WASHINGTON, May 11 (UPI) -- The organizer of last month's Minutemen border protest says more than 15,000 people have volunteered for future citizen patrols along the Mexican border.
"We considerer this a mandate from the citizens of the United States," Chris Simcox will tell a hearing of the House Government Reform Committee Thursday, according to a copy of his prepared testimony obtained by United Press International.
The Minutemen recently held a month long protest in Arizona, with volunteers patrolling the border and reporting suspected illegal crossers to authorities. They say they deployed 857 volunteers along the border, facilitating the apprehension by the Border Patrol of 335 people illegally crossing into the country.
Simcox's prepared testimony indicates the Minutemen have begun "the task of recruiting, training and deploying" the thousands of volunteers it will need to patrol all four states that border Mexico.
"We now consider the movement to be a revival of the Civil Defense movement of the World War II era," Simcox plans to say. "While our troops are fighting on foreign soil ...we the people will take up the slack" by patrolling the border.
