We are all Mexico -Trump, Mexico, and the Griminess of Politics
Ivan Segura
We are all Mexico
Trump, Mexico, and the Griminess of Politics
A few days ago, in his presidential campaign announcement speech no less, Donald Trump uttered the following words: “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best-They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people.” Mr. Trump, unable to see the xenophobia and racism instilled deep inside his comments, doubled down a few days later with similar comments about the perils of immigration across the US-Mexico border. He even insisted on building a massive wall and not only having Mexicans to build it but Mexico’s government to pay for it!
What followed after that was a series of political talking heads on TV and radio attempting to make sense of Mr. Trump’s comments. They referred to the US immigration problem, to the need to secure the border and some of them attempted to gain some ratings by presenting special reports about undocumented immigrants. The issue, however, is a different one. It is one of generalization and double standards. What Trump (Yeah, I am removing the Mr. from right in front of his name) did was to consider all individuals crossing the southern border as Mexicans and all as undocumented.
The short answer to this Trumper is to state the fact that not all Mexicans are undocumented and that not all undocumented people are Mexican. The long answer includes providing Trump with important demographic and economic information. The vast majority of Mexicans living in the US (around 85%) are in the US legally. The Mexican community comprises about 64% of the Latino community. And by 2015, this Latino community has reached an estimated 54 million individuals with a purchasing power of 1.5 trillion. To explain the complexity of this issue, we have to delve into the economic/social pushing and pulling factors for immigration across countries. We also have to recognize the fact that the US capitalist economy is in constant need for cheap labor to produce goods and services. There are entire US industries that rely heavily on labor from immigrant workers including agribusiness, farming, meat processing plants and construction services.
But Trump is a business man. He already knows all of this economic data. What he is doing is using the griminess of politics to his personal political advantage. By offending the whole Mexican –and by extension the Latino community, he is playing into the fear and xenophobia of a group of the electorate who still consider this should be a country of immigrants –but only immigrants of white ancestry. Trump’s peculiar surge to first place in the polls affirms this and sheds a light into the minds of some voters.
As a community, our response should be strong and unequivocal. These types of reprehensive comments are something that needs to be denounced at all times. This obligation falls not only to Mexicans but to all the Latino and immigrant community. There has been a silver lining to Trump’s insipid blabbering: the political awakening of the Latino community. In recent days, I have received countless texts, messages and words from friends from different countries expressing their support against what Trump said. Yesterday, a friend from Ecuador told me “We are all Mexicans” when expressing his support not only to the Mexican community but to all the members of the immigrant community that felt offended by what Trump said.
Let’s hope we all can unite in response to these xenophobic and racist comments. We will make it clear to Trump that we are not rapist nor criminals nor drug dealers. We are a community full of brilliant, talented, hard-working and honest people. And we will remember his words –and those who supported them, come election day.
Council of Mexicans in the Carolinas