Tears for fears change to tears of Hope in Justice.
by Jane Guskin.




Nurses see everything in a day's work. But at the maternity ward of Nashville General Hospital, nurses caring for an immigrant woman in labor broke down and cried when the sheriff's deputy guarding the woman refused to remove the shackles chaining her leg to the bed. The undocumented woman was detained by local authorities because of a cooperation agreement between the county sheriff's department and the immigration enforcement agency, ICE.

In Seattle, a seasoned community leader couldn't hold back her tears at a press conference as she read excerpts from her organization's report about abuses and indignities suffered by immigrants at a local detention center. Female detainees described strip searches and genital and anal cavity inspections following meetings with attorneys; detainees affected by an outbreak of food poisoning were denied medical treatment for many hours; a group of detainees transferred out of the facility by plane to Alabama -- to clear room there for workers arrested in a raid -- were refused access to the bathroom and were forced to sit in their own excrement for the duration of the flight.

Following the May 12 immigration raid at the Agriprocessors meatpacking plant in Postville, Iowa, court interpreter Erik Camayd-Freixas reported seeing attorneys "weep alongside their clients" as hundreds of immigrant workers were left no choice but to plead guilty to criminal charges.
At St. Bridget's church in Postville, where staff and volunteers have been providing humanitarian assistance to families traumatized by the raid, Father Ouderkirk quotes Sister Mary as saying: "Once you've cried for two straight weeks, you don't have any more tears. But it doesn't mean you stopped feeling."

I've covered immigration news in a weekly bulletin for over a decade, and co-authored a book about immigration which came out last year. Yet it took me three weeks to write about the Postville raid because I couldn't stop crying as I read about the indigenous Guatemalans and Mexicans, victims of labor exploitation, who were dragged through an incomprehensible legal process in makeshift courtrooms at a cattle fairgrounds and are now serving prison sentences; mothers hobbled with government tracking devices on their ankles as they try to care for their families, now without income; and hundreds of children who are grieving the sudden loss of a parent.

I can't even skim through our own book without crying. In the chapter on detention and deportation, the "Story of S." still burns me up, unleashing tears of helplessness, as I remember how ICE delayed releasing S. for a few extra days, saying we needed to prove we had arranged a safe place for her to stay, since she was a survivor of abuse. Yet when they finally released her, they dumped her on the street without letting anyone know -- not even her lawyer -- and without any money, even for a phone call, so she had to make her way on foot to a public library and ask to borrow the phone.

Then there's Farouk Abdel-Muhti, a friend and colleague whose case we covered in that same chapter. Farouk would be 60 now, but he died four years ago today -- on July 21, 2004, his 100th day of freedom after two years in immigration detention. It's not even Farouk's death that brings up the tears for me. It's the eight months he spent in solitary confinement, without seeing the sun, or breathing outside air -- in total violation of the government's own rules -- while our protests, vigils, press releases, and petitions were ignored. And the fact that his entire detention was a farce, since the government already knew Farouk was a man without a country who couldn't be deported.

Tears of rage, of frustration, of grief.

And tears of hope, when I see kids in Providence, Rhode Island, leading some 200 people in a noisy protest to support immigrant janitors arrested by ICE just a few hours earlier. Tears of hope, when I hear that Jewish and Christian communities are planning to converge in Postville on July 27 for a major demonstration in solidarity with the families affected by the Agriprocessors raid. Tears of hope, whenever I see resistance rising.

Hope that we will never get used to the brutality, the human tragedy, that our immigration enforcement system unleashes all around us. Hope that our tears will never dry up, our hearts will never cease to hurt, and our voices will never get tired of demanding justice

Why should the American people be responsible for paying for Rolls-Royce medical care for illegal aliens?" Rep. Steve King said.



I said: Mr. King with all my respect being so inhumane, heartless and ignorant are not for well educated people. The taxes paying for Undocumented, Legal and U.S. Citizens are paying for your Rolls Royce, your private jet, your entertainment, your luxury dinners and your Salary so do not be so pathetic. Or you are consenting or agree with people dying while in ICE Custody?


DHS bureau will report the number of people who die awaiting deportation.

