Panama City Florida's Illegla Immigrant Round Up Plan

Panama City Florida Sheriff Frank McKeithen is a genius and my new hero. His plan for rounding up illegal immigrants inovlves going where many of them work:

The sheriff's department has developed a remarkably effective — and controversial — way of catching illegal immigrants: Deputies in patrol cars pull up to a construction site in force, and watch and see who runs.

Those who take off are chased down and arrested on charges such as trespassing, for cutting through someone else's property, or loitering, for hiding out in someone's yard, or reckless driving, for speeding off in a car.

U.S. immigration authorities are then given the names of those believed to be in this country illegally.

"It's not wrong for them to run, but it's not wrong for us to chase them either," said Sheriff Frank McKeithen, who created his Illegal Alien Task Force in April to target construction sites in this Florida Panhandle county.

The usual suspects are up in arms over the matter. The Mexican American Legal Defense fund says McKeithen's tatics amount to intimidation. The builders that are hiring the illegal immigrants say the illegals are their best (read cheapest) labor and without them nothing is going to be built. However, McKeithen has the law on his side, it is illegal in Florida to hire illegal immigrants (of course it is illegal in the rest of the country as well).

The ACLU, not surprisingly, is also upset and calls McKeithen's tactics constitutionally suspect.

Benjamin Stevenson, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union in Florida, said he finds the tactic troubling.

"Why are they sending out six or seven agents to investigate a paper crime, and are they causing them to run in the first place through intimidation?" he asked.

snip

McKeithen has asked Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum for a legal opinion on his tactics. A spokeswoman for McCollum said the office is researching the request.

What will the ACLU do if the Attorney General comes back and says, yep this is okay? You guessed it, they will sue.

In the meantime, McKeithen's methods are making in-roads--the illegal immigrants are leaving.

Mexican illegal immigrant Jose Madrid, 28, said he has been unable to find a construction job over the past six weeks because of the crackdown, and hasn't been able to send money to his parents and his 7-year-old son back home.

"We immigrants, we are leaving Panama City. People are afraid they will be deported," he said. "The companies don't want to hire illegal people. Now they're only hiring those with papers."

Of course, that is what employers are supposed to be doing.