Employers fueling illegal immigration

SASABE, Mexico – Somewhere north of this Mexican cattle outpost, U.S. National Guard troops man 24-hour observation posts and better-equipped U.S. Border Patrol agents roam the desert, searching for illegal immigrants.

Yet even as the Bush administration points to a drop in apprehensions at the border as proof that the new security measures are working, thousands of Mexicans and Central Americans still gather daily in border towns like this, willing to risk anything for a slot in the U.S. labor market.

“There’s a lot of migra now, mucha migra, but I must keep trying,” said Felipe Perez, 30, using the name migrants collectively call the border forces.

Perez wiped away rivulets of sweat as he shouldered his backpack for a second attempt in 48 hours to climb over the wire cattle fence dividing this section of Mexico’s Sonora state from Arizona. Once over, he planned to walk toward Phoenix, through the kind of 100-plus-degree heat that killed 267 migrants in Arizona alone last year.

But Perez’s determination is no blind desperation – like most others making the trek, he not only knows he’ll find work in the United States, he knows exactly what he will be doing, for whom and where.

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Employers fueling illegal immigration
Journal Gazette