Operation Wetback

In 1949 the Border Patrol seized nearly 280,000 illegal immigrants. By 1953, the numbers had grown to more than 865,000, and the U.S. government felt pressured to do something about the onslaught of immigration. What resulted was Operation Wetback, devised in 1954 under the supervision of new commissioner of the Immigration and Nationalization Service, Gen. Joseph Swing.

Swing oversaw the Border patrol, and organized state and local officials along with the police. The object of his intense border enforcement were "illegal aliens," but common practice of Operation Wetback focused on Mexicans in general. The police swarmed through Mexican American barrios throughout the southeastern states. Some Mexicans, fearful of the potential violence of this militarization, fled back south across the border. In 1954, the agents discovered over 1 million illegal immigrants.

In some cases, illegal immigrants were deported along with their American-born children, who were by law U.S. citizens. The agents used a wide brush in their criteria for interrogating potential aliens. They adopted the practice of stopping "Mexican-looking" citizens on the street and asking for identification. This practice incited and angered many U.S. citizens who were of Mexican American descent. Opponents in both the United States and Mexico complained of "police-state" methods, and Operation Wetback was abandoned.

The effort began in California and Arizona, and coordinated 1075 Border Patrol agents, along with state and local police agencies, to mount an aggressive crackdown. Tactics employed included going as far as systematic police sweeps of Mexican-American neighborhoods, and using racial profiling on random stops and ID checks of "Mexican-looking" people in a region with many Native Americans and native Hispanics. In some cases, illegal aliens were deported along with their American-born children.

Some 750 agents targeted agricultural areas with a goal of 1,000 apprehensions per day. By the end of July, over 50,000 illegal aliens were caught in the two states. An estimated 488,000 illegal aliens are believed to have left voluntarily, for fear of being apprehended. By September, 80,000 had been taken into custody in Texas, and the INS estimated that 500,000 to 700,000 had left Texas of their own accord. To discourage illicit re-entry, buses and trains took many deportees deep within Mexican territory before releasing them. [http://www.pbs.org/kpbs/theborder/history/timeline/20.html]

Operation Wetback was a 1954 operation by the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) to remove about one million illegal aliens from the southwestern United States, focusing on Mexican nationals. Tens of thousands more were deported by two chartered ships: the Emancipation and the Mercurio. The ships ferried them from Port Isabel, Texas, to Veracruz, Mexico, more than 500 mi (800 km) to the south. Some were taken as far as 1000 mi (1600 km). Deportation by sea was ended after seven deportees jumped overboard from the Mercurio and drowned, provoking a mutiny that led to a public outcry in Mexico. [http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/OO/pqo1.html]