous, compassionate and welcoming people on earth.  Yet, with the recent surge on the border and the President's unwillingness to even address the issue in any meaningful way, citizens are beginning to look up from their busy lives and realize we have a really serious problem on our hands.

Citizen's patience with the President and Congress and the lack of enforcement of our existing immigration laws has worn thin and immigration has now moved to the top of the list of issues that concern voters - finally!  There is nothing more powerful or more effective in correcting the course of our nation than citizen activism and involvement.

Letters to the editor (LTE) are an effective way to reach folks in your community and to educate them about the devastating, tax funded, job stealing, health risking, environment destroying, culture altering situations we will all be facing in the very near future if the situation, not only on the border, but, all across the country is not resolved soon.

Be certain to be factually accurate and to the point when you write a LTE.

Please read the excellent letters submitted from citizens all over the state and then write one of your own. Consider submitting your letter not only to the larger newspapers, but to your local community paper, as well.  It's time to speak up!


  Read more about Poke the Bear

Transport of nearly $1 million worth of meth lands Canby man 17+ years in prison

Omar Martinez Rodriguez showed such little sophistication in drug trafficking that he stuffed 22 pounds of methamphetamine worth close to $1 million into two coolers for the road trip from California to Oregon, his lawyers said.

...Martinez Rodriguez was just a bit player – a courier, not a kingpin.

...sentencing him to more than 17 years in prison. The federal judge said he believed Martinez Rodriguez was planning to sell the meth – some 40,000 doses worth, according to prosecutors.

"You didn't have a chance to capitalize on it, and that's the only thing that saved you from being even more involved as a distributor," Jones said in U.S. District Court in Portland. He noted Martinez Rodriguez' previous assault convictions as well as the undocumented immigrant's illegal re-entry to the United States just months before his September 2013 arrest. "It sounds like you didn't learn anything from going to prison," he said.

Martinez Rodriguez must also serve five years of supervised release, and if he is deported must first get approval from governmental agencies before he may return to the United States.

Martinez Rodriguez was targeted in an investigation, and an informant made arrangements to buy meth from him, according to the government's sentencing memorandum. Authorities learned that his phone was in California, and they began following him after he entered Oregon.

Police conducted a traffic stop around Salem and found the drugs in the coolers ...

  Read more about Transport of nearly $1 million worth of meth lands Canby man 17+ years in prison

Smugglers cut hole through one part of the fence, while rains knock down another section

TUCSON, Ariz. — U.S. Border Patrol officials said Wednesday that agents discovered a garage-sized hole through a steel fence that divides the United States and Mexico just east of Nogales, Arizona.

The announcement was the second one this week about problems with the border fence...

"Smugglers often attempt to cut border fences; dig under them; climb over them; and even throw things over the fence," Border Patrol spokeswoman Nicole Ballistrea said...

.... smugglers have no shortage of creative ways to try to bypass the law and sneak drugs into the U.S....

Just last month, agents in Arizona spotted a truck made to look like it belonged to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, a federal agency. The decals on the truck turned out to be fake. But the 3,200 pounds (1,451 kilograms) of marijuana in it were real.

  Read more about Smugglers cut hole through one part of the fence, while rains knock down another section

House GOP leaders hold out hope for border crisis fix, after vote fizzles

House Republican leaders are trying anew to round up an elusive majority for a bill addressing the border crisis, after a chaotic day where they initially abandoned the legislation and began sending lawmakers home for the summer recess -- only to reverse course moments later.

The dramatic scene unfolded at a rapid clip Thursday afternoon. Earlier, House leaders abruptly canceled a planned vote on a package meant to address the surge of illegal immigrant minors crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, with a combination of funding and policy changes, after failing to gather enough votes for it.

Lawmakers began heading out for the five-week summer recess. But incoming House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., then took to the floor to say "additional votes are possible," indicating lawmakers should stay. Boos could be heard in the House chamber as he made the announcement.

But House Republicans later huddled on Capitol Hill before the House adjourned for the day. It was scheduled to meet again Friday morning.

The second thoughts reflected deep concerns in the GOP caucus about the prospect of leaving for the August recess without addressing the border bill, amid criticism from both sides of the aisle.

It remains unclear whether there's any chance enough votes can be rounded up to pass the measure. Senior Republican leaders were adamant, though, that something must be done, regardless of the looming recess.

"We'll stay until we vote," House oversight committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said.

Asked if the House can find a solution, House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich., said: "We'd better."