The top U.S. immigration enforcement official told a congressional subcommittee yesterday that the Bush administration will disclose more information about foreigners who die in the sprawling network of federal detention centers around the country.

Julie Myers, assistant secretary of the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau, said her agency will report such deaths to a branch of the Justice Department that collects similar information about inmates in state prisons and local jails.

The Justice Department publishes statistics on the fatalities, not the identities of the victims, but Myers said the change represents "more transparency" about detainee deaths. Since last year, congressional Democrats have pleaded with ICE to reveal the names and circumstances of foreigners who have died in U.S. custody.

Myers announced the new reporting requirement during a congressional hearing on medical care for immigration detainees, the first since The Washington Post published a series of articles last month that documented a broken system of care for the growing number of foreigners who are imprisoned while the government tries to deport them.

The articles, based on thousands of pages of internal documents, found that 83 detainees had died since ICE was created five years ago and that many more sick and mentally ill people have been denied the treatment to which they are entitled. The Post found medical staff shortages, treatment delays, sloppy record-keeping, poor administrative practices and cover-ups by employees aware of the poor care.

Yesterday's hearing was partisan and testy. Myers said ICE has been working to improve the health-care system. But detainees, their lawyers and relatives, and advocates for immigrants offered graphic testimony about misdiagnoses, medical neglect and secrecy.

ICE officials "are defending the indefensible," said Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee's immigration subcommittee. "Whatever you think about the overall debate on immigration," Lofgren said in an interview, "you are not supposed to kill people who are in custody."

Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.) countered, "Why should the American people be responsible for paying for Rolls-Royce medical care for illegal aliens?"

Myers and committee Republicans said that ICE figures show that the rate of deaths among detainees has fallen in recent years, and that fewer people die in immigration detention than in prison.

But one witness, who works in detention centers with foreigners seeking asylum in the United States, disputed ICE's claims, saying that health care in detention centers "is getting worse, not better." Homer Venters, a physician at the Bellevue-New York University Program for Survivors of Torture, said ICE's assertion that deaths among detainees fell by 49 percent between 2006 and 2007 is misleading.

Venters said those figures ignore the fact that detainees are, on average, spending less time in custody. Taking the length of stay into account, he testified, the mortality rate during that period increased by 20 percent.

Venters said ICE's assertion that fewer people die in immigration detention than in prison also is misleading because detainees tend to be younger and in custody for less time than prisoners.

Democrats grilled Myers about The Post's findings that more than 250 detainees had been sedated with powerful psychotropic drugs for their deportation over the past five years, even though they were not mentally ill. ICE has recently changed its rules to require permission from a federal judge before detainees are drugged for behavioral reasons. Myers said yesterday that the agency has sought four such court orders, all of which are pending.

Sisters of Mercy reacting to the Impact of Immigration raids in Iowa.




On Tuesday, May 20, Sister of Mercy Kathy Thill spoke at a press conference about what happened in Postville, Iowa when 390 of approximately 2,300 residents were arrested and detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Below are her remarks.

My name is Sister Kathy Thill and I am a Sister of Mercy who works with the Latino community of Iowa. I am also a United States citizen who grew up believing that this is a democratic country in which the dignity of all people is respected and their rights protected. That is not the country I experienced this past week.

I share my experience with the hope that it will help lawmakers and my fellow citizens see that our nation's immigration policies and practices are broken and inhumane. We need comprehensive immigration reform which includes a pathway to lawful permanent residence and citizenship, meets immigrants' basic needs, encourages family unity and reunification and addresses the root causes of migration.

When ICE took over the National Cattle Congress grounds for "training purposes" a week before the raids, we knew something was going to happen. Not one of us was prepared for what did happen on Monday, May 12 in Postville, Iowa.

Sister Mary McCauley at St. Bridget's Catholic Church called me that morning, shortly after the raids began. I was one of three from El Centro Latinoamericano, a Hispanic resource center in Waterloo, who went to help in Postville. At St. Bridget's we found hundreds of people in shock and distress - frightened to leave the church for fear of being arrested and desperate to find out what was happening to their loved ones who had been arrested.

