Mi Casa Is Not Tu Casa

An independent contractor named Russ Smozanek says that a legitimate employer would have to pay worker's compensation, liability insurance, and taxes to cover Social Security and Medicare. In addition, one would need to have paid for a business license and articles of incorporation. This could cost thousands of dollars, he says. Compare that with someone operating under the table, hiring an illegal worker for $7 or $10 an hour.

Robert Mergupis is a 48-year-old metal-stud framer who says he's been out of work for two years because he cannot compete with the low cost of illegal immigrant labor. "If my wife hadn't had a house deeded to her, we'd be homeless. People label me a bum, but I built all those single-family homes in the Bluffs. I'm protecting my life out here. I'm protecting you guys' families."

Mergupis attends a Catholic church. Of the Catholics' support of the day labor center, he says, "I feel they put a dagger in my heart."

One protester says: "I work at a grocery store. The immigrants get free milk — gallons and gallons. A lady has two kids and is pregnant and you see 'em put it in the back of their brand-new truck."

"Tuberculosis was just about cured 70 years ago; now it's coming back," says Jupiter resident Marianne Bonsignor. She explains that the immigration system was better a hundred years ago. "At Ellis Island, immigrants from Italy and Hungary would be shipped back if they had bad eyes. Only a certain quota was allowed." Criminal screening was better there too. "If they had a record back in Italy, they could check that." How? "You could go to any church. They've got it all written down in Latin. You could go see the priest and ask."

Sixty-year-old Leonor Mason chimes in: "My grandsons and their friends come home for summer vacation and there are no jobs for them. At night, you walk in the neighborhood — it's frightening. [The immigrants] urinate by the clock tower! At CVS, my God, they just loiter — it's hurting their business. They're shoplifting. Go in TJ Maxx, Ross — you don't have room to walk anymore."

Joseph Henry Timlin Jr., a master tile setter — "28 years in the trade, baby" — says he went to El Sol to find day work. "I thought I had a good chance." He says he took a number but didn't get hired. Like most of the protesters, he is white. He wishes more African-Americans would join the protesters' cause. If a white woman wanted to try going through the raffle process at El Sol, Timlin says, "Come armed, and bring your boyfriend. Illegal aliens commit a lot of rapes."

Marine Bob gets a kick out of the time he called the cops on a Mexican restaurant that was flying the Mexican flag withoutflying an American one in a position of superior prominence — a violation of U.S. Code, Title 4, Chapter 1, Section 7, Paragraph C, he recites. The cops, he said, made the restaurant fold up its flag.

Almost every time the light turns red and cars back up at the intersection, the protesters get at least one honk of support. Sometimes people chime, "Get 'em out of here!" or "Better days are coming!"

Less frequently, people argue: "Racist! I respect hard-working people better than you!" One passerby shouts out the window: "Oh yeah — you guys were all on the Mayflower! You're all fuckin' idiots."

It's about 11:30 a.m. when four giggling teenagers suddenly jump through the bushes carrying signs that say "I [Heart] Immigrants," "Buck Fush," and "Deport Yourself — You're an Immigrant Too."

"We are brothers!" shouts the only boy, 17-year-old Eric Lankford. He runs through the crowd of protesters and leans toward the windows of passing cars. "The melting pot is boiling over!" he wails, then bursts into laughter. His three female friends giggle and raise their signs high in the air.

This is something the protesters didn't count on: counterprotesters. Teenaged nihilists. Provocateurs who question everything.

"Shut up, you piece of junk, piece of trash," mutters John Barber, in his jean shorts.

"You hate your own family!" cries Lankford, jumping up and down.

"Speak for yourself, idiot," Barber says.

"I think that guy's got a problem," Marianne Bonsignor says worriedly.

"Everyone here is for Satan!" Lankford yells at cars, laughing.

"You're jumping around like a nut," Bonsignor says.

"They're radicals," John Parsons mumbles dismissively, trying not to take the bait.

"Hooray for communism!" Lankford shouts.

"If I had a son like that...," Bonsignor gasps. "He's got a brown sock and a black sock — is that weird or what?"

The protesters leapfrog the counterprotesters to get the more visible spot on the sidewalk. The counterprotesters leapfrog them. And so it goes, until the cops walk over.