Move Against Illegals at Track Opposed

Hector Gonzalez and two other Mexicans share a stall on the “backside” at Del Mar Race Track--a hot cinder-block cubicle with no running water, three lumpy beds and a tired, tiger-patterned blanket hanging limply over the window.

Across the way, the thoroughbreds they groom enjoy single rooms--spacious stable space with thick beds of clean straw, cool air circulating down the shady corridors, and their names engraved on brass plates on halters hanging outside.

On Monday, Gonzalez retained his sense of humor about the human condition at Del Mar, while illegal aliens continued to slip away to avoid a threatened Border Patrol raid. Gonzalez cracked to a visitor, “If everyone leaves, there will be only two to a room.”

But few people, including Gonzalez, had anything nice to say about the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), which is threatening to crack down on the 1,500 illegal aliens it estimates are working as grooms and hotwalkers, the most menial jobs at the track.

Owners and trainers insisted Monday that they couldn’t survive without illegal help, since U. S. citizens won’t or can’t do the work. They said some trainers had already begun shipping horses out, and the state would lose millions of dollars if racing stopped.

Legal Mexican and U. S. workers argued that the crackdown against Mexicans is unfair because the backside houses illegal European workers who escape the Border Patrol’s eye. They said Mexicans should have some rights. After all, some said, California once was theirs.

Finally, illegal Mexicans said the crackdown is futile because, if deported, they would simply come back. Unable to make a living and support their families in Mexico, they said they take the only reasonable course, returning across the border to work at Del Mar and other tracks.

“To be very truthful, we’d just appreciate it if they’d leave us in peace,” said Henrique Mena, a trainer who is in the United States legally. Mena said he could not understand why the United States invites in Vietnamese and Cubans but throws out its neighbors. “People get hungry. They’ve got blood in their veins.”

Monday evening, lawyers representing the 200 trainers at the track, hoping to stave off a raid and avoid disrupting the racing schedule, blamed their dilemma on the California Horse Racing Board for licensing illegal aliens to work at state tracks.

At a press conference at the track, they said the Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Assn. is asking Gov. George Deukmejian to consider making the board check all applicants’ right to work in the United States before issuing licenses.

The trainers’ group also promised to make new efforts to hire U. S. citizens and get temporary visas for undocumented workers. In the meantime, they asked that the INS give them time.

However, backside workers doubted there would be a permanent solution.

“They don’t care for us. They only care when they need us,” said Juan Partida, a groom who has worked at race tracks for 17 years. “Right now, the trainers need us, so they’re trying to do something . . . but after this goes down, it’s going to be the same thing.”

On the backside at Del Mar Monday, where the horses and workers reside, workers described the life as hard--up at 4 a.m. to clean and exercise horses; seven-day weeks with few days off; months and years away from families, often living in cluttered tack rooms, and, some said, salaries that don’t meet the minimum wage.

They said the backside is a world unto itself, a place where there are always a couple of bootleggers, great Mexican food, and even a few families holed up against the rules. At night, men bring out their guitars. There are barbecues, parties and lots of drinking.

Many said they wouldn’t consider working with humans.

“Horses are individuals, just as much as people are individuals, with a complex personality,” said Dave Freston, a 23-year-old groom and trainer. “But a person can tell you when he’s upset or hurt or doesn’t want to work. With a horse, you have to figure it out.”

“When you put up with the public, boy, you’re roughing it,” said Warren Laidley, a track blacksmith since 1959. Laidley compared the work favorably against work in the athletic-shoe store run by his wife.

The INS first warned the track of an impending crackdown last week, after Border Patrol agents say they received information that Del Mar had the largest concentration of illegal aliens working in San Diego County.

They arrested some 32 undocumented workers at the track last week. Then the INS began negotiating with the trainers and track managers to find a way of clearing out illegal aliens without disrupting the racing schedule.

Michael Williams, a Border Patrol agent on the case, said the INS warned the trainers two years ago to stop hiring illegal aliens or begin applying for the documentation they need to work legally.

Several trainers said they applied on behalf of some workers and were unable to get approval. But Williams said trainers never bothered--a view shared by a number of backside workers.

“They’ve been warned for three years,” said one groom. “The trainers have made a mistake in not getting the Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Assn. to deal with it.”

Monday night, the trainers blamed the California Horse Racing Board for the illegal-alien situation, saying that once the board had licensed a worker, the trainers assumed the person was legal.

But Ed Stetson of the racing board said the board asks only for green cards or Social Security cards--and illegal workers said they could easily buy $20 fakes. Stetson said the board cannot legally ask to see a man’s birth certificate.

Anthony Bennett, a trainer from New Orleans who has one employee, was one of the few people Monday who seemed to support the INS position.

“There’s a law here that’s involved. You either have a law or you change it,” he said. As for the working conditions for Mexicans at the track, Bennett said, “I don’t think it’s right. It stinks. Besides, they owned California in the first place.”