Miss. voters being dealt ‘brown race card’ over immigration

The Clarion-Ledger Editorial, 9/14/7

Now in 2007, the black race card for the moment has been replaced with a brown race card, namely undocumented Hispanic immigrants.

Latino workers have worked for years in poultry processing plants in east-central Mississippi and catfish industries in the Delta, and many have become integrated in the local community. A year ago I remember a Mexican native who built up his own restaurant in Newton became something of a local celebrity when he tried to stage a bullfight using a Mexican bull. Unfortunately, the bull couldn’t get cleared at the border in time.

While evident in Mississippi for a long time, Hispanic immigrants got no political attention until immigration reform appeared on the national radar screen.