A labor union representing farm workers that for more than a decade begged the Border Patrol to enforce immigration laws is now part of a lawsuit against the Border Patrol for doing just that. The lawsuit, filed by the United Farm Workers (UFW) and five Kern County residents, seeks to stop the Border Patrol from future enforcement actions that stop, arrest, and remove “community members” from the country.
The lawsuit was filed in response to a week-long immigration enforcement operation conducted by Border Patrol agents assigned to the El Centro Sector of the United States Border Patrol in January. The targeted enforcement action, dubbed “Operation Return to Sender,” was based on intelligence received by the agency regarding the presence of specific individuals who were illegally present in the Kern County area and were suspected of being involved in criminal activity, according to the Border Patrol.
In an announcement by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on Wednesday, the civil rights group described the action as “brazen and unlawful raids by federal agents.” The lawsuit, filed against the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and U.S. Border Patrol, asserts the practices employed during the operation violated the U.S. Constitution and federal law in the predominantly “Latine” areas of Kern County and the surrounding region. The term “Latine” was created as a gender-neutral term to refer to people of Latin American descent.
The legal action is in stark contrast to the history of the UFW’s stance on the unauthorized employment of illegal aliens in the farm industry. Cesar Chavez, who famously led the organization during the 1960s and 1970s, viewed illegal immigration as a threat to working conditions and wages for American farm workers. Farm owners often used the mostly Mexican illegal aliens to break strikes carried out by the UFW.
Chavez’s stance on illegal immigration and attempts to force the federal government to enforce immigration laws were noted in the Congressional record in 2018. A 115th Congressional session resolution sought to recognize March 31, the labor union leader’s birthday, as “National Border Control Day.” The measure, House Resolution 791, highlighted Chavez’s actions to control the border and prevent illegal workers from reaching farms in the United States. The resolution never made it out of committee.
The resolution cited testimony before Congress in 1969 in which Chavez told lawmakers, “We gave the Immigration and Naturalization Services and the Border Patrol stacks and stacks of information. They did not pull workers out of struck fields. This is why we are forced to boycott: We have had no enforcement by the Border Patrol.”
As noted in the resolution, Chavez’s actions and stance on immigration remained unchanged during his time as the UFW leader. In the mid-1970s, Chavez organized the UFW’s “Illegals Campaign” to identify and report illegal workers, saying, “If we can get the illegals out of California, we will win the strike overnight.”
Chavez’s efforts to force the hand of the federal government to enforce immigration law continued into 1979, where at a National Press Club speech, he proclaimed, “If my mother was breaking the strike and if she were illegal, I’d ask the same thing.”
At the end of the week-long “Operation Return to Sender,” Border Patrol agents arrested nearly 80 illegal aliens, including several sex offenders and others with criminal records that included drug trafficking and weapons offenses. Although the operation targeted specific individuals, those migrants found to be in illegal status during the search were also arrested as required by current law.
As previously reported by Breitbart Texas, a source within Customs and Border Protection described the action as ” achieving its goals of negatively impacting Transnational Criminal Organizations and sending the message that Border Patrol agents from the border region can move inland and operate away from their home stations in support of enforcing current immigration laws.”
Customs and Border Protection provided a statement on the operation at the time that read, Border Patrol Agents with the El Centro Sector Border Patrol conducted an operation in and around the Bakersfield area in Kern County. Our operation focused on interdicting those who have broken U.S. federal law, trafficking dangerous substances and non-citizen criminals, and disrupting the transportation routes used by Transnational Criminal Organizations. The U.S. Border Patrol is no stranger to operations in places like Bakersfield, Stockton, Modesto, Fresno, and Sacramento, as the now closed Livermore Border Patrol Sector regularly conducted enforcement operations over this area up to the mid-2000s.
Upon the operation’s conclusion, El Centro Chief Patrol Agent Gregory Bovino commented, “The El Centro Sector takes all border threats seriously. Our area of responsibility stretches from the U.S./Mexico Border north, as mission and threat dictate, all the way to the Oregon line.”
Randy Clark is a 32-year veteran of the United States Border Patrol. Prior to his retirement, he served as the Division Chief for Law Enforcement Operations, directing operations for nine Border Patrol Stations within the Del Rio, Texas, Sector. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @RandyClarkBBTX.
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