Working with the staff of St. Bridget's we did our best to meet the needs of the families and, at 4:00 p.m., we went to Agriprocessers, the site of the raid, and tried to get information on those detained. We were especially concerned about the 17 minors who had been taken during the raid. We brought a list of names and ages of the minors and requested information about them. We were told to come back later and that parents with ID could come to pick up some youth who would be released. ICE officials did not provide any information. Later, we brought two parents, each hoping for word on their sons. Again ICE officials did not give us any information. So we waited.

Eventually, some women and youth were released wearing GPS tracking devices on their ankles to track them until their court appearances. We were told there would be no more releases and that detainees were going to be transferred to Waterloo and held at the Cattle Congress. The parents we brought earlier still had no word on their sons. Their tension, grief and distress increased as buses began to take detainees from the site.

Of the 17 minors arrested, five or six are still in custody. A 16-year-old who was released told me that he kept trying to tell officials his age, but they refused to believe him, cursed at him and made fun of him for being Hispanic. A 17-year-old who was arrested asked me, "I didn't come here to rob people or do bad things. I just came to work, to earn money for my family. Why do people hate us so much?" I had no answer.
The only bright spot in the day was in the generosity of those in the Postville community and throughout Iowa who have made donations and volunteered to help their immigrant sisters and brothers. We spent several hours on Monday evening having family members sign the forms necessary to enable immigration attorneys to see the detainees the next day.

Meanwhile hundreds of men, women, children and babies remained at the church sleeping on the floor and church pews, too frightened to go home. This arrangement continued throughout the week despite our efforts to convince them it was safe to go home.

During the early morning hours on Tuesday a few women were released at varying times for humanitarian reasons and taken back to Postville. One woman who was released me told me it had been her first day at Agriprocessors and she had been only working 15 minutes when the raid began. While in custody she asked to call her family but was told by officials she did not have a right to make a phone call. Seeing this mother reunited with her child brought tears to everyone's eyes. It lifted my spirits, but not for long.

Throughout the week we met with one obstacle after another. For example, on Tuesday, after waiting and negotiating most of the day to see the detainees, the attorneys learned that criminal charges, not immigration charges, would be filed so the immigration lawyers could not see or talk to the detainees. I learned later that Mexican Consulate officials were also there first thing on Tuesday and were denied access for quite a while.

Much time and effort was spent during the week trying to obtain information about the detainees, confirming the immigrants who were detained, the charges filed against them and where they were taken. ICE had set up an 800 number to provide this information but this was very ineffective.

Hundreds of families are torn apart by this raid. In several families, both parents were arrested leaving no one to care for children. In one example, a neighbor took the children in until the mother was released on Wednesday. Even upon her release, ICE officials would not allow her to go to the church where her children were staying. Instead, they took her to her apartment, looked around and, as they were leaving, threatened her not to take a step out of the apartment. If she did, she would never see her children again.

The mother of another family was released while her husband is still detained. Her children, one of which is a U.S. citizen, are upset and frightened. The six year old cries asking to see her daddy. The mother cannot work. There is no income, no way to provide for her children.

The humanitarian impact of this raid is obvious to anyone in Postville. The economic impact will soon be evident. Hundreds of families are now left without income - struggling to figure out how to pay the rent and provide food for their children. Some have thought about canceling their phone service to save money but ICE officials told those with GPS devices they must maintain service to have contact with officials. Other families have decided to move several families into one apartment to save on rent.

Those released need to appear in court - some in Waterloo and in other places around Iowa - but they have no money for transportation, much less for a night's stay somewhere if that is required.

Postville's population before the raids was only 2,300, so the impact on this community will be devastating. It is estimated that the population will decrease by one-third to one-half. And the impact goes beyond Postville. In Waterloo, we are receiving calls from people too scared to go to work. People are losing their jobs and have received their last paycheck. Others are in hiding.

Fear is rampant. I spoke with a Waterloo school official who was concerned about a particular student who had not been in school this week. Her family was too afraid to leave the house after ICE had come knocking at their door.

In Postville, half of the children were absent from school this week. Counselors were brought in to assist the children devastated by the loss of a parent or family member. Later in the week counselors were called back to assist non-immigrant children who were having nightmares worrying that their parents would be taken.

