Progressives Beware, the Dark Side Has Come Calling

April 3rd, 2009

The nativist triumvirate-composed of  the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), VDARE, and the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR)-has spun off another front group, and this time the goal of the nativists is to woo progressives.  Our friend Eric Ward at the Center for New Community and Imagine2050.net broke the story earlier this week about the extremist front group, Progressives for Immigration Reform.

There is nothing progressive about this group, and we doubt that our colleagues in the progressive world will be fooled.  This is not the first time that the nativists have tried this tactic through the John Tanton network.  Having failed in their quest to recruit in the African American community, the environmental community, and the labor community through their campaigns of fear and hate-mongering, they're now going after progressives. 

We remain hopeful that our friends in the progressive world will see right through this latest charade.  Eric blogs:

"Real progressives would do well to prepare in the coming months.  The civil rights organization Center for New Community announced in the most recent edition of its e-bulletin, FAIR Exposed, that the Tanton Network has launched a front group called Progressives for Immigration Reform (PFIR).  PFIR is simply another addition to a growing list of anti-immigrant groups being set up under the Tanton Network to give the illusion that the anti-immigrant movement is broader than it really is.

This network of organizations is named after white nationalist John Tanton, the founder and key leader in a network of anti-immigrant organizations, spin-offs and front groups.  Key entities include Center for Immigration Studies, Social Contract Press, and the Coalition for the Future American Worker.

John Tanton is a controversial figure.  The founder and a current board member of FAIR, Tanton helped secure over a million dollars in funding from a foundation known as the Pioneer Fund, a racist foundation that peddles pseudo-science claiming that blacks are intellectually inferior to whites based on cultural and biological factors.  In the 1930s the Pioneer Fund distributed propaganda films developed by the Nazi Germany to public schools."

Read the full post here.