If lawmakers do end up breaking for recess without a bill, House leaders left open the possibility of recalling members if need be when they feel they have a majority of 218 votes. Earlier, sources said GOP leaders were "way short" of the votes they needed, with conservative lawmakers joining Democrats in refusing to back the package.

Asked Thursday afternoon if the bill still has a chance, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers, R-Ky., said: "We'll see." He told Fox News that he was at the airport when his secretary told him to return to Capitol Hill.

The Senate still has a border bill on its plate, but that legislation is different from what was being considered in the House.

A joint statement from House Republican leaders said the "situation shows the intense concern within our conference -- and among the American people -- about the need to ensure the security of our borders and the president's refusal to faithfully execute our laws."

In the absence of legislation, Republicans urged President Obama to act on his own to secure the borders and safely deport illegal immigrant children.

"We will continue to work on solutions to the border crisis and other challenges facing our country," they said.

But Senate Democrats blasted their House colleagues for dropping the legislation. "Shame on the House of Representatives," Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry also slammed his fellow Republicans, saying "it's beyond belief that Congress is abandoning its post while our border crisis continues to create humanitarian suffering."

The legislation's prospects changed quickly over the course of the day. Initially, House leaders thought they had a plan to win enough support, by scheduling a separate vote on legislation to prohibit Obama from expanding a policy that lets some illegal immigrants who came to the U.S. as children stay. Amid reports that the administration is considering such an expansion, the bill by Rep. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., would specifically bar the president from broadening the 2012 policy.

Republicans say another illegal immigrant reprieve by the president would only exacerbate the surge of illegal immigrant children trekking to the U.S.-Mexico border from Central America.

"Such action would create an even greater incentive for more illegal crossings and make the crisis on our border even worse, and that would be a grave mistake," House Speaker John Boehner said Thursday.

The vote had been scheduled by Republican leaders as part of the effort to win conservative support for the separate, scaled-down package giving the Department of Homeland Security an immediate $659 million to address the border crisis and making other policy changes.

But Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, nevertheless raised concerns with House members about their version of the border legislation, and lawmakers and aides said Thursday that it had an impact. They also pointed to opposition from Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala.

Sessions voiced concerns about both the House and Senate proposals, arguing that the Senate would never take up the executive action bill being considered in the House. Sessions wants any bill addressing the president's funding request to also address the executive action issue.

"We as policy makers must face the reality that the president is openly planning to use executive actions to provide amnesty and work permits to millions without any lawful authority," he said in a statement.

Democrats, meanwhile, accused Republicans of playing games.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said earlier in the day: "It is extraordinary that the House of Representatives, after failing for more than a year to reform our broken immigration reform system, would vote to restrict a law enforcement tool that the Department of Homeland Security uses to focus resources on key enforcement priorities like public safety and border security, and provide temporary relief from deportation for people who are low priorities for removal."

Unlike the House bill, the Senate package would authorize $2.7 billion with no policy riders.

While 11 Republican senators helped the Senate bill meet a key procedural hurdle, enough of them -- including at least one Democrat -- said they would filibuster final passage if the measure is not amended. Like their House colleagues, they want changes to a 2008 law that would require the government to treat illegal immigrants apprehended at the border the same, regardless of country of origin. Read more about House GOP leaders hold out hope for border crisis fix, after vote fizzles

Call and oppose the flawed border bill

Alert date: 
July 28, 2014
Alert expiration date: 
August 2, 2014
Alert body: 
Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR). Washington DC
FAIR ACTION ALERT, July 28, 2014
 
House Leadership to Send Flawed Border Bill to Floor
Call Your Representatives NOW and Urge Them to Vote No!
 
Sources all over Capitol Hill are reporting that House Speaker John Boehner plans to send a flawed border bill to the floor this week. The bill will be a response to President Obama's request for Congress to provide government agencies an extra $3.7 billion to speed up the processing of and provide care for illegal alien minors flooding the border and resettle them all across the country. 
 
CALL YOUR REPRESENTATIVES NOW AND URGE THEM TO VOTE NO!
 
1. President Obama has caused this crisis. 
 
Under the guise of "prosecutorial discretion," President Obama has blatantly refused to enforce our immigration laws, ordering immigration agents to essentially ignore all illegal aliens who have not been convicted of violent crimes. Removals of illegal alien minors have dropped nearly 80 percent during his Administration. Even President Obama's former director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) unapologetically declared that the chances of the average illegal being deported are "close to zero." 
 
To make matters worse, President Obama has circumvented Congress and adopted administrative amnesty programs, such as the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA), that shield illegal aliens from deportation. These policies have sent a clear message around the world: if you come, you can stay. 
 
