washingtonpost.com Protests Hit Illegal Immigration Summit

By ADAM GOLDMAN
The Associated Press
Sunday, May 29, 2005; 9:38 PM

LAS VEGAS -- Protesters on Sunday gathered outside a meeting where members of a controversial civilian group that has been monitoring the Mexican border gathered with other activists seeking to curb illegal immigration.

More than 150 demonstrators used placards and bullhorns and waved Mexican flags to get their message out: "Racists, go home!" they screamed.

Hundreds of people had gathered for the two-day summit titled "Unite to Fight Against Illegal Immigration" at a Las Vegas convention center.

Miguel Barrientos, president of the Las Vegas Mexican-American Political Association, said people sopping up the rhetoric of Minuteman Project founder Jim Gilchrist were not protecting the country _ they were harming it.

"They're creating division among Americans," he said. "We don't need it."

Nearly 900 Minuteman volunteers, some of them armed, patrolled the Arizona border in April.

Organizers said volunteers' calls to the Border Patrol resulted in the arrests of 335 illegal immigrants. Critics of the program, including Border Patrol officials, have said the group was little more than a nuisance.

In a 45-minute speech Sunday, Gilchrist said a declaration of war is committed every time a Mexican flag is planted on American soil.

"If this isn't a declaration of war, I don't know what is," Gilchrist said.

There were no immediate reports of violence. A protest against Gilchrist in California turned violent when demonstrators hurled rocks and unopened soda cans at police and people attending his speech.

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