This past week a mother and daughter - both U.S. citizens - were stopped while shopping at Wal-Mart and questioned by ICE officials for an hour and a half.

The tension and fear is not limited to the Hispanic and Latino communities. When driving to Postville this Friday with a car full of donations I received a call about possible checkpoints between Waterloo and Postville. I wondered what might happen to me for delivering the supplies. I suddenly felt like I was in a strange country. I didn't feel free.

The immigration policies and practices of our government are disastrous. The inhumane way these raids are conducted and the negative impact on families and our communities is intolerable. The trauma created is a tremendous injustice.

Perhaps an even greater injustice is the exploitation, physical and sexual abuse by Agriprocessors. Those who are willing to risk so much to put food on their table and try to provide a better life for their children are put in jail and labeled criminals. Yet those who commit crimes of violence are free.

It is with urgency that I call on the government to pass comprehensive immigration reform which includes a pathway to lawful permanent residence and citizenship, meets immigrants' basic needs, encourages family unity and reunification, and addresses the root causes of migration.

It is time to change our immigration policies and practices so that once again we become the nation in which the dignity of all people is paramount and their rights protected

Hometown to the World: Raids against Immigrants just because they violated the Law.






Are they mad because I'm working? They don't go after employers, CEOs and put them in jail for violating Labor, Immigrations and environmental Laws?. Why? I am not the only one breaking the Law?

Antonio Escobedo ran to get his wife Monday when he saw a helicopter circling overhead and immigration agents approaching the meatpacking plant where they both work. The couple hid for hours inside the plant before obtaining refuge in the pews and hall at St. Bridget's Catholic Church, where hundreds of other Guatemalan and Mexican families gathered, hoping to avoid arrest.

"I like my job. I like my work. I like it here in Iowa," said Escobedo, 38, an illegal immigrant from Yescas, Mexico, who has raised his three children for 11 years in Postville. "Are they mad because I'm working?"

Monday's raid on the Agriprocessors plant, in which 389 immigrants were arrested and many held at a cattle exhibit hall, was the Bush administration's largest crackdown on illegal workers at a single site. It has upended this tree-lined community, which calls itself "Hometown to the World." Half of the school system's 600 students were absent Tuesday, including 90 percent of Hispanic children, because their parents were arrested or in hiding.

Current and former officials of the Department of Homeland Security say its raid on the largest employer in northeast Iowa reflects the administration's decision to put pressure on companies with large numbers of illegal immigrant workers, particularly in the meat industry. But its disruptive impact on the nation's largest supplier of kosher beef and on the surrounding community has provoked renewed criticism that the administration is disproportionately targeting workers instead of employers, and that the resulting turmoil is worse than the underlying crimes.

"They don't go after employers. They don't put CEOs in jail," complained the Postville Community Schools superintendent, David Strudthoff, 51, who said the sudden incarceration of more than 10 percent of the town's population of 2,300 "is like a natural disaster -- only this one is manmade."

He added, "In the end, it is the greater population that will suffer and the workforce that will be held accountable."

Congressman Bruce Braley (D-Iowa) said enforcement efforts against corporations that commit immigration violations have "plummeted" under the Bush administration. "Until we enforce our immigration laws equally against both employers and employees who break the law, we will continue to have a problem," he said.

Julie L. Myers, assistant homeland security secretary for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), said that to the contrary, the agency has seldom been so aggressive, including opening criminal investigations of company officials. While cases have netted only a handful of sentences for low-level managers so far, Myers said, such white-collar crime investigations typically take years to develop.

"Can we really execute a search warrant without taking any action against [illegal employment] that we know is taking place?" she asked. "Or will just taking business records through a search warrant cause illegal aliens to leave, and then we're not fulfilling that part of the mission, as well?"

Lobbyists and former officials say that in unleashing ICE, the administration is trying to "turn up the pain" to motivate businesses and Congress to support the comprehensive immigration changes sought by President Bush, such as a temporary-worker program and earned legalization. If the existing legal tools are too blunt, they said, Congress should create a fairer system.

