Immigrants Targeted: Extremist Rhetoric Moves into the Mainstream
Groups:
Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee (ALIPAC) – North Carolina
The platform of the North Carolina-based Americans for Legal Immigration Political Action Committee (ALIPAC), asserts that “more should be done to reduce illegal immigration.” To achieve what is a legitimate and credible policy aim, the group pledges to utilize the work of its members and contributors to support “candidates for office that are serious about immigration reform.” The group also encourages members to take individual action and lobby elected officials. But its most visible representative, ALIPAC president William Gheen, advances this mission by branding undocumented immigrants as murderous criminals infecting Americans with diseases.
At an August 2007 rally in North Carolina, Gheen stated, “Illegal aliens in this country have set up ethnic cleansing zones, ethnic cleansing zones where if you walk past the wrong sign post, the invisible line, you’re under the threat of death.”
In July 2007, Gheen appeared with Ted Hayes, leader of the anti-immigrant organization Choose Black America, on a Fox News segment and demonstrated his bigotry, explaining, “I can’t see how anybody would think that someone who’s here illegally in the country that’s stolen someone’s ID, stolen someone’s American job, should then be able to rape, assault or murder and not be deported.”
Gheen also inflames anti-immigrant sentiment by falsely asserting that foreigners bring disease into the nation. During a June 2007 radio interview, he said, “We've got bedbugs back in all, almost all of our 58 [sic] states. We've got TB on the rise, we've got hepatitis, we've got HIV, we've got diseases like Chagas disease, which is a horrifying disease, but also, much like TB, is very, very difficult to treat at all, and it's coming in because of the, the lack of enforcement of our immigration laws and, and the end result is Americans are suffering, Americans are dying.”
During Gheen’s speech at a June 2007 rally in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, in support of that city’s restrictive ordinance against undocumented immigrants, he said, “I want to talk about crime and disease for a second…They broke the law when they stole your identity, wrecking your life. They broke the law when they took a job they weren’t supposed to have…These people have shown a pattern of disrespect and a pattern of criminal behavior coming from gang-rule areas where there is no law. And that is what our nation is becoming like because it’s common sense that when you inject that into a nation, that is what your nation becomes like.”
He continued, “We got a problem. Well I got some news. According to some rough math I did 20 minutes ago, we’re getting four to ten TB active cases rushing across our southern border every night.”
Gheen also maintains affiliations with the Minutemen. The Minutemen are a loose network of local chapters around the country, whose primary goal is to keep undocumented immigrants from Mexico out of the United States. The more extreme Minutemen chapters advocate patrols of the Mexican-American border by armed volunteers.
In July 2007, Gheen was a guest on Minuteman Radio, hosted by Minuteman Civil Defense Corps leader Chris Simcox. The day before, he spoke at an anti-immigrant conference in Chicago. Fellow speakers included Illinois Minuteman leader and prominent YDSFM member Rosanna Pulido and Ted Hayes.
ALIPAC had a heavy presence at the April 2007 anti-immigrant “Hold Their Feet to the Fire,” a series of anti-immigrant events in Washington, D.C., that brought together several members of Congress, anti-immigration groups, media figures, border vigilante groups, and citizen activists from around the country. Though “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” included several mainstream, legitimate figures who refrain from extreme language in their opposition to immigration, ALIPAC invited Los Angeles Minuteman chapter leader Tony Dolz to become an official participant in Blogger’s Row, a small group of individuals who dedicated three days to “meet with citizen activists, talk radio hosts, and elected officials” and catalogue the events in their online journals.
In April 2005, Gheen was a guest on The Political Cesspool, a Tennessee-based radio show hosted by white supremacist James Edwards that regularly features neo-Nazis and white supremacists as guests.
Featured Video: "William Gheen of ALIPAC in Hazelton, June 3, 2007"
This video, shared on YouTube, presents ALIPAC leader William Gheen’s speech at a June 2007 rally in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, in support of that city’s restrictive ordinance against undocumented immigrants.
Please click on minutes 4:25 – 3:00 for highlights of William Gheen’s speech.
At an August 2007 rally in North Carolina, Gheen stated, “Illegal aliens in this country have set up ethnic cleansing zones, ethnic cleansing zones where if you walk past the wrong sign post, the invisible line, you’re under the threat of death.”
ALIPAC had a heavy presence at the April 2007 anti-immigrant “Hold Their Feet to the Fire,” a series of anti-immigrant events in Washington, D.C., that brought together several members of Congress, anti-immigration groups, media figures, border vigilante groups, and citizen activists from around the country. Though “Hold Their Feet to the Fire” included several mainstream, legitimate figures who refrain from extreme language in their opposition to immigration, ALIPAC invited Los Angeles Minuteman chapter leader Tony Dolz to become an official participant in Blogger’s Row, a small group of individuals who dedicated three days to “meet with citizen activists, talk radio hosts, and elected officials” and catalogue the events in their online journals.