2. Policy changes will either fail in the Senate or become a vehicle for amnesty. 
 
As Congress has debated how to respond to the President's request for $3.7 billion in extra funding, House leaders have insisted that policy changes must accompany the money. They have focused specifically on changing the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act (TVPRA) of 2008 to allow minors from Central America to be processed and deported quickly like minors from Mexico.
 
While this is a laudable goal, the Senate has vowed to block any changes to the 2008 Act. And, if policy changes are sent to the Senate, any legislation that returns to the House is likely to contain some sort of amnesty or other bad policy changes. This would set up a dangerous scenario for a conference committee or action in a lame-duck session of Congress. 
 
3. If policy changes pass Congress, they will be rendered meaningless by the Obama Administration. 
 
President Obama has made it clear that he does not care whether Congress amends the 2008 Act to speed up the removal of minors from Central America. Just last Thursday, the White House confirmed that it is considering a plan to admit even MORE Honduran, Guatemalan and Salvadoran minors by giving them refugee status -an act that requires outright ignoring the legal definition of a refugee. Granting refugee status to these minors would nullify any legislation Congress passes to speed up the processing and deportation of illegal alien minors crossing the border.
 
More importantly, the Obama Administration has vowed that by the end of August, it will unilaterally grant some sort of administrative amnesty to illegal aliens already in the U.S. By some accounts the plan may shield millions of illegal aliens from deportation! (See, e.g., The New York Times, June 30, 2014)
 
4. The legislation being proposed by House Leadership will not improve the situation.  In fact, it will make matters worse! 
 
In particular, the House Leadership bill is damaging because it includes the Cornyn-Cuellar bill. This bill actually further complicates the process of removing illegal alien minors by giving them an additional hearing before an immigration judge to attempt to establish they have a legitimate claim to stay in the U.S.  In addition, the Cornyn-Cuellar bill allows illegal alien minors who have received final deportation orders in the past 18 months to get those orders expunged and re-apply for admission to the U.S.!! (To learn more, read FAIR's summary of the Cornyn-Cuellar bill.) 
 
Finally, the House Leadership bill does nothing to address the real cause of the crisis. It does not attempt to stop President Obama's non-enforcement policies or his administrative amnesty programs. And it does nothing to impede President Obama from fulfilling his promise to grant administrative amnesty to millions of illegal aliens in the U.S. by the end of this summer! 
 
Act NOW!  FAIR is asking all of its members, supporters, and activists to call their Representatives and urge them to vote NO on the House Leadership supplemental spending bill.  Tell your Representative:
 
• You oppose new legislation that will only complicate the deportation of illegal alien minors;
 
• You demand that House leaders address the TRUE cause of this border crisis: the President's non-enforcement policies and administrative amnesty programs. House leaders should support legislation that significantly restricts the President's ability to abuse various forms of relief such as deferred action, humanitarian parole, parole-in-place, temporary protected status, etc. This includes supporting legislation authored by Senator Ted Cruz and Representative Marsha Blackburn that would end DACA; and
 
• You demand that House leaders immediately take action to stop the President from fulfilling his promise to grant administrative amnesty to millions of illegal aliens in the U.S.
 
House leaders plan to vote on their bill THIS WEEK! Call your Representatives NOW! 
 
**************************
Find numbers for your U.S. Senators and Representatives from Oregon at: http://www.oregonir.org/how-contact-oregon-congressional-delegation

Northern sheriffs get close-up look at border crisis

The tens of thousands unaccompanied immigrant children who have been caught this year at the border are being bused and flown to facilities across the country where they will be housed and cared for in make-shift camps until they are released to family. As a result, many officials in northern states are taking a sudden interest in this crisis and are demanding to know what is being done to deter future waves of children from coming to America illegally.

Last week six sheriffs from across the country were given the opportunity to take a ride on two of the Texas Highway Patrol speed and gun boats that have been patrolling the Rio Grande south of Mission since this crisis began.

Susan Tully, as the Federation for American Immigration Reform’s (FAIR’s) National Field director, helped organize the tour. Tully said FAIR is a nonprofit public policy organization out of Washington, D.C., that has been in place 35 years. Supporters of FAIR believe immigration policies should benefit America and Americans first and foremost, she said.

“What we’re doing down here in the Rio Grande Valley is all about public education of our law enforcement officials so that they can see exactly what is going on along the border,” Tully said. “The true story is not being told by most of the media so we felt it was important for these sheriffs to see the situation down here first-hand.”

She said sheriffs were strategically picked from across the country so they can in turn go back and share what they learned with their colleagues.