But the pressure on employers -- whose wages and hiring practices have lured illegal workers to both large cities and small towns -- has mostly been indirect and economic: While workplace arrests have risen tenfold since 2002, from 510 to 4,940, only 90 criminal arrests have involved company personnel officials.

So far, no officials at Agriprocessors have been charged. The company, founded by Aaron Rubashkin, has a storybook history whose recent chapters have turned murky. After some of Rubashkin's Lubavitch Hasidic family moved here from Brooklyn in 1987, the firm became the nation's largest processor of glatt kosher beef, the strictest kosher standard. It produces kosher and non-kosher beef, veal, lamb, turkey and chicken products under brands such as Iowa Best Beef, Aaron's Best and Rubashkin's

According to an affidavit filed by an ICE agent in conjunction with this week's arrests, 76 percent of the 968 employees on the company's payroll over the last three months of 2007 used false or suspect Social Security numbers. The affidavit cited unnamed sources who alleged that some company supervisors employed 15-year-olds, helped cash checks for workers with fake documents, and pressured workers without documents to purchase vehicles and register them in other names.

In addition, the affidavit alleged that company supervisors ignored a report of a methamphetamine drug lab operating in the plant. It also cited a case in which a supervisor blindfolded a Guatemalan worker and allegedly struck him with a meat hook, without serious injury.

Agriprocessors has faced other troubles, as well. In 2006, it paid a $600,000 settlement to the Environmental Protection Agency to resolve wastewater pollution problems, and this March it was assessed $182,000 in fines for 39 state health, safety and labor violations. In 2004, the U.S. Agriculture Department's inspector general accused the company of "acts of inhumane slaughter" after animal rights advocates publicized an unauthorized video of a stumbling, dying cow, and some Jewish groups attacked its worker practices.

And last month, the company lost a federal appellate court battle over whether it could ignore a vote by workers at its Brooklyn distribution center to unionize, on grounds that those in favor were illegal immigrants and not entitled to federal labor protections.

"This employer has a long history of violating every law that's out there -- labor laws, environmental laws, now immigration laws," said Mark Lauritsen, international vice president of the United Food and Commercial Workers union, which has waged a bitter battle to organize the Postville plant. The union charged that the immigration raid disrupted a separate U.S. Labor Department investigation into alleged child labor law violations and other infractions.

ICE may be "deporting 390 witnesses" to the labor investigation, Lauritsen said, adding, "This administration seems to place a larger value on big, splashy shows in this immigration raid than in vigorously enforcing other labor laws."

In November, Sholom Rubashkin, company vice president and the founder's son, wrote a letter to customers decrying "a slanderous and patently false campaign" by the union, and defending the company's record and its products as "safe and wholesome." After this week's raid, the family released brief statements expressing its sympathies to workers, commitment to customers and cooperation with authorities.

Chaim Abrahams, a company representative, said Agriprocessors is working to "bolster our compliance efforts to employ only properly documented employees" and has launched an independent investigation into the circumstances that led to the raid.

The blitz, which occurred after a 16-month investigation, began with helicopters, buses and vans encircling the western edge of town at 10 a.m. Witnesses said hundreds of agents surrounded the plant in 10 minutes, began interviewing workers and seized company records.

By early afternoon, illegal immigrants began arriving by bus at the National Cattle Congress grounds in Waterloo, Iowa, about 75 miles from Postville. ICE held 313 male suspects at an exhibit hall and 76 female suspects in local jails for administrative violations of immigration law.

Those arrested include 290 Guatemalans, 93 Mexicans, 2 Israelis and 4 Ukrainians, according to the U.S. attorney's office for the Northern District of Iowa.

Eighteen were juveniles who have been released or turned over for refugee resettlement, and the prosecutor's office would not say if there were underage workers at the plant. Of the adults, 306 face criminal charges for aggravated identity theft and other crimes related to the use of false documents. A lawsuit filed on behalf of the workers on Thursday, meanwhile, accused the government of violating their constitutional rights through arbitrary and indefinite detention

For now, Postville residents -- immigrants and native-born -- are holding their breath. On Greene Street, where the Hall Roberts' Son Inc. feed store, Kosher Community Grocery and Restaurante Rinconcito Guatemalteco sit side by side, workers fear a chain of empty apartments, falling home prices and business downturns. The main street, punctuated by a single blinking traffic signal, has been quiet; a Guatemalan restaurant temporarily closed; and the storekeeper next door reported a steady trickle of families quietly booking flights to Central America via Chicago.

