Ruthie Hendrycks and Ernesto Bustos each made the long drive to Postville, Iowa, Sunday because of their passionate interest in the immigration controversy.

Despite the 350-mile round-trip, however, they didn’t share a ride.

Hendrycks, of rural Hanska, is the founder and president of an organization that adamantly opposes illegal immigration and isn’t predisposed to large numbers of legal immigrants either.

Bustos, a former Minnesota State University student and community organizer in Owatonna, believes current immigrants — legal and illegal — are an integral part of the American economy and are just the latest chapter in a centuries-old story of American immigration going back to Plymouth Rock.

Both were drawn to Postville for a rally organized by Jewish and Catholic leaders to express support for immigration reform and fair labor practices for existing immigrants. The small Iowa town was the site of the massive raid in May by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, who arrested nearly 400 workers at a meatpacking plant.

Bustos, who works for Centro Campesino, was there in support of the rally, offering workshops on immigration history in an attempt to connect Americans to the immigrant roots of their ancestors. He said more than 800 people demonstrated their support for the children, relatives and friends of the arrested workers.

“There is a strong message of community and unity sent to the families,” he said. “For them to see so many people, so many other families, it was a very strong message for them.”

Hendrycks and others from Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform were staging a counter protest, letting the assembled media see the other side of the story — that many Americans are fed up with immigration policies. Estimates of the number of counter protesters ranged from 50 to 150.

“We got our word out,” Hendrycks said. “We will not be silenced.”

They needed a leader

Even as immigration seems to have faded this year as a campaign issue, the strong feelings felt by many were in evidence at the event. And intense attitudes remain in south-central Minnesota as longtime residents see immigration changing the face of the region.

Hendrycks seems an unlikely ringleader of people opposing illegal immigration. A dental hygienist living in rural Hanska, she said she’d been concerned about illegal immigrants (she prefers “illegal aliens”) for some time before deciding to get active three years ago.

“Instead of being one of those who continues to complain and be vocal and do nothing, I got involved,” Hendrycks said. “We found out there were so many people who had the same idea but had no idea how to express their opinion. They needed a leader.”

So she formed Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform. There were 10 people at the first meeting, 50 at the second, she said. Now it’s a statewide organization with some members from other states. Hendrycks said there are more than 350 members.

The group took a bus to Postville, meeting in Owatonna and picking up others along the way. The group’s goal is to “educate, activate and motivate people to get involved,” she said.

But she and her followers are perfectly willing to mix it up with pro-immigrant groups, and there was some yelling across Postville’s main street Sunday. While Hendrycks said she insists that members of her organization behave, she tells of repeatedly hearing “KKK” and “racist” shouted at her at previous rallies.

“If you have 20 Hispanics standing there yelling ‘KKK’ and I scream, ‘Go back to Mexico,’ guess who’s the ‘racist’?” she said.

Unity with the people

Bustos came to Minnesota from Mexico several years ago. He said his family has followed the immigration rules to the extent that one sister has been waiting in Mexico for her visa for 14 years.

He attended MSU and has been working for Centro Campesino, an organization promoting the rights of migrant farmworkers and rural Latinos in southern Minnesota, for nearly five years.

Bustos’ goal, in part, is to make people see immigrants in a way that goes beyond stereotypes and preconceptions. He wants southern Minnesotans to understand the challenges facing new immigrants as they adapt to a new culture, a new language and a new economy.

“It’s not about people anymore,” he said of opponents of immigration. “It’s just about criminals, it’s about other things. They’re missing the other side, the human faces — that it’s people that are suffering.”

As for rallies like Sunday’s, Bustos said immigrant-rights groups have mixed feelings about their usefulness.

“That’s a debate we have before we go out and take to the streets,” he said. “I think there’s two things that can be gained. One is the awareness you create, especially when television and the media cover it.

“The other is to give a sense of empowerment and encouragement and unity with the people who are affected.”



Minnesotans Seeking Immigration Reform and other similar groups from a handful of Midwestern states knew they’d be outnumbered Sunday, but Hendrycks said it’s important to get the message out that many Americans want illegal immigrants gone.

“The bottom line is there’s a lot of angry Americans, and I’m one of them, because our government is not looking out for their best interests,” she said. “Unfortunately, the no-action by our government is just adding to the frustration and animosity.”

