What Daniel Beck Told the Minutemen at MCC – Part 8 – The Critics

The series of articles telling what Allen County, Ohio, Sheriff Daniel Beck told the Illinois Minuteman Project audience at McHenry County College October 25, 2007, is almost completed.

Previously articles include

Fighting Republican Courthouse Corruption,

Motivation for Getting Involved with the Fight Against Illegal Aliens

The Rule of Law

Enforcement Techniques, specifically, how 287(g) training is not necessary to get started,

Idendtity Theft Enforcement,

Other Crimes by Illegal Aliens, and

Terrorism and Bondage.

Today we hear Sheriff Beck’s take on his critics.

“Several of the Latino advocacy groups didn’t like what I was doing,” he observed.

“Ohio probably has one of the most (liberal) open records law in the country,” he said to explain a request from the Mexican Consulate on September 6, 2005, that he considered unreasonable.

“Those folks threw the gasoline on the fire.”

He took 45 days to reply.

The Atlanta News (I can’t find a newspaper by that name on Google) called and asked about the lateness of his reply.

“I told them, ‘No, I didn’t think it was important.’

“I sent a letter to President Bush,” Beck continued, suggesting that his final paragraph about Bush’s getting to “work on an immigration law” probably wasn’t appreciated.

Because of the Mexican Consulate’s request, he was interviewed live on “Hannity and Combs” for 7-8 minutes.

“After that, people started sending me information on illegal immigration.

“Probably one of the best things that’s happened to me is the Mexican Consulate sending me that letter.”

“We need to make our visitors feel welcome,” he quoted Lima’s liberal mayor.

Beck’s reply?

“We have three hot means a day in jail.”

He also has some contact with the Mennonite-dominated community of Goshen, Indiana. Mennonites welcome the immigrants. Its population has grown 35-40% over four years, he said.

One person from Goshen said, “Thinks have been going really well, except we’ve had two homicides in the Latino community.”

Beck suggested the reason was the Latino gangs like MS-13.

Beck explained that he has a “Criminal Alien Task Force,” which has devised guidelines.

“We don’t want to profile,” he said.

“When arrested, we try to go after the employer. It’s kind of hard to do.”

Beck said he uses the “questions given to me by IRS’ Criminal Investigation Division.”

He then made a reference to the movie “Absence of Malice” in explaining how he deals with reporters, whose articles have been critical of his illegal alien enforcement, I sensed.

He said the following is from the movie:

“The newspapers don’t print the truth. They print what people say.”

Apparently the local paper in Lima has not been very friendly. He flashed a number of front page articles with negative headlines on the screen.

“I’ve survived 16 years of politics and most of them (the reporters) are gone.”

Speaking to any local official who might contemplate following in his footsteps, Beck said, “You’re going to take a lot of guff.

“I’ve been criticized by the Catholics, the Mennonites, the League of Latin American Citizens.” (And, he may have mentioned more.)

“We have something of a (rocky) relationship,” he said of the latter group.

“I seem to be kind of a radical. I’m sorry about that.

“The ACLU sent out a press release a year and a half ago, almost two years ago (criticizing what he is doing). They still have not found a valid complaint.

“I got a (congratulatory) call from a friend. ‘You finally got the ACLU to come out against you!’”

Where have the illegal aliens in Allen County, Ohio, come from?

Beck put up a slide with all the countries, but I couldn’t catch them all before he took it down. There were more.

Most, he said, were from south of the border; these are the countries I copied down:

Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Poland, Cuba, Albania, Poland, South Africa.

“I never received one (complaint) of improper conduct or profiling by any persons illegally in our community,” he said.

= = = = =
Sheriff Daniel Beck is seen in the top photograph. The bottom one contains Carlos Acosta, executive director of the McHenry County Latino Coalition. He attended the meeting, but asked no questions. He is being interviewed by Northwest Herald reporter Sarah Sutscher for this article.


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