"Postville will be a ghost town," said Lili, a Ukrainian store clerk who spoke on the condition that her last name be withheld.

But Cesar Jochol, 48, a native of Patzun, Guatemala, and owner of a market called Tonita's Express, questioned whether the raid will be a deterrent. People who can afford to eat meat only once or twice a week in Guatemala, while earning $4 a day, can earn $60 a day in Iowa, enough to eat beef or chicken three times a day, he said. "You take away a hundred people. A couple hundred more will come tomorrow; they'll just go to L.A., New York, New Jersey and Miami," said Jochol, a 21-year U.S. resident.

At St. Bridget's Catholic Church, Eduardo Santos, 27, who came from Guatemala and lost two of his fingers working at the factory, said the raid was "fair . . . but it's bad for everybody. There's no work." He plans to go home.

"The problem is, who is going to do the work?" said Stephen G. Bloom, a University of Iowa journalism professor who wrote a 2000 book on the clash of cultures in Postville as Agriprocessors' Lubavitch Jewish leaders gained influence in the mostly Lutheran town. "This is a no-win situation."

GOP HIS PANIC= LATINOS. GET THE LATINOS OUT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.

FAMILIES ARE UTTERLY ENGULFED IN TEARS AND VERY FRIGHTENED.

How in the world no one see the Inhumane raids by ICE do to the Dysfunctional and broken Immigration system!!!!!!!!!!

The largest workplace raid in Iowa history Monday resulted in the arrest of more than 300 people and reignited the debate over immigration; Tears families aparts, creating fears within communities and inhumane raids.

As two law enforcement helicopters hovered overhead, dozens of federal agents descended on Agriprocessors Inc., the nation's largest kosher slaughterhouse.

The 300 people arrested represent almost one-third of the plant's 968 workers, and federal officials said the number of arrests could increase. The number is three times as many as were arrested in a raid 18 months ago at the Swift plant in Marshalltown.

Months in planning, Monday's raid involved 16 local, state and federal agencies, led by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). They executed search warrants related to criminal activity, as well as a civil search warrant for people believed to be in the United States illegally.

"This is the largest operation of its type ever in Iowa," said Matt M. Dummermuth, U.S. attorney for the Northern District.

Protests in Waterloo

About 200 protesters on Monday evening filled the sidewalk in front of the gates of the National Cattle Congress fairgrounds, where those arrested were being taken by bus.

They chanted "We have rights" and waved signs that said, among other things, "Honk for Human Rights."

Father Nils Hernandez of the Immaculate Conception Parish in Cedar Rapids came to Waterloo after he heard about the raid.

"This is inhumane," he said.

The protesters were faced with a half-dozen people who shouted "Send 'em back," to which the crowd responded, "We have a right to be here, too."

Feds allege rampant ID fraud

A federal search warrant said immigration officials have filed almost 700 complaints about immigration violations and criminal activity by workers at the Postville plant. The activity spans a two-year period, and some workers face multiple allegations.

Federal officials allege that as many as three-fourths of the company's workers at the end of last year were using fraudulent Social Security numbers.

Last November, the search warrant said, ICE agents interviewed a former Agriprocessors supervisor who said some employees were running a methamphetamine lab in the plant and were bringing weapons to work.

Another source alleged worker abuse, officials said in the warrant. In one case, a supervisor covered the eyes of an employee with duct tape and struck him with a meat hook.

The worker, who had entered the country illegally from Guatemala, was not seriously injured. He declined to report the incident for fear of losing his job, the warrant said.

Another plant worker told federal officials that undocumented workers were paid $5 an hour for their first few months before receiving a pay increase to $6 per hour. The minimum wage in Iowa is $7.25 an hour.

