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Commentary: The Ugly Mexican-American Immigration Debate

May 15th, 2008

CNN's website, if not its actual television coverage of the immigration issue, has been showing a more nuanced look at the immigration debate.  In particular, the website has been running columns that show the impact of hate on the immigration debate and hint at a real dialogue between columnist Ruben Navarrette and his readers.  It's a firsthand look at how extremism is affecting the immigration debate.   Two installments are below, or click here: 

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/14/navarrette.mexican/index.html?iref=newssearch

and here:

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/04/28/navarrette/index.html?iref=newssearch

Commentary: The ugly Mexican-American immigration debate

By Ruben Navarrette Jr.
Special to CNN

SAN DIEGO, California (CNN) -- In an episode of the television show "Seinfeld," Jerry Seinfeld worries that his dentist has converted to Judaism so he can tell jokes about Jewish people. Someone asks Seinfeld, "And this offends you as a Jewish person?" No, he says, "it offends me as a comedian."

As a Mexican-American, that's how I feel when someone takes note of my support for comprehensive immigration reform, or my opposition to absurd "solutions" to the immigration problem, and concludes that I'm more Mexican than American.

Anyone who thinks there is no racism in this debate should read my e-mail. You'd find that readers say things to me they'd probably never say to a columnist who wasn't Latino. Like this: "You want your people here and despite your convoluted attempts to justify your position, you clearly don't give a whit on how they get here." Or this: "You keep justifying the illegal immigrants because you are a Mexican." Or this: "It is soooo obvious that you are a racist who is ONLY looking out for "your" people!"

Others suggest that I wouldn't be so quick to defend illegal immigrants if so many of them hadn't come from Mexico, or suggest that U.S-born Latinos like me have a vested interest in "bringing in your relatives" or in using immigration to increase the size and power of the U.S. Hispanic population. Others accuse me of having a secret agenda.

They're half right. I do have an agenda, but it's no secret. I've written op-eds and columns for nearly 20 years, and I still write 15,000 words a month.

My views are well-known. As an opinion writer, my agenda is to expose shameful politicians who use immigration to scare up votes, to be skeptical of feel-good solutions that don't work, and -- consistent with the journalist creed -- to comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

My agenda is to demand what this debate really needs: more honesty, an end to hypocrisy, a ban on simple solutions, to be purged of racism and nativism, and an understanding that our anger should be aimed not at people but at government.

My agenda is to make sure that illegal immigrants, whatever their ethnicity, not be treated as scapegoats, picked on, or unfairly blamed for all of society's ills while we turn ourselves inside out making excuses for their accomplices -- the employers who hire them.

As a Mexican-American, I needn't choose between being Mexican and American. I'm both. But, it's true: I am more one than the other. As an American, I care about the little guy; Mexico doesn't. As an American, I recognize the positive impact of legal immigration; Mexico doesn't. As an American, I care about fairness and stamping out racism and prejudice; Mexico doesn't. In the country that nearly 100 years ago cast afloat my Mexican grandfather, there are winners and losers; in mine, we take it as fact that with hard work and sacrifice, anyone can win.

Some assume that the ugly tone of the immigration debate offends me as a Mexican. No. It offends me as an American.

Commentary: 10 ugly things about the immigration debate

By Ruben Navarrette Jr.
Special to CNN

A woman wrote in and asked me to be more specific: Just what was it about the immigration debate that was so ugly?

She came to the right place. After nearly 20 years of writing opinions and insisting that I don't speak for all Hispanics, in recent months, I've heard from hundreds of Hispanics who -- appreciative of my middle-ground approach to the immigration issue -- insist that I can speak for them anytime. So, with the authority vested in me, I'll now share some of what other Hispanics are saying.

It's not far off from what Janet Murguia had to say. As president of the National Council of La Raza, the largest Hispanic civil rights organization in the United States, Murguia recently delivered an important speech to the National Press Club. The topic: the immigration debate and what she called a wave of hate sweeping the land -- one that isn't limited to illegal immigrants, but which is now affecting all Hispanics regardless of where they were born, what language they speak or what flag they salute.

The way Murguia sees it, immigration is "on the verge of becoming one of the largest civil rights issues of our generation." And, Hispanics are playing the piñata.

Murguia was right on the button. To borrow a phrase, it's getting ugly out there. And U.S.-born Hispanics see it as plain as day. Here are 10 things they find distasteful about this debate:

• The hypocrisy. We have two signs on the U.S.-Mexican border: "Keep Out" and "Help Wanted."
• The racism. With lightning speed, the debate went from anti-illegal immigrant to anti-immigrant to anti-Mexican.
• The opportunism. Too many politicians are trying too hard to portray themselves as tough on illegal immigration.
• The simple solutions. "Build A Wall." "Deport All Illegals." A quick rule of thumb: If it fits on a bumper sticker, it's not a workable policy.
• The naiveté. People ask why Mexico won't help stop illegal immigration. Hint: Last year, Mexicans in the United States sent home $25 billion.
• The profiling. Dark skin and Spanish surnames shouldn't be proxies for undocumented status. Been to Arizona lately?
• The meanness. Nazi-produced Internet video games let players shoot illegal immigrants crossing the border. Fun stuff.
• The amnesia. Americans think grandpa was welcomed with open arms and that he plunged into the melting pot. Whatever.
• The buck-passing. Americans love to blame Mexico for their choices, yelling across the border: "Stop us before we hire again."
• The double standard. The same folks who have zero tolerance for illegal immigrants easily tolerate those who hire them.

Some of this is painfully familiar, recalling earlier versions of this debate as it played out a hundred or two hundred years ago. Hispanics are the new Germans, the new Irish, the new Italians. But it's also ugly. It was then. It is now.

Ruben Navarrette Jr. is a member of the editorial board of the San Diego Union-Tribune and a nationally syndicated columnist.