Citizens target businesses using illegal alien workers

Ted Carter:

A backlash against Lowcountry businesses that hire illegal immigrants may soon involve the grassroots organization whose members have been patrolling a 23-mile stretch of the Mexico-Arizona border to report illegal crossings.

A coalition of citizen groups met in Greenville over the Memorial Day weekend to discuss how they can help the federal government staunch the flow of illegal aliens into South Carolina. Mostly, they focused on ways to identify and seek prosecution of the businesses that hire undocumented workers, said Ebba Gamer, president of Citizens for a Better Community, a group formed to put a spotlight on illegal workers on Hilton Head Island and in Bluffton.

The exact approach the coalition effort will take has not been decided, said Gamer, a retiree who transplanted to Hilton Head from California. For the time being, she said, her group is fanning out across southern Beaufort County to gather automobile tag numbers of business-owned vehicles they suspect are occupied by illegal workers. They are also scouring business licenses and gathering other information on companies they think are violating federal illegal immigration laws. Many of the violators are roofing, painting, construction and landscaping outfits, Gamer noted.

"We're doing surveillance," she said, "I have eyes and ears out there. I have a list like you wouldn't believe."

She said a pair of immigration lawyers in the group is providing advice on the legality of tactics and the value of information gathered.

Good legal advice is critical to the success of the effort, said Jim Gilchrist, a retired Southern California CPA who founded the "Minuteman Project" seven months ago. It's important to have a lawyer "to make sure the data is legally acquired," Gilchrist said.

Since the Oct. 1 launch of the Minuteman Project, "this thing exploded," Gilchrist said.

He said he's had a few e-mails and phone conversations with Citizens for a Better Community and other anti-illegal immigration organizations in the Palmetto State. Getting groups such as Gamer's to join the Minuteman Project as information gatherers and advocates for stepped-up law enforcement is a natural extension of the campaign whose roots are into desert between the border Mexico and Arizona, Gilchrist said.

"Now we've got to move into supporting the Bureau of Immigration and Customs' enforcement," he said, noting the assistance will be mainly in the form of serving as informants.

The goal, he said, is to help "bring the country under the rule of law."

Gilchrist blames the multi-national corporations for much of the nation's illegal immigration problem but emphasizes he is equally eager to go after any businesses that put undocumented workers on their payrolls. "If you want to stay out of my way, you want to make sure all of your workers are legal and that you're paying workman's compensation."

He said that while the federal government has been lax on illegal immigration to the point of putting the nation's sovereignty at risk, there is one department of the government that won't need much coaxing to accept the assistance of the Minuteman volunteers: the Internal Revenue Service.

"The IRS is deadly" and more than happy to pay a bounty for help catching businesses that hire illegal workers as a way to avoid paying taxes.

As an example, Gilchrist noted that $10,000 would go to someone who helps the IRS nab a construction contractor who has escaped paying $100,000 in taxes. The liens, fines and property seizures won't go unnoticed, he said. "They'll say, 'Boy, I better not continue what I was doing.'"

Let's hope that this makes a few employers think twice before hiring cheap illegal labor.