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2 Crit 110 (2009)
Open Letter to Cameron County Commission

handle is hein.journals/tcrit2 and id is 110 raw text is: Vol. 2, Issue 1 OPEN LETTER TO CAMERON COUNTY COMMISSION Margo Tdmez* INTRODUCTION Background: In late July 2007, Eloisa Garcia Tdmez began receiving telephone calls from U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agents informing her of the government's plans to construct a wall across her lands. Their insistent pursuit of a signed waiver allowing the government access and title led to a series of controversial invasions of Tdmez' privacy-at her place of work, at home in the evenings, on weekends, and in public spaces. DHS' demands that she sign a waiver granting the government title to her lands turned into volatile verbal confrontations and threats. Tdmez is a Lipan Apache and land grant title heir to lands originally held collectively by her ancestors in the Rancheria of El Calaboz, Cameron County, South Texas. By August of 2007, DHS, U.S. Customs Border Patrol (CBP) and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (ACE) proceeded to press for her waiver. Their insistent demands finally caused Tdimez to officially refuse to sign officially. She invited the representatives of the three agencies to her work place and in front of all, officially informed them of her decision. At that time, according to her testimony, she was informed that her name would be added to a list of refusers. Her refusal to waive her lands to DHS was based upon her position on indigenous and human rights. T6.mez is represented by Peter Schey, director of the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law in Los Angeles, California, and supported by a local, regional, national and international body of legal 'cells' from the University of Texas at Austin Law School, the Rapoport Center for Human Rights and Justice, the Advancement Project, and Native American attorneys in private practices. T6.mez' indigenous support base stimulated a cohesive cybernet 'netwar' comprised of community organizations, international indigenous organizations, student groups, and critical Mexico-U.S. binational Native American networks. Soon, the quiet community of El Calaboz, whose ancestors fought off Spanish colonization, found themselves in the center of a ground-breaking constitutional law case. Margo Tamez is a post doctoral student in American Studies at Washington State University.

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