Company officials could not be reached for comment. The plant, which produces kosher and nonkosher meats, opened in 1987 when butcher Aaron Rubashkin and about 200 Hasidic Jews from New York took over a defunct meatpacking plant. Hasidic Jews follow strict laws. It is a branch of Orthodox Judaism.

The Jews' arrival turned Postville, a community of 2,273 people on the Allamakee-Clayton county border in northeast Iowa, into one of Iowa's most ethnically diverse.

Rumors of raids elsewhere

Rumors had swirled across eastern Iowa for several days that one or more raids of meat-processing plants were imminent, but federal agents said Monday's action was limited to the Postville plant.

Gov. Chet Culver said he was told of the raid about 10:15 a.m. He appointed a group of state agency officials, led by Lt. Gov. Patty Judge, to help Postville deal with the raid's impact.

The governor said federal officials reassured his staff that those arrested and detained will have their rights protected. He also emphasized the importance of enforcing immigration laws.

"I have said before that I believe it is important that we crack down on illegal immigration," Culver said. "Illegal means illegal, not just those that are crossing the border illegally, but also those who are responsible for helping to make it happen."

State and federal labor officials confirmed Monday that investigations had been under way at the Postville plant for possible violations of labor laws.

The United Foods and Commercial Workers Union, which had been trying to organize Agriprocessors' employees, said it had alerted government investigators that the plant was exploiting underage workers and paying them off the books, said Jill Cashen, a union spokeswoman.

It's unclear whether the union's charges led to Monday's raid. Mark Lauritsen, the union's international vice president, wrote to ICE officials on May 2, asking them to refrain from raiding the Postville plant while the other investigation was under way. ICE officials had no comment on the letter.

Buses depart for Waterloo

Buses, apparently filled with detainees, began leaving Postville at 4 p.m. Monday, headed toward Waterloo. Each bus was escorted by two Iowa State Patrol cars, one in front and one in back.

The plant entrance remained blocked by ICE agents and state troopers.

The National Cattle Congress fairgrounds in Waterloo will serve as an intake center, said Barbara Gonzalez, an ICE spokeswoman.

The men will be housed at Estel Hall at the Cattle Congress and the women will be taken to local jails, she said.

It's unlikely anyone will remain at the Cattle Congress past Thursday, Gonzalez said. Federal officials have leased the fairgrounds through May 25.

'We are with you!'
'We are with you!'

When the chained gates at the Cattle Congress site opened to admit a bus of detainees at 8:15 p.m., the crowd of about 200 people screamed their support.

Some were in tears as they shouted "We are with you!" and "We are all equal!"

Police looked on during the protest. Waterloo Police Department Lt. M.W. McNamee said the department had protesters move across the street to the sidewalk in front of the fairgrounds.

"You can't be on the property here ... but you can be on the sidewalk," McNamee told the growing number of protesters. "Unfortunately there's not a lot of area where you can be. This is not conducive to have a vigil."

The protest wrapped up just before 10 p.m.

Change in tactics

Immigration officials appeared committed to avoiding some of the criticism that followed the federal raids in December 2006 at six Swift & Co. meatpacking plants across the country, including one in Marshalltown. Those raids resulted in 1,297 arrests, including about 100 in Iowa.

Critics, including former Gov. Tom Vilsack, accused federal officials of violating the workers' Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures. Federal agents also were criticized for separating parents from their children.

In Postville, ICE spokesman Harold Ort said that the children of anyone detained would be cared for, and that "their caregiver situation will be addressed.

"They were asked multiple times if they have any sole-caregiver issues or any child-care issues," he said.

Forty Agriprocessors workers were later released, with supervision, "on humanitarian grounds," said Dummermuth, the U.S. attorney.

"They assured us the kids were going to be taken care of," said Postville Mayor Robert Penrod.

Penrod said a majority of townspeople understand the plant's role in the Postville economy, while a small number would cheer the raid.

"There's people who hate the Hispanics, and there's people who don't like the Jews and would like to run them out of town," he said.

Tears at St. Bridget's

Frightened townspeople flocked to St. Bridget's Catholic Church.

"The families (there) are utterly engulfed in tears and are very frightened," said Sister Mary McCauley. "One young boy left school and came here because he knew his parents had been taken."

