In late April, the ACLU of New Mexico sent letters to federal, state and local authorities urging them to criminally investigate a group calling itself the United Constitutional Patriots (UCP) that has been illegally arresting immigrant families at gunpoint in southern New Mexico and turning them over to Border Patrol. Videos that the UCP posted online show masked men in military camouflage surrounding hundreds of men, women and young children huddled. Some of the men carry military-style weapons. In one of the videos, a vigilante shines a flashlight on two immigrant men and muses, “The only problem is if we shoot on the hill it will be an international crisis . . . It would save some time though, wouldn’t it?”
By Peter Simonson