Check out the media bias against the Minutemen in this El Paso Times piece:

Plans by vigilantes to patrol the border for undocumented immigrants in October are expanding to El Paso, Fabens and Fort Hancock, organization officials said.

"Plans by vigilantes..." The editors couldn't keep from injecting commentary past the third word in the story! Anyway...

A group called Texas Minutemen is trying to organize 150 to 200 civilian volunteers into two or three patrol shifts in the Lower Valley this fall.

"We will mainly be sitting around in lounge chairs -- I'm a big lounge-chair person -- and we look through the binoculars, and looky here, if we see people, we call the Border Patrol," said Sandra Beene, an organizer with the group in Dallas.

Sitting around in loung chairs with binoculars. These dangerous vigilantes are obviously trying to pass for a backyard astronomy club.

Texas Minutemen organizers said they hoped locals would volunteer and said they have already gotten positive response from large landowners in the Lower Valley.

But Rogelio Sanchez, former longtime county commissioner in Fabens, said he did not think the Minutemen would "be very welcome in the area."

"I think we should let people who have been trained to protect the border do it," he said.

Note well: no quotes from Minutemen supporters, who are legion throughout the border areas. The one guy the reporter does find to quote is probably the one guy in the whole area who doesn't want the Minutemen around. The reporter probably found him by going through the local chapter of the ACLU.

(thanks to MR)

MORE: The Minutemen are also moving into Houston, which isn't a border city per se but is a major port and hub for illegal immigration activity:

The Minutemen are coming to Houston. ADVERTISEMENT

Leaders of the controversial group dedicated to stopping the flow of illegal immigration said they will patrol the streets of the Bayou City beginning in October, as part of a campaign that will extend north from the Mexican border. Houston volunteers will gather near day labor centers and corners where immigrant workers solicit work, in an effort to draw critical attention to the city's hands-off policy toward illegal immigrants.

"We will be videotaping the (day laborers) and we will be videotaping the contractors who pick them up," said Bill Parmley, a Goliad County landowner who heads the Texas chapter of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps. The Minutemen will only observe to draw attention to the problem and will not attempt to make arrests, he said.

The local officials' attitude is, as usual, priceless:

News of the potential patrols in Houston drew a muted response from Mayor Bill White, who said he did not want to engage in a "pointless public relations battle."

"I'm not in a position to dictate to private organizations other than that they should obey the law," White said.

But others were more outspoken.

"This is a welcoming community, and (the Minutemen) should let the law do its job," said City Councilman Gordon Quan, a longtime advocate for immigrants. "They would be a polarizing influence that would bring out latent prejudice."

"Letting the law do its job" would work if cities such as Houston didn't actively undermine the law through sanctuary policies that forbid the local police from inquiring about anyone immigration's status. That is a policy put in place by the city. Such policies are why the Minutemen are needed--many of our elected officials are scofflaws themselves.

(thanks to gg)