Tea-party event hails Arizona law

HEREFORD, Ariz. - Tea-party groups converged on a remote section of the U.S.-Mexico border on Sunday to show support for Arizona's controversial immigration law and hear from conservative speakers, many of them candidates running for office in crowded Republican primaries.

Several speaking to the crowd of more than 400 demanded that Congress and President Obama devote more resources to increasing border security in remote areas such as the site of Sunday's demonstration south of Tucson.

"We are going to force them to do it, because if they don't, we will not stop screaming," said former State Sen. Pam Gorman, one of 10 Republicans vying for an open congressional seat in north Phoenix. She carried a handgun in a holster slung over her shoulder.

Obama on Friday signed a bill directing $600 million more to securing the U.S.-Mexico border - money that will pay for hiring 1,000 more Border Patrol agents along with customs agents, communications equipment and expanded use of unmanned aerial vehicles.

A federal judge last month delayed the most contentious provisions of Arizona's law, including a section that would require officers to check a person's immigration status while enforcing other laws if they have "reasonable suspicion" that the person was in the country illegally.

Sunday's demonstrators drove four miles on a rutted and rocky dirt road to reach a private ranch 70 miles east of Nogales where the steel posts of the Arizona-Mexico border wall are set inches apart to prevent people from crossing into the United States.

The rally was the most recent in a long line of sweaty demonstrations staged by activists on both sides of the debate over Arizona's controversial law.

"It's time for us to stand up and say, 'We're not going to leave our country like this to our children and grandchildren," said Jim Howard, 61, who is retired from the Air Force and works at Walmart.