On
June 30, protesters defied dangerously hot temperatures and took to
the streets in over 750 cities in the United States and abroad to
protest Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policies. The
marches and rallies focused on his administration’s practice of
separating immigrant families and imprisoning their children.
Over
30,000 participated in the Families Belong Together march in
Washington, D.C., and tens of thousands more came out in other
cities. Common demands included “Abolish ICE,” “No human being
is illegal,” and “End deportations.”
Many
protesters expressed rage at the claims that Trump employs to justify
the crackdown at the border. He raises the specter of violent gangs
like MS-13 infiltrating the country, and calls refugees animals,
criminals, and rapists—comparing them to household vermin by saying
that the U.S. faces an “infestation” of immigrants.
Easily
verified facts refute the lie that immigrants and people asking for
refuge are criminals. Trump’s claims are aimed at energizing his
base and sowing fear in immigrant communities, while he stokes the
white nationalist idea that the very existence of the United States
is in danger from an immigrant “invasion.”
As
the outcry and mobilizations grew over the last month, Attorney
General Jeff Sessions tried to demonstrate the correctness of the
policy by quoting a Bible passage formerly used to justify slavery.
This caused some religious leaders to criticize Sessions’ attempt
to drape the administration in Biblical authority. Homeland Security
chief Kirstjen Nielsen also defended the policy to a law enforcement
group.
In
comments to the press, Trump admitted that the child separation
policy is a “negotiating tool” to get an immigration bill and $25
billion in funding for his border wall. The factually challenged
Trump continued to insist that the child separation policy was due to
a law put in place by the Democrats. In truth, his “zero tolerance”
policy changed the “offense” of crossing the border without
official permission from a civil to a criminal matter, which,
according to the Justice Department, required that children be
separated from parents.
In
his presidential campaign, Trump beat the drums of racism and
anti-immigrant sentiment. As president, he has followed through by
taking steps to stigmatize migrants and the foreign born. Early in
his administration he tried to institute a Muslim ban through an
Executive Order spurring huge mobilizations at airports across the
United States. On June 26, a slightly watered-down directive, banning
people from five Muslim countries plus Venezuela from entering the
U.S., was upheld by the Supreme Court.
Trump
also took measures in recent months to revoke the Temporary Protected
Status (TPS) of Haitians, Salvadorans, Sudanese, Nicaraguans,
and Hondurans—a move that affects tens of thousands of vulnerable
refugees.
Private
prison companies, which also contribute huge amounts to the campaigns
of members of Congress, stand to reap millions in profits from the
mass incarceration of immigrants. Reports of companies’ being paid
more than $700 per detainee are examples of the outrageous practice
of profiting from the misery of the oppressed. Facilities lack
adequate numbers of social workers, and there have been reports of
guards physically, emotionally, and sexually abusing detained
children.
Crisis?
What crisis?
The
pro-business conservative publication Forbes cast
doubt on June 25 on Trump’s claims of an immigration crisis, noting
that the number of undocumented people apprehended at the border is
only 11% higher than in the previous fiscal year, which, according to
the U.S. Customs and Border Protection, was “lowest
level of illegal cross-border migration on record, as measured by
apprehensions along the border and inadmissible encounters at U.S.
ports of entry.”*
As
images of children in cages went viral, large numbers of people
mobilized against the Trump policy, holding vigils and
demonstrations. In Portland, Ore., Occupy ICE PDX has blockaded the
ICE facility. At least 80 tents have been erected and protesters have
maintained the blockade. At one point, DHS police cleared a path to
allow about 20 ICE employees to leave the building. As this is
written, there are blockades or occupations of ICE facilities In
Portland, Tacoma, Los Angeles, New York City and Detroit. In Portland
and Detroit, the proto-fascist Proud Boys tried to instigate
confrontations with protesters.
One
occupier in Portland, a young carpenter who identified himself as
“A,” spoke to the Guardian newspaper:
“I can sympathize so much with these children. I’m a
working-class person. I am surrounded by people who have fled here
for their safety. They come here seeking safety and asylum, and they
get violence.”
Demands
to abolish ICE and the Border Patrol are gaining popularity. However,
Bernie Sanders, in an appearance on CNN, declined to support ICE
abolition.
Executive
Order
Under
popular pressure, Trump, after repeated claims that he could do
nothing to alleviate the situation, suddenly reversed course with a
poorly thought-out Executive Order, which will reunite some children
with their parents. The Executive Order will incarcerate families
together without any clearly defined legal process. Under the order,
more detention facilities will be erected, and Army bases and prisons
around the country will also be used for incarceration.
In
the meantime, workplace raids are accelerating. Early in 2018, ICE
signaled that they intended a 400% increase in workplace raids this
year.
The
decree attempts to modify the Flores decision,
which protects immigrant children from being jailed more than 20 days
through extra-constitutional means. It’s unclear that all of the
children will be reunited with their loved ones because of the shoddy
record keeping of the agencies involved. The genealogical DNA
service, 23andme,
has offered DNA testing kits to help match children and parents.
