Day Labor Center Supporters Voted Out

The Washington Post reported today that Herndon, Virginia's voters spoke loud and clear on the immigration issue.

Herndon voters yesterday unseated the mayor and two Town Council members who supported a bitterly debated day-labor center for immigrant workers in a contest that emerged as a mini-referendum on the turbulent national issue of illegal immigration.

Residents replaced the incumbents with challengers who immediately called for significant changes at the center. Some want to bar public funds from being spent on the facility or restrict it to workers living in the country legally. Others want it moved to an industrial site away from the residential neighborhood where it is located.

The council voted 5 to 2 last August to establish the center, but yesterday's vote created an apparent 6 to 1 majority in opposition.

Two incumbents were reelected. Dennis D. Husch, who was one of the two council members to vote against the center, received more votes than any of the eight other council candidates. J. Harlon Reece was the lone supporter who was reelected. He received the fewest number of votes among the six winners.

[Newly elected council member, Charlie D.] Waddell said he favors moving the center to a commercial area and will try to tap private funds for its operation. It now operates in part on a grant from Fairfax County.

"You've got day laborers cutting between yards to get to the center," he said. "I've talked to residents who said they have been awakened at 6 in the morning by laborers sitting on their lawn furniture in the back yard because they are waiting for the center to open. That's not good for the neighborhood."

No, that's not good for a neighborhood at all.

City residents and politicians speculated that the recent protests by illegal aliens may have influenced the vote. I hope the protesters keep up their activities throughout the election season, so they can keep on influencing elections--against the politicians who turn their backs on genuine citizens to embrace the illegals. May Herndon be a strong lesson to all of them.