AZ Militia Support Intensifies With Bill’s Defeat
The recent defeat of legislation that would have created a citizens’ border group is driving up support for Arizona militias.
The Arizona Daily Star reports the state’s border-militia groups are seeing members becoming more motivated after plans for a state-sanctioned organization were struck down in the Legislature.
Leaders of volunteer patrols along the Arizona-Mexico border said there is an invasion of smugglers and illegal immigrants that needs to be stopped. Supporters say they are giving up on getting assistance from lawmakers.
Jack Foote, a longtime Arizona border-militia leader from Cottonwood, worked with the group that penned the bill.
“We have now washed our hands of our state’s Legislature,” Foote said. “Now we are going to do things our own way.”
The proposed bill would have established a 300-member, armed Arizona Special Missions Unit to guard the border at the governor’s request. A provision in the bill included screening volunteers to weed out violent extremists.
Critics of the bill say a border militia is extremist in nature.
Mark Pitcavage of the Anti-Defamation League said extreme behavior is no longer found on the fringes of militia movements.
“Some are explicitly white supremacists,” Pitcavage said. “The others may not be white supremacists but may well be racists.”