On
June 24, Trump advocated violating the due process rights of the
undocumented by deporting them without judges or hearings. The legal
rights of immigrants are already tenuous with the use of mass trials
under a program called Operation Streamline. Under Operation
Streamline, as many as 75 immigrants at a time are subjected to a
process in which they are given two minutes to consult a lawyer
before appearing in a kangaroo court.
A
deportation system built by Bush and Obama
While
Trump’s zero-tolerance policy is new, it rests on an immigration
system that was already weighted against refugees and the
undocumented. In the aftermath of the 9-11 terror attack, federal
agencies were reconfigured and immigration laws made more draconian.
The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) was split into three
new agencies—U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS),
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and U.S. Customs and
Border Protection (CBP)—under the aegis of the Department of
Homeland Security. Homeland Security Chief Tom Ridge put forward an
aggressive plan to round up and deport the undocumented.
After
taking office, Obama increased the budgets of immigration enforcement
agencies by 300 percent, expanded the Bush-era Secure Communities
program, expanded Operation Streamline, and pushed for local police
participation in immigration enforcement. It was Obama, rather than
Bush, who became known as the “Deporter-in-Chief.” Much to the
chagrin of liberal apologists, Obama deported more than 2 million
immigrants during his tenure.
Migration
fueled by U.S. policies
The
source of migration from Mexico and Central America is in U.S.
foreign policy going back many decades. U.S. imperialism ruthlessly
smashed the Central American revolutions of the 1980s with death
squads and massive military aid. Even when U.S law forbade military
aid to Guatemala because of human rights abuses, the Israelis stepped
in as a proxy for the U.S. Trade policy, military coups, and support
for repressive regimes are the center of U.S. policy towards its
southern neighbors.
The Philadelphia
Inquirer noted
on June 24 the levels of violence in Central America that are driving
desperate people to seek refuge in the United States. El Salvador,
for example, has a murder rate of 99.7 per 100,000, “higher than
all countries suffering armed conflicts, except for Syria.” It is
estimated that almost 300,000 Salvadorans have been displaced by
violence. Similarly, high numbers of Guatemalans and Hondurans have
fled repressive conditions, “akin to war zones,” in their
countries.
The
Trump claim that MS-13 members are being sent to the U.S. is a
fabrication. The spread of the gang to Central America is a result of
the immigration policies of the U.S. government, which deported to El
Salvador many immigrant youth who were deemed to be criminals. Once
they had arrived in El Salvador, many of these youth, jobless and
without local roots, banded together as self-protection against
existing gangs.
Trump’s
racist rhetoric tries to tie Democrats, like Nancy Pelosi and others,
to MS-13, claims echoed by his propaganda arm, Fox News. Far from
being the sophisticated criminal enterprise alluded to by Trump and
his spokespersons, MS-13 is considered by criminologists to have
nowhere near the sophistication or levels of centralization that more
well-established drug cartels possess.
Fight
Back!
Building
a fightback against immigrant bashing and xenophobia will require the
broadest popular mobilizations, including the ranks of organized
labor. Labor, religious, and civil rights organizations should take
the lead in building a national March on Washington to put a million
people in the streets. Learning from the example of past movements
against war and for civil rights, local and national coalitions can
be built to advance the struggle in solidarity with immigrant workers
and families.
The
examples of the women’s marches and the mass outpouring against
Trump’s Muslim ban last year demonstrate the potential power of
mass action. The recent teacher strikes also point to the road
forward.
Movimiento
COSECHA , an immigrant rights organization is calling a national
conference of immigrant communities in September, with the aim of
organizing mass actions modeled on the May 1, 2006, immigrant
mobilization that took on the character of a one-day general strike.
Pointing
to the example of the recent teacher strikes, COSECHA organizer
Catalina Adorno wrote, “One day is not enough. In order to win
permanent protection, dignity, and respect, we must not only go on
strike, but we need to be able to sustain the strike. As the teachers
demonstrated, to win they had to hold their ground and refuse to go
to work until their demands were met. That is what the immigrant
community needs to do when we go on strike, and we have to do it in
large numbers across the country—just like the teachers.”
The
Janus decision, the attacks on immigrants, the epidemic of police
murder of Black people, and the ramped-up offensive against women’s
rights and the gains made by LGBTQ people mean that our struggles
must be united in struggle. Solidarity is urgent in the days and
years ahead.
Ultimately,
this movement cannot depend on the courts or capitalist politicians
to make change. Every bit of progress won by workers and oppressed
peoples in the past was won in the streets. It’s encouraging that
thousands have mobilized already. It’s urgent that the movement
keep the pressure up and not buy into attempts to divert it into
electoralism.
We
have to continue the fight for papers for all, for the demolition of
repressive agencies like the CBP and ICE, an end to workplace raids,
and to stop the construction of the racist border wall.
Smash
ICE and the CBP! Unite the struggles of workers and the oppressed!
Reunite families now! Stop the raids! Stop Trump’s Muslim ban!
Demilitarize the border! No Wall, no way!
*https://www.forbes.com/sites/stuartanderson/2018/06/25/there-is-no-crisis-at-the-border-and-dhs-stats-prove-it/#67b033df112a
>> The article above was written by John Leslie, and is reprinted from Socialist Action.
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