Hendrycks said her organization believes the nation’s borders need to be tightly sealed, that protections and benefits must be eliminated for illegal immigrants, and that employers have to be punished if they hire illegals.

“You take away the perks and the jobs, and they will go back to their own countries,” she said.

Hendrycks seems to have particular disdain for “bleeding heart” media stories that portray immigrants as hard-working people attempting to attain the American dream, stories that show people working the harshest jobs for low pay and then seeing their lives ripped apart by immigration raids.

She talks, instead, about a contractor who’s struggling to keep his business alive because he keeps losing jobs to competitors he believes are paying low wages to crews of illegal workers.

She talks of victims of criminal acts by illegals, including one family that lost its mother to an illegal immigrant drunken driver.

Hendrycks blames illegals for the rising unemployment rate and even for higher gas prices, saying there would be millions fewer drivers if illegal immigrants were kept out. And she sees them as a drain on government budgets because their low wages qualify them for numerous assistance programs.

From the Mayflower

Bustos insists the issue is more complex than that and talks about the nation’s long history as a destination for immigrants.

“From the moment the Mayflower arrived, that’s the history of immigration in this country,” he said.

Immigration by Latinos really picked up during World War II when they were needed to do agricultural work after workers in those jobs moved into arms factories, Bustos said. They continue to come in search of better jobs and a better life, as did European immigrants of previous generations.

Criticisms involving crime, failure to fit in to American culture and the impact on job opportunities for citizens are similar to what the European immigrants faced, Bustos said.

“We could have asked the same questions 200 years ago,” he said. “Nothing has changed but the color of the faces and the language they’re speaking. It’s been the same for hundreds of years.”

Bustos doubts many Americans want to do the meatpacking and agricultural jobs being filled by Hispanic workers. And everyone benefits from the lower food prices that come with low-paid food-processing workers.

“It’s very convenient to our lifestyle to have cheap food products,” he said. “... There’s a very large benefit on a whole for the country to have a ghost work force.”

Most immigrants have taxes deducted from their paychecks, just like any other worker, he said. And noncitizens have Social Security deductions as well, even though they won’t qualify for Social Security payments in their retirement.

As for crime, he says some immigrants behave badly just like segments of every group. This time, it’s Bustos who complains about the media.

“When it’s a person of color, you seem to hear the story 10 times more often than if it wasn’t a person of color,” he said.

The legal way

Hendrycks has counter arguments for most of the points Bustos makes, disputing that immigrants bring substantially lower food prices or that Americans wouldn’t work the jobs now being done by immigrants.

But she said the main issue for her organization is that too many immigrants have entered the country illegally.

“I don’t care what color your skin is, I don’t care what country you came from,” she said. “If you came here illegally, you have broken our laws.”

More than 3 million people are waiting legally for their chance to immigrate to America, and it’s wrong for others to jump ahead of them, she said.

Bustos, though, said rules for legal immigration are broken.

“The problem is there really isn’t a legal way,” he said. “The legal way is obsolete and so complicated and difficult.”

Hendrycks concedes she wouldn’t support opening up the nation to large-scale legal immigration, even if the illegal immigrants were successfully forced to leave the nation. Bringing in too many people from another culture causes “separation and segregation” because the new immigrants do not assimilate into the American culture.

“The diversity this government and administration is now pushing is going to destroy this country,” Hendrycks said.

She supports allowing additional immigrants only on a set of preconditions.

“If you want to come and share in the American Dream, then you must abide by our laws, our language and our culture, and fly the American flag only. ... There is no give and take on that.”

Honest conversation

Bustos and Hendrycks haven’t met, but Bustos said he’d be willing to discuss her concerns — in English — anytime she wants. But he’d also like to talk to her about the human side of the immigration issue.

“A lot of people who are on the opposite side don’t see those faces, don’t have that contact, don’t hear the other side,” he said. “I’m more than willing to talk to her, or anyone really. ... There needs to be an honest conversation about what immigration does in this country, both positive and negative, so we can find a path to reform.”

There was a chance for about seven hours of conversation on the rural highways of southern Minnesota and Iowa Sunday, but Bustos and Hendrycks left Owatonna in separate vehicles. The bus Hendrycks caught was for immigration opponents heading to Postville, and she said the members would be adamant that any strangers getting on the bus — including any reporters — first pledge they are committed to the cause before being allowed to board.