The raid was the talk of the day at the Yeshiva of Northeast Iowa, a Jewish high school attended by about 50 students, many from out of state.

Students said they worried about the health of the meatpacking plant because it supports their school.

Abi Naparstek, 16, a student from Brooklyn, N.Y., said he was optimistic that the plant would remain open. He said people from the area recognize how vital it is to the economy.
"If it did close, it would be bad for everybody - Jews, non-Jews, everybody," he said.

If the plant closed, the students said, most of the Jews would leave town, because they would have no reason to stay.

Near the Agriprocessors plant, Bruce Stockman, owner of Best Place Auto Repair, leaned on his truck and watched the day's events unfold. Stockman said many of his customers work at the plant, and the raid could hurt his business.

Stockman, who worked briefly at the plant, said townspeople have mixed feelings about the immigrants.

"There's good ones, there's bad ones," he said. "You're going to have that anywhere."

Rep. King gets in war of words over Muslims. He is fostering stereotypes.



WASHINGTON – Rep. Steve King said he's just watching out for national security interests.

The first Muslim elected to Congress, Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota, said the Iowa Republican is fostering stereotypes.

At issue is a special immigration visa that is used by religious organizations to bring religious workers into the country.

In August 2005, the government reviewed 220 pending and completed petitions applying for religious work visas. It found that one-third involved fraud, such as phony churches or nonexistent U.S. jobs.

The public report on that review did not break down which religious groups were linked to the incidents of fraud.

But King said people who helped prepare the report told him that 80 percent of those cases were coming from what he called "the mosques." King declined to name his sources.

King is calling for congressional hearings to investigate which religious groups were involved in the fraudulent petitions.

If his information is accurate and one group is responsible for most of the fraud, King said, people from that group should be excluded from the visa program "until they clean up their act."

Ellison said King's comments were irresponsible and could lead to religious stereotyping.

"Saying that some groups are more responsible for fraud than others . . . that's a slur on somebody," Ellison said. "If he's going to make an inflammatory comment like that, he should be prepared to back it up — and he obviously wasn't."

Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif., said U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services told her that the government review "doesn't reveal any indications that any one denomination over any other has any particular problem."

King said that he could not believe that.

"That's nuts," he said. "It violates my sense of credulity, because anybody knows that when you have human beings involved, you're not going to have an equal distribution across a spectrum."

Chris Rhatigan, spokeswoman for the immigration agency, declined to comment on King's assertion.

King said he's not stereotyping anyone.

He and Ellison had a testy exchange at a hearing of a House immigration subcommittee on which they both serve.

King said he was trying to be sensitive about the matter and at first spoke only in generalities about one religious group being responsible for more fraud than others. He said he singled out Muslims only after Ellison asked him repeatedly to specify which group he was talking about.

"If you ask three times and you get the answer, you can't blame the guy that gave you the answer," King said of his pointing to Muslims.

King said that the United States must be vigilant about who is allowed to enter the country, given the threat of terrorism.

If 80 percent of the fraud in religious visas is occurring within one group, then excluding that group from the program would greatly reduce the fraud, he said.

King said the nations of origin of those who committed the fraud concerned him more than did any particular religion. "I've got to get more documentation before I say more," he added.

Ellison said the United States is supposed to be a nation where people are not harassed because of their religion or country of origin.

The Special Immigrant Non-minister Religious Worker visa program was established in 1990 to allow churches, synagogues and mosques to hire qualified foreigners. It's being debated in Congress because the program is set to expire.

The House Judiciary Committee last week approved a bill to reauthorize the program for seven more years.

King pushed unsuccessfully to reauthorize the program for only five years, to put more pressure on immigration officials to fight fraud.

One portion of the bill — which could go to the House floor in the coming weeks — would require federal immigration officials to finalize new rules aimed at addressing the fraud problems.

Those proposed rules include an inspection of sponsoring religious organizations and requiring proof that applicants are qualified for the work they are supposed to be doing.

James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute, said Friday that his group would look into King's statements.

"If he's making claims, then the burden is on him to come forward and establish" those claims, Zogby said.