Who's behind the anti-immigrant crusade?

[Hannah Bell]

Intended as a call to arms for a popular insurgency supposedly driving the law from the grassroots, the half-filled stadium in Tempe and poorly attended Phoenix rally told a different story...the latest anti-immigrant surge is a highly orchestrated campaign, emanating from within the Washington beltway... the law is actually a foreign import into the state.

SB 1070 is the brainchild of Kris Kobach, an anti-immigrant lawyer on the payroll of the Federation of American Immigration Reform (FAIR), a Washington D.C.-based lobbying group dedicated to promoting extreme measures against immigrants. FAIR is tied to the pseudo-scientific Center for Immigration Studies, which has put forward a framework for what it calls "attrition through enforcement" as a strategy to "shrink the illegal population..." Kobach's origins are far from grassroots...In 2001, just days after 9/11, Kobach got a job as chief adviser on immigration law and border security to John Ashcroft, who was in his first year as U.S. attorney general...

Hammering immigrants is designed to provide conservative Republicans with a "wedge issue" to rally supporters around, and to obscure the constellation of real and tangible problems facing the populus--problems for which the Republicans have no solutions....

http://socialistworker.org/2010/06/11/behind-the-anti-immigrant-crusade



Arizona is the testing ground

YOU'VE GOT to remember that SB 1070 is a culmination point. It is the crown jewel in order to launch new and different attacks. But let's not talk about the new attacks that are coming forward now because of SB 1070--let's talk about why SB 1070 occurred. I believe that SB 1070 occurred because Arizona was intentionally selected as a target. This is exactly what the right wanted.

Many people say, "Well, aren't Arizona politicians doing this because the federal government has failed to act in order to address the problem at the border?" But in truth, it's the exact opposite.

The federal government has acted--by funneling all the migrants through the state of Arizona with its Operation Gatekeeper that closed up the traditional crossing areas for 100 years. Arizona then became fertile ground for all of this to take root.

In Arizona, the federal government owns nearly all of the borderlands, unlike in Texas. Texas, like Arizona, is a very conservative state, but as soon as Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff started building walls there, the communities came unglued. There were lawsuits by white and brown and black alike. They knew that wouldn't happen in Arizona.

Knowing that the chaos and division at the border wouldn't result in the kind of fightback that it did in Texas, they weren't going to pick any other state. Plus, in the last 10 years, we were the number-one growing state, and not because of migrants, but because of the influx of retirees--which means, of course, more conservative people.

http://socialistworker.org/2010/06/10/arizona-is-the-testing-ground

[stray cat]

1. Who is in favor of illegal immigration?

[yellowwood]

2. People Who Aren't Realistic

A nation that can't control its borders is doomed.

To be against illegal immigration doesn't mean that one is anti-immigrant. There are ways to do this right.

The world population fifty years ago was 2,982,000,000.
Now it's 6,826,626,558

World and national resources are limited.

I don't know the answer as to how borders can be secured, but, obviously, they must be.

[tuckessee]

3. Better question - Who is behind the illegal immigrant invasion? n/t

[pinboy3niner]

4. Illegal immigration actually has declined

With fewer jobs available, the number of people crossing the border from Mexico has declined, and many others have been leaving the U.S. to return to Mexico.

Anti-immigrant legislation is likely to increase the exodus from the U.S., but it may also have the unintended effect of spurring comprehensive immigration reform. The only thing holding up reform now is the intransigence of Republicans in Congress, who've vowed to block passage of legislation.

K&R for the OP, especially for the great interview with Isabel García at the second link.

:kick: