IMMIGRATION IN BLACK, WHITE, YELLOW AND BROWN

welcome to America
I've been meaning to write on this for weeks but haven't had the chance (not like it's going to be pushed to the back burner by politicians or the media any time soon however). Living in California, immigration tensions are never that far from the surface but thanks to Congress - and the subsequent community response - it's become much more of a pertinent issue for all Americans to engage. Or almost all Americans. To wit:

There's been numerous discussions in the media about what role race relations play in the current immigration debate but not simply between (presumably) pro-immigration "brown" people and nativist "white" folk. A recent LA Times headline is telling: "Immigrant Crusade Enlists Few Blacks" and there have been other stories looking at this issue (to just link to a few).

Sufficed to say, this is a huge, complex issue so I'm going to try to tackle a few specific points and questions.

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1) What role/obligation does the current immigrant rights movement (IRM) owe to the African American community especially in light of the ways in which the IRM has adopted (co-opted?) civil rights rhetoric? This is precisely what Andre Banks (of Colorlines Magazine) addresses in his oft-circulated essay, "The Price Of The Ticket" (James Baldwin, holler). Banks argues that African Americans have been "rendered invisible by the current deliberation on immigrant civil rights," and more specifically, notes that,

"The narrative of the immigrant as the symbol of hard work that leads to opportunity can mean nothing but alienation for Black people precisely because we know this myth is false. Without our labor - not immigrant labor, but slave labor - in the fields and on the march there would be no market brimming with wealth and economic opportunity, nor a tradition of civil and political rights readily available for appropriation and exploitation."

In other words, it's one thing to claim that "America was built by immigrants" but as Banks argues, implicit in that rhetoric is the avoidance of acknowledging that it was, in fact, Black slaves who built America's key economic (and by extension, political and social) institutions (especially prior to the large-scale influx of immigrants in the mid/late 19th century).

There's more to Banks' piece that I think is well worth people considering, especially around the collisions of race and class and the question of citizenship. Banks' attention to history is important here because he notes, quite importantly, that often the ways in which immigrants (especially but not exclusively of European origin) have acquired symbolic citizenship in American society has come at the detriment of the African American community. To put it in even simpler language, one could claim that to truly "become American," turning one's back to - if not outright oppression of - Black people is as much a prequisite as being able to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. With that understanding, it's easier to understand the ambivalence that some (it's not clear if it's most or even many) African Americans have towards the current IRM.

However, while I urge people to read Banks' essay in full, the one point I wanted to draw attention to is this: "Today's immigrants will find that without Blacks, and a commitment to challenge racism beyond the reach of immigration policy alone, their movement will lose both its moral authority and the practical victory it hopes to achieve."

Does the IRM really need the involvement and endorsement of the Black community in order to achieve a "practical victory"? I agree with Banks that, on a moral level, the IRM - as with many social justice campaigns - would do well to forge a cross-racial solidarity, especially if it insists on characterizing itself as "the new Civil Rights Movement" (as if the old one was over). However, I think realpolitik suggests that even if the IRM is mostly the result of Latino involvement, it has the demographic (and therefore political) clout to achieve some of its key aims - especially legislatively speaking - even if the Black community stands outside. Given the historical disenfranchisement of the Black community power (especially now, post-deindustrialization, post-COINTELPRO, post-crack, etc.), can they compel a seat at the table around the IRM? And if they can't, how will this affect whatever short-term goals the IRM has set for itself?

2) Shifting focus a bit, the other question I'm thinking about is what role do Asian Americans (APAs) play in the IRM? There have been several articles noting their relative absence despite the fact that they constitute a massive immigrant population. Theories given include: 1) lack of civic of participation ("we put the "APA" in apathy!"), 2) fear of deportation back to Asia (it's not easy digging a hole from China) and 3) Asian people don't care for undocumented immigrants, even "their own." That said, according to Sing Tao Daily, news coverage is following the issue closely even if people themselves are staying largely out of the rallies and organizations.

While it's true that the % of undocumented Asian immigrants is lower than that for the Latino population, it must be noted that any rights afforded immigrants are going to be equally shared - unless there's going to be legislation that's Latino specific (which won't happen), then Asian immigrants will almost certainly benefit from whatever gains are made. Likewise, any backlash is going to affect the APA community as well - Latinos might take the brunt of it initially but there's no way that APAs won't catch some of the heat too. Cajoling APAs into political action is rather difficult, I know (unless it's about stereotypical media images, ha), but I really can't imagine a more pertinent issue on the current events horizon especially considering that the majority of APAs are first-generation immigrants. If there's one lesson to be learned from history, it's that tensions around immigration will almost always find their way into this community sooner or later. Better to play a part than be left wondering what happened.

3) This is an interesting contrast: one community that feels left out of the conversation, another that presumably wants to stay out yet the IRM - whatever its successes and failures - is never going to stay contained to just brown/white color lines. Given that immigration is only going to become a more divisive political debate as we roll towards the November elections, we're really at the front end of seeing how this is all going to play out...as well as who the major players are going to be.

--O.W.