Comments on: Wal Mart Raids Seem Not To Be Rumors

By: ana

ana — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 19:09:11 +0000

TO:Siqueiros
How can there be witnesses if most of them were deported? and those that weren’t are afraid to come foward. I am not as skeptical as most about these raids since other such human righst crime have happen in a not so distant past. The only difference being that it happened to other cultural groups such as the japanese in the wwII. Not many will come forward for fear of future turbulation, we are talking about a global chain of stores who would want to go against that? Fear is a powerful remedy to voice that want to speak, i would just hope that those that did incounter such a horrible crime to come forth and speak and know that they are not alone.

By: adrian

adrian — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 13:11:10 +0000

Hello I just want to add that ice has also started with this raids at walmart in Austin, San Marcos and Seguin Texas, we are asking everyone to be very careful when shopping at those locations, ice agebts tend to be very aggressive and racist. They will insult you and treat you like criminals. Also a very important note, ice has also started going inside the HEB stores with their permission. These people are working undercover so you will not recognize them. Please stay away from this places.

By: ANA FLORES

ANA FLORES — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 22:32:53 +0000

Hi my name is Gabbie I was brough here as a child and I’m now 25 and I’m so scared, this is horrible!! I wish people would understand that we young adults are just trying to give our families a better life and is so unfair that we are being chased down as animals it is so painful to live in fear all the time… we need this reform

By: Kathy Gilly

Kathy Gilly — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 00:06:46 +0000

Hello, My name is Kathy and I was in a WalMart in Palm Bach County, to be specific on Belvedere Road and Military and there was a raid from ice, in WalMart, I heard that ICE did have prior permission from WalMart to enter the stores and do a Lock down, which they did, this was at 3pm a on Wednesday 03/10/2010, and this was not aimed at workers but to shoppers. I was placed in a Van, were I was told by a immigration official that we f…. came here to get the jobs that belongs to the Americans. She also threaten to take my kids to Child Services, if my work permit came back false. WALMART AND IMMIGRATION ARE WORKING TOGETHER TO GET RID OF THE ILLEGAL ALIENS, I WAS THERE THIS IS NO RUMOR!!!!! SHOP AT YOUR OWN RISK AT WALMART, THERE HAVE BEEN FOUR ICE RAIDS ARE TAKING PLACE IN Several PALM BEACH COUNTY WalMart’s

By: Le

Le — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 12:16:59 +0000

I have been informed by a family member that works at a local Austin TX Walmart, that ICE will be at the store 3/21, they were not informed for what reason, just my 2 cents, I hope some kind of reforms is passed soon. this great country of all for all was built by all for all
something needs to change for the better, we immigrants contribute billion and billions of dollars to this country, if this turns out just to be a rumor the economic impact will be felt, not just by walmart but by all those companies that sell to Walmart. we wait and see…..

By: Hector A. Chavana, Jr. (Tlacaelel)

Hector A. Chavana, Jr. (Tlacaelel) — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 14:32:12 +0000

I would love to be able to interview them. Many organizers do not believe that this actually occured since no eye-witnesses have come forward. I finally spoke to an eye-witness here in Houston, but they refused to go on the record.

By: Teresa

Teresa — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 05:06:50 +0000

I live in La Habra, Ca. I work as a waitress and although La Habra is a latino community, Pico Rivera is even more; one of my coworkers saw the raids conducted at the walmart. My neighbor confirmed also that in Anaheim there were also vans with people inside. Its so unfair because Walmart should appreciate us more, we are their costumers, they should ask us for papers at the check out when we give them our hard earned money. Shame on walmart for allowing this.

By: nancy

nancy — Sat, 13 Mar 2010 04:38:48 +0000

my friend told me that she heard there was a raid in the mt vernon walmart in washington state. they said it was on the spanish news, Primer Impacto, but i have not seen anything on there. I am checking local news stations but havent found anything yet.

By: Siqueiros

Siqueiros — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 21:04:34 +0000

Compañer@s,
I work as the Communications Coordinator for the San Diego Immigrant Rights Consortium, which is a San Diego based coalition of legal, labor, faith-based and community based organizations. The consortium includes the ACLU, AFSC and many community based human rights organizations.

I also run the website which has been accessed 4138 times this past week due to people trying to find some truth to the Walmart Raids Rumors. People have accessed the site from 27 states across the country, including California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado and New York.

Working with all these organizations and having so many thousands of people access the site, we have not received one single testimony from an eye-witness that saw raids were taking place anywhere in the country. We normally get calls and emails from people who visit the site and have questions and all of these organizations are well known in the communities. This does not mean that ICE is not visiting certain stores to do I-9 verifications or for other reasons. They have visited stores in the past and will continue to do so. But there is no evidence that raids have taken place as of yet.

And we mention only what we know. We are not trying to speak for or defend Walmart. What we want to do is prevent the deepening of the fear that already exists in our communities. It was fear of the raids that broke the back of the marches in 2006 and we must do what we can to prevent that from happening again, especially now since immigration reform is on the agenda again.

Finally, the source of the rumors have been confirmed. A human rights group in Georgia, known as the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human rights, wanted to put pressure on Walmart to take a stance in favor of comprehensive immigration reform, INVENTED the rumor about the raids to discourage people from shopping there. They admitted to this in a report done by Univision. We suspected it had something to do with them since they have been the only group calling for a boycott of Walmart stores.

If there are cases of raids taking place, we have to hear from the eye-witnesses. Documentations must be taken of their testimony, and having someone else report or speak for another person is only hearsay and does not serve as a credible source. Human rights groups are trained in taking documentation and eye witnesses should speak to a human rights observer, or a lawyer. If there are cases, please have them documented and we can connect them with lawyers in order to be able to take some legal action.

Please check out the articles we have posted on our website to see the coverage we have about the rumor, and let’s look for real ways to mobilize the community for their freedom and rights.

http://www.immigrantsandiego.org

R.F.

By: moises

moises — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:15:56 +0000

my sister works at a wendys right in front of a walmart store in haltom city tx (FORT WORTH) and she said she saw an immigration van there today but there was nobody in it