[#] “There’s no reason to be scared.”
Cyclist for Social Change, “The Undocumented”. Three Points, Arizona, April 2006.
[Day Twenty-Nine] On the last day of their April campaign, the Minutemen pull a quarter mile off their “Alpha Line”, Elkhorn Ranch Road, into the desert. Legal observers arrive as a group of migrants approaches two Minutemen and their vehicles. “We were trying to get to Arizona,” they tell legal observers, “but we got lost. Is the highway close to here?” The 86 is fifteen miles away.
“You have the right to keep walking,” Ray says, “but they’ve already called the Border Patrol…” One woman weeps. Two men stare into the dirt, not saying a word. “Here’s more food and water,” Ray says. “There’s no reason to be scared.”
“Why did you call them?” one of the migrants asks a Minuteman, perched on top of his SUV.
“Because it’s our job.”
A mother carries her infant child swathed on her back. The baby starts crying, perhaps dehydrated, and certainly agitated upon the arrival of a Border Patrol helicopter. Repeatedly, the Minuteman directs Ray to "impress upon the mother" that, for the sake of the child, she should not cross the desert again.
“How’s this baby going to make it?” ask the Minuteman.
“I imagine the way they make it every day,” Ray says. “Why did you come to the United States?” he asks the group.
“For work.”
“Out of necessity.”
“To move forward.”
“Oh, I sympathize,” says the Minuteman. “You can tell I speak a little bit of Spanish. I didn’t get it from sitting around on my butt. I worked with Hispanics all my life. Toda mi vida. I’m just concerned that a terrorist might cross the border.”
Ray shakes his head. “Does this baby look like a terrorist to you?”
On their final evening shift, the Minutemen set up their Bravo Line out on King's Anvil Ranch, and another seven cars take off for their Charlie Line, Coleman Road. When they set up at their usual position, three cars leave for a second location—“Charlie Two”. Legal observers follow them until the lead cars turn down a narrow wash. Pineapple Six and Scorpion, two of the Minutemen leaders, are in the third car. They stop in the middle of the road and prop the truck’s hood. “Oh dear,” giggles Pineapple Six. “I don't know how to fix this. I'm not a mechanic.” He circumambulates his vehicle. “Oh dear.”
After several minutes, the lead cars return empty of their passengers, and Pineapple Six’s vehicle starts once again. The Minutemen leave, and we continue along the backroads just north of King’s land. One legal observer hears the squawk of a walkie-talkie off in the distance. He exits the car and mounts the hood of the vehicle, as though a tracker in the bush. He spots footprints. We ditch our vehicle and follow them under a barb-wire fence. We’ve just crossed a line, and we know it.
We hear a walkie-talkie at full volume and return to the north side of the line. We scamper up the adjacent mountains for a better vantage point, and we sight four Minutemen in full camouflage. We hear on their radios that they’ve detained four migrants. We watch them until nightfall, but the foothills block much of our view. We can’t see any migrants. We can’t do anything.
A sheriff’s deputy waves us down from the mountain and tells us that we’re trespassing. We have to leave immediately, he says. We know that we’re on the right side of the line, but Ray arrives and tells us to go home. For a month, we hadn’t stepped foot on King’s property, but now…
“Go home,” Ray says. “Go home.”
A Border Patrol vehicle entered the area but left soon thereafter, Ray tells us later, unable to find either Minutemen or migrants.
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