A prominent Latina joined the Minuteman Project of volunteer border watchers, a movement that immigrant-rights activists have repeatedly condemned as racist.
She is Lupe Moreno, a self-described Mexican immigrant-smuggler's daughter and first-generation U.S. citizen who has built her Orange County Republican Party political resume on her opposition to illegal immigration.
Moreno, 47, of Santa Ana, took her place alongside a group of Minutemen volunteers to watch the border near Palominas, Ariz., early this month. It was windy, dusty and cold, but she said it was important for her to sit in a lawn chair 10 feet from a hole in the wire border fence, watching for illegal entrants.
"I never got to see one close up," said Moreno, who works as an office specialist for Orange County. "I see more where I work."
Moreno, who favors deporting and withholding government services from undocumented residents, holds views that are at odds with most California Latinos and Inland area residents. Most consider the economy, jobs, gas prices and education to be more important issues than illegal immigration, according to a statewide survey of the Public Policy Institute of California.
"The Latinos have very different attitudes toward undocumented immigrants than other groups in the state," said Mark Baldassare, director of research, in a phone interview. "Generally they are much more sympathetic to the plight and experiences of undocumented immigrants."
To Moreno, illegal immigration is the underlying cause of Californians' economic distress and problems in schools.
"I think people are not paying attention," she said. "We're just being overwhelmed."
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