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Anti-Immigrant Activist Admits Hiring Illegal Workers

Alan Kravitz in New York

A man who posted billboards against illegal immigration admitted this week that he hired illegal workers at a Mexican restaurant he co-owned with his brother.

The billboards began appearing around New York and half a dozen cities in a handful of other states about 10 months ago.

But Craig Nelson said he sold his shares in the Manhattan restaurant in January, four months before he posted his first billboard calling for deep cuts in legal immigration and an end to illegal immigration.

A few weeks later he began his web site, www.ProjectUSA.org.

Nelson said he is like a former drug user who goes around the town preaching against addiction.

"Part of my awakening to immigration was through experience in this business," Nelson said.

Nelson said he reluctantly used illegal workers to compete with other fast-food restaurants.

"The whole of America is addicted to illegal labor,'' Nelson said. "It's the fault of the government for allowing it," he said.

Several Indian community leaders said Nelson whipped up hysteria against immigrants while keeping quiet about his profits from illegal workers.

"He must have used the money made out of poor illegal workers to speak out against the very people that made him rich," said an Indian school teacher.

"He never talks about the contribution immigrants make to America every day," said Hari Hareshwara, a community activist. "Even there, this man is not facing the truth. It is shocking to hear that his web site is visited by thousands of people each day. What will this man do next? Run for a seat in Congress?"

Earlier, Nelson had mentioned his experience in China, where he had taught for nearly a year, and how he was scared by the congestion in the cities because of over-population. He thought that if immigration was not checked, America would soon become like China and India.

Nelson has not been to India.

Hs critics, including Claire Shulman, president of New York's Queens district, which has over 50,000 people from the subcontinent, slammed Nelson's explanation. They pointed out that the man who put up billboards with the messages like, 'Tired of Sitting in Traffic? Everyday, another 6,000 immigrants arrive. Every day!', admitted to hiring illegals only when a reporter for Fox Television confronted him.

"It just shows the hypocrisy we are dealing with here," Shulman said. She said she had always believed that Nelson's campaign did not have anything to do with a debate about the immigration policy. "It had to do everything with what we like and what we don't like," she said.

The billboards carry messages such as, 'Because of mass IMMIGRATION, U.S. population will exceed half a BILLION in my lifetime. Help us, Congress. - an American kid, age 6'.

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