While public education was one of the objectives of the northern sheriffs’ visit to the Valley last week, Tully said FAIR’s ultimate goal is to change the nation’s current immigration laws.

“One of the reasons we came down here was to talk to the people who are having to deal with this crisis on a daily basis,” said Tully. “Without fai,l they all agree that the first thing we need to do is to change the 2008 law that requires them to treat minors from other countries differently than they do those from Mexico. That we need to change that legislation because between that and the (Obama) administration granting DACA (deferred action for childhood arrivals) telling children and young people that if they show up here we’re going to legalize them somehow is a perfect storm for what’s going on down here.”

The six sheriffs that toured the Rio Grande on the Texas Highway Department boats last week were Lewis Evangelidis (Worchester County, Massachusetts), Charles Jenkins (Fredericks County, Maryland), Sam Page (Rockingham County, North Carolina), Tony Childress (Livingston County, Illinois), Ken Matlack (Morrow County, Oregon) and Thomas Hodgson (Bristol County, Massachusetts).

As the six sheriffs stood on the boat dock at Anzalduas Park shortly after their ride-along with state troopers, Hodgson said the group met with Hidalgo County Sheriff Eddie Guerra as well as Border Patrol personnel.

“Seeing as how a number of us are having to deal with individuals who are being sent from here to our home states, we need to know what kind of problems they’re dealing with along the border because with the movement of these individuals all over the country we’re all becoming border states,” Hodgson said.

“We’re going to be mobilizing sheriffs across this country to demand that Congress, as well as the president, act to secure these borders once and for all. We’ve been asking for it for decades and while a lot of people are referring to this as a humanitarian crisis, those of us who have our boots on the ground and have been working to get our federal government to secure our border over these years see it as a leadership crisis. Therein lays our problem.”

According to Customs and Border Protection reports, CBP has apprehended 57,525 unaccompanied alien children along the Southwest Border between October 2013 and June 2014 -- a 106 percent increase over the same period a year ago. During the same period CBP also apprehended 55,420 family units crossing the border illegally -- a 493 percent increase over last year.

In the Rio Grande Sector there have been 42,164 unaccompanied alien children and 42,358 family unit apprehensions since last October. These represent increases of 189 percent and over 500 percent, respectively.

Other than Mexican apprehensions reported from October through June were 154,606 for the Rio Grande Sector and 202,951 for the Southwest Border. Read more about Northern sheriffs get close-up look at border crisis

'Keep Mexicans in Mexico' comment stirs up controversy at rally

SALEM, Ore. -- It's exactly 1,050 miles from the Northeast Center St. overpass along Interstate 5 in Salem to the Mexican border.

About two-dozen people lined the overpass with American flags and signs on Saturday afternoon for Salem's slice of the big national movement this weekend against illegal immigration.

"We have compassion for the people coming here. But it's important they know they can't stay," said Cynthia Kendoll, president of Oregonians for Immigration Reform, the group that helped organize Salem's event. "They need to return to their home countries."

Most of the protesters trying to get drivers to pay attention were white and American-born, except for a man named Ryan Trasad.

Trasad is an immigrant himself who came to the United States 40 years ago from the Fiji Islands, closer to New Zealand than America.

"I don't think anybody I've talked to is against immigrants," said Trasad. "We're a land of immigrants. We know that."

Trasad probably did not talk much with a woman named Laura Cole, who was at the same protest on the overpass with her husband and 4-year-old son.

"I want to keep Oregon the way it is, the people that make up this town" said Cole.

When asked what she meant by that, Cole answered she wants to "keep Mexicans in Mexico. Keep European-Americans here, where we are, in our homeland... I think it's OK for us to be proud that this is our territory."

Officially, the protest was only supposed to be objecting to illegal immigration, not all kinds of immigration.

It only took a few minutes for word to spread among the protesters about Cole's comments during our recorded television interview.

Cynthia Kendoll, the group's organizer, approached our crew to distance herself from Cole's opinions.

"I heard through multiple other people that a woman made a remark that the United States should remain white, and other people should go back to their home countries," said Kendoll. "The message of our organization is if you want to come to the United States, there are legal channels to do so."

Kendoll knows fringe messages of intolerance can seep in awfully easily.

For example, after drivers passed below the official protest on I-5, they approached another group of people with an even larger sign on the next overpass.

The large banner said, "Diversity is code-word for white genocide," which represents a group opposing all forms of diversity.

"A small element of it does shade what we're trying to do," said Kendoll. "We are a nation of people who have immigrated here to build our country." Read more about 'Keep Mexicans in Mexico' comment stirs up controversy at rally

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