Illegal immigration emerges as key issue in First District race

Dick Day took an unusual campaign trip this month as a Republican candidate in Minnesota's First Congressional District, which spans the whole of southern Minnesota from Wisconsin to South Dakota.

Day traveled more than 1,600 miles farther south.

The Republican state senator from Owatonna went to the U.S.-Mexican border at the invitation of the activist anti-open border Minutemen Project. He came away convinced that pressing for controls on illegal immigration will be the key to a victory against incumbent Democrat Tim Walz.

Walz acknowledged concerns that immigration might be used as a wedge issue in the race.

Day said his three days along the border in the Arizona desert drove home for him the need to remove incentives for foreigners to enter the United States illegally to punish businesses that employ them and to prevent cities from sheltering them.

Minnesota is home to about 317,000 legal immigrants and an estimated 60,000 illegal immigrants. The first district contains large food processing plants in Owatonna, Austin and Worthington, where recent well-publicized immigration raids have revealed the scope of illegal immigration in the district.

Day said his journey to the border was inspired after he attended a series of town meetings on immigration issues in Austin. About a month afterward, he got a call from the head of the Minuteman Project inviting him to the border. The weekend before Thanksgiving, Day flew to Tucson and drove a rented car to what is known as the Sasabe Corridor in Arizona, a roughly 10-mile-wide stretch of land between the San Luis and Baboquivari mountains.

Accompanied by members of the Minuteman Project and later by federal Border Patrol agents, Day drove and hiked miles back into the desert, where, he said, he encountered thousands of discarded backpacks and hundreds of pairs of shoes strewn along the path known locally as the Amnesty Trail. Illegal immigrants had discarded the clothing and equipment after making it across the border.

"The one thing that hit me is that we could secure the borders if we really wanted to ... This is a little dinky area of Arizona and there are thousands of people walking around," Day said. "It tells you we don't have any border. It's a sieve. But I observed that if the federal government wanted to tighten up the border and shut the border off, we could do it."

While the Minutemen Project has been criticized as a form of vigilantism, Day said members of the group appear to work closely with the Border Patrol. He said he saw no evidence of group members attempting to exercise any enforcement authority.

A leading issue

Day has made immigration an issue in his campaign from the beginning. He is advocating a physical barrier in high population areas and increased surveillance; identifying every foreign national who enters the country; penalizing "sanctuary cities" that harbor illegal immigrants, and creating a temporary worker program to fill jobs not taken by U.S. workers.

Immigration is a leading theme for other announced Republican candidates running to defeat Walz.

Rep. Randy Demmer, R-Hayfield, opposes permitting sanctuary cities and offering public benefits to illegal aliens.

Rochester physician Brian Davis advocates creation of a tamper-proof system to determine whether an immigrant applying for a job is legally in the country.

Lake Crystal-Wellcome Memorial school board member and employee benefits consultant Mark Meyer said he favors a work visa program, a path to legal status for illegal immigrants, and better enforcement of immigration laws.

Walz's view

Walz, too, plans a trip to the southern borders within the month. While he said he believes a physical fence along the border will prove unworkable, Walz advocates a streamlined system for legal immigration that includes requiring illegal immigrants to return home, pay a fine and then get in line for legal immigration. He also advocates a national biometric card used for verification of employment.

"If people are going to come here, we're going to know who they are, they are going to come here legally, they are going to come here with identification that is tamper-proof and we're going to make sure our employers are going to be able to hire the workers they need. But if they hire the workers illegally there are going to be severe consequences for it," Walz said.

The immigration issue already is resonating in many parts of the district. In Worthington in southwestern Minnesota, immigration may top even concerns over health care as a voter priority.

Last December, 400 workers were detained at the city's Swift & Co. pork-processing plant as part of a six-state hunt for illegal workers who allegedly used stolen identities to get hired. The Hispanic population in Worthington is 17 percent and growing. Communities all along the Interstate 90 corridor have become home to large numbers of immigrants.

Worthington law enforcement has encountered people with multiple identity cards, landlords have exploited illegal immigrants who are afraid to complain, and hospitals have found two people using the same identification.

"Something has to be done and if Day's proposal gets it done, so be it," said Worthington Mayor Alan Oberloh, who cautioned that it is too early to endorse any particular candidate or plan.

Mark Brunswick • 651-222-1636