The Bloody History of Border Militias Runs Deep — and Law Enforcement Is Part of It

Ryan Devereaux April 23, 2019 The Intercept ...the very creation of the border, and the genesis of American border policing, is rooted in a deep and bloody tradition of vigilantism. A member of the civilian border militia group the United Constitutional Patriots stands near the border in Sunland Park, N.M., Ryan Christopher Jones for The New York Times Last week, American vigilantes captured hundreds of migrants — including women and small children — along a darkened stretch of the border in New Mexico. The group, calling itself the United Constitutional Patriots, or UCP, uploaded video of its score to Facebook. Illuminated by the fluorescent glow of flashlights, the shaky footage showed weary mothers, fathers, and toddlers kneeling in the dirt, heads bowed, as the armed men circled around them. The migrants’ captors summoned the Border Patrol. The agents, once they arrived, offered no sign of concern at the masked men carrying AR-15s decorated with Punisher skulls. For others, however, the footage shot in Sunland Park was a chilling reflection of America in 2019. “We cannot allow racist and armed vigilantes to kidnap and detain people seeking asylum,” American Civil Liberties Union attorneys María Martínez Sánchez and Kristen Greer Love said in a letter. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham called the vigilante operations “unacceptable” and Democratic Sens. Tom Udall and Martin Heinrich said the UCP’s operations “cannot be tolerated.” Customs and Border Protection, the agency that oversees the Border Patrol, provided The Intercept and several other news organizations with the same statement when asked about the militia’s operations: U.S. Customs and Border Protection does not endorse private groups or organizations taking enforcement matters into their own hands. Interference by civilians in law enforcement matters could have public safety and legal consequences for all parties involved. Border Security operations are complex and require highly trained professionals with adequate resources to protect the country. Border Patrol welcomes assistance from the community and encourages anyone who witnesses or suspects illegal activity to call 911, or the U.S. Border Patrol tip line.

When Americans Lynched Mexicans and Mexican Americans

When Americans Lynched Mexicans

By WILLIAM D. CARRIGAN and CLIVE WEBB • FEB. 20, 2015

Photo Credit Rachel Levit

THE recent release of a landmark report on the history of lynching in the United States is a welcome contribution to the struggle over American collective memory. Few groups have suffered more systematic mistreatment, abuse and murder than African-Americans, the focus of the report.

One dimension of mob violence that is often overlooked, however, is that lynchers targeted many other racial and ethnic minorities in the United States, including Native Americans, Italians, Chinese and, especially, Mexicans.
Americans are largely unaware that Mexicans were frequently the targets of lynch mobs, from the mid-19th century until well into the 20th century, second only to African-Americans in the scale and scope of the crimes. One case, largely overlooked or ignored by American journalists but not by the Mexican government, was that of seven Mexican shepherds hanged by white vigilantes near Corpus Christi, Tex., in late November 1873. The mob was probably trying to intimidate the shepherds’ employer into selling his land. None of the killers were arrested.
From 1848 to 1928, mobs murdered thousands of Mexicans, though surviving records allowed us to clearly document only about 547 cases. These lynchings occurred not only in the southwestern states of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas, but also in states far from the border, like Nebraska and Wyoming.