Anti-Illegal Immigration Group’s New Sign Elicits Protests

An Orange County coalition opposed to illegal immigration has resurrected a billboard that declared California “the illegal immigration state” and that earlier this year caused a major confrontation between coalition members and Latinos on the Arizona-California border near Blythe.

The latest sign is 10 by 40 feet long and faces motorists traveling from Arizona into the state along Interstate 10 near Blythe. The $6,000 sign was constructed on private land the coalition is leasing from a rancher, said Barbara Coe, chairwoman of the California Coalition for Immigration Reform.

The billboard, about a mile from the site of the original, reads: “Welcome to California, the illegal immigration state. Don’t let this happen to your state,” and includes a toll-free telephone number.

“We still need to send a warning to other states,” Coe said. “With greater illegal immigration, the message is even more critical now.”

When the sign was originally put up in May, it prompted criticism from numerous Latino community groups and leaders, including Mario Obledo, former state secretary of health and welfare, who promised to tear it down.

But before Obledo and others could act, the billboard was removed by an advertising company after its other clients received threats of economic boycotts.

Marcos Contreras, state president of the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), a Latino civil rights group, said the sign “demeans the image of the Latino citizen and won’t be tolerated.”

“We are quite disappointed that these people have not gotten the message,” Contreras said. “We will not tolerate this affront.”

Contreras said he plans to discuss the billboard at a LULAC board of directors meeting Saturday in Santa Ana.

In Blythe, some Latino residents said they were disappointed and frustrated after a local newspaper ran a story on the coalition’s attempt to put up the new sign.

“I think it’s a disgrace that anyone would be so adamant about putting something up that they know is so offensive to so many people,” said Sally Rivera, dean of student services at Palo Verde Community College in Blythe.

“It’s suggesting that we condone something illegal, which we don’t, and suggesting that we’re all illegal over here, which we’re not,” Rivera added. “It’s an attack on all Latinos in the state.”

Coe said pressure from residents made it difficult for her group to find a contractor; but one did eventually construct the sign “under cover of darkness” over the weekend.

She said several contractors had been threatened with violence.

Coe, whose coalition co-sponsored Proposition 187, the 1994 ballot measure that bars illegal immigrants from attending public schools and receiving social services and health care, said she would notify law enforcement if anyone threatened to take the sign down.

“It is a symbol of our freedom of speech and we will not allow terrorists to threaten that freedom by tearing the sign down,” she said.