Recently I was on the social media platform formally known as Twitter (right before I deleted my account) and saw some people posting about immigrants. I won’t get into the specifics of everything that was said but the original poster asked a question “why do Democrats defend illegal rapists and murders?” Now this post was meant to be a shot at Democrats under the guise that all illegal immigrants are violent criminals and drug dealers. Rational and non-racist people will know that’s not true.
During the elections, and for years before that, a huge amount of misinformation and ire was targeted at immigrants. Particularly ones from countries south of the United States and Asia. Immigrants were talked about by the GOP more than transgender people and inflation. I thought it would be good to talk a little about these things and how we got to this point.
I want to start with the most ridiculous claim made by the GOP and their talking heads, “Biden’s open border policy.” Let’s all be honest. This is just plain stupid. Joe Biden did make some reforms to the asylum process to help individuals who were coming to America from regions where their lives would be in jeopardy. However, Joe Biden never “opened the border.” If he did, there would be no such thing as an illegal immigrant.
If this was true, people wouldn’t need to find a way around the stupid ass wall that was constructed during the first Trump administration. There would be no need for border patrols past the ports of entry. There would be absolutely no reason to send National Guard troops to the southern border or construct obstacles to prevent people from coming to the United States. There would be no need for visas or immigration paperwork. If the border was open, people could just come right on in and live here.
During the election, there was a purposely throughout campaign by the GOP to paint all immigrants as illegals. Constantly, we heard MAGA candidates talk about rape and murder victims. However, instead of calling out the issues of these, many found it easier to just point out that the offenders in these crimes were immigrants. In a couple of cases, they were there illegally but most came in the proper way. They spent millions of dollars on ads that painted anyone who came across the southern border as a criminal looking for prey or hoping to sell drugs and kill Americans.
I am not going to make light of the tragedies that happened. People like Laken Riely do deserve justice but their tragedy should never be a rally cry for hatred of an entire population of people. Yes, there are groups, usually the Cartels, who bring drugs across the border. This doesn’t mean everyone who crosses into the United States is carrying a bag of fentanyl and planning to sell it to young adults and teenagers so they can overdose.
However, during all the rhetoric and campaigning, there was no distinction. The GOP purposely used phrases like illegals, illegal immigrants, migrants, and immigrants interchangeably. This was done to create an environment of fear. Its not different from when there were people screaming that immigrants were coming to steal jobs away from Americans. As someone who had their job terminated and given to someone from another country, I remember that very time very well. However, I was never angry at those who took my job. I never blamed them. In fact, I was a little sad for them. They got paid the bare minimum to do a thankless and demanding job.
Truth be told, I hated that job. The truth was the company let me go to make their profits go up. However, they realized that they needed someone to do the absolute shit tasks I was doing and found someone who was so desperately in need of work that they were okay taking a very low pay. Like the saying goes, some dollars are better than no dollars. It was moments like that where I realized the fear around losing jobs wasn’t because there were immigrants but because corporations wanted to make more money at the cost of their work force.
I tell you all this to bring us to my next point, there are jobs in America that most people simply won’t do. Corporations and companies are always trying to maximize their profits. That means finding the cheapest labor possible. Many Americans, however, believe certain jobs are beneath them. These jobs include farm work harvesting crops. You won’t find most Americans, especially well to do people, signing up to work in the fields and pick vegetables or wander the orchards picking fruit. Hell, during the founding of our nation, wealthy (and white) people used slave labor to do these same tasks that are being done today.
Yet, when talking about immigrants, there was no distinguishing between migrant workers (many who come, do the job, then leave) and violent criminals. There was no distinction between these people who make life easier for the rest of us and those who bring in drugs. This is all on purpose. Like everything else, it’s about control.
Those of us born here are extremely privileged. The American dream was handed to most of us. Now I don’t mean the overly romanticized version but the version where we have rights and freedoms. Where we can speak our minds, own a firearm, and have the ability to work freely. However, somewhere along the way, Americans lost their compassion. Multiple times in history, people have fled from foreign countries to seek refuge here in the United States. Some because there was no way to feed their families in the country of origin. Some to escape oppressive regimes who dictated every aspect of people’s lives. Some to find a safe haven from those who would put them to death in their origin country. These are just some of the examples. Yet, more and more, there are Americans who treat these people as monsters to be feared.
Now I am going to double stack my soap box for a moment and throw some logic at everyone that hopefully will make you think. The GOP has constantly talked about how many people have been detained and how much illegal drugs have been seized at the southern border. They use these numbers like it’s the amount of those things that got into the country. However, if the numbers are correct, doesn’t that mean our current border policies are working? I mean, Customs and Border Patrol agents sound like they are really doing a kick ass job out there by these numbers. Also, if these numbers were the totals that got past CBP, how in the hell is it being tracked? Do you really believe there are people telling CBP that they are just going to cross illegally? Do you really believe CBP are that bad at their jobs?
There has also been a lot of talk about repealing the 14th Amendment, commonly known as the birthright amendment. Think about this, it guarantees citizenship for anyone who was born here in the United States. It doesn’t distinguish between any groups of people such as children from immigrants. That means it applies to all of us. Your rights are included in that. Unless you are of strict Native American decent, you wouldn’t be a citizen. How could anyone possibly agree to that?
Immigrants have a bigger impact on our daily lives that a lot of MAGA supporters want to believe. Think about all the things others will have to do that migrants do now. Think about how much more expensive things will get because American workers demand a higher wage to do the same thankless job a migrant did. Think about the tax dollars immigrants pay (yes, they pay taxes) that help pay for our government services.
Rapists, murderers, and other violent criminals should have to face justice for their crimes. However, demonizing an entire population because of a few shitty people is not one of the ideals that this country was founded upon. Yes, we can acknowledge some of the inherently racist things our forefathers did, but we are supposed to be civilized. We are supposed to be the land of opportunity. I always took offense with what MAGA stood for, it’s an acronym for Make America Great Again, which is bullshit. If America wasn’t great, why would people come here seeking a better life? Why would they leave the oppression and dangerous conditions to come here if it wasn’t great.
This country was founded by immigrants, and we are all descended from immigrants of some sort. Take a moment to put your privilege aside and put yourself in their shoes. What would you do if you lived in a country under a brutal regime? What would you do if you had to get resources like water from a truck once a week because there isn’t enough to go around? What would you do if you couldn’t get adequate medical care when you are sick? What would you do if staying the country, you were born meant you were facing certain death? What would you do if the only place you could go had such a broken immigration system that you would possibly succumb to these things before ever getting the chance at a better life? What would you do? Think about it.
-Robin Alura
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