Tic marks in my notebook as I counted each one. “Illegals”
who steal American jobs. Burdens on the health and welfare system. Research
subjects for academics and high theorizing. Criminals. Unruly invaders who are
threatening our culture.
These representations conveniently dehumanize the sisters,
the brothers, the mothers, the fathers, the daughters, the sons, the cousins,
the aunts, the uncles, the grandmas, the grandpas, the hard working, hopeful,
desperate and determined people that cross the U.S. border searching for a
better life.
This weekend at the Alliance for Global Justice “Tear down
the walls” conference, I learned about “Operation Streamline,” a program that
targets migrant workers on the U.S.-Mexico border. Since the program started in
2008, the criminal prosecutions have increased every year. Part of the new
immigration bill mandate in Arizona is to triple the number of prosecutions from the
current 70 per day. In order to keep the system running, Tucson spends $11-17
million per month.
As the money pours into the criminal justice system, other
vital services suffer (like the postal station, which was closed to save $14
million) and private companies such as the Corrections Corporation of America
(CCA) receive $3,450 per month for each detainee. That’s $1,000 more than
public prisons make for their detainees. The felony crime of re-entry under
Arizona’s law 1326 is the “easiest crime to prove” according to Isabel Garcia, an Arizona attorney and human rights activist with Coalicion de Derechos
Humanos (Human Rights Coalition).
The opportunity for profit is an undeniable factor in the
push to increase the prosecutions from 70 to 210 per day in Tucson, to double
the maximum sentence from 6 months to a year, and to compromise the justice process
making it easier to get convictions. Aggressive plans to increase prison beds
and government corruption (e.g. politicians being major stock holders in CCA),
along with statistics that clearly demonstrate the ineffectiveness of
criminalizing immigration provide ample evidence of the driving force behind
programs such as Operation Streamline: lining the pockets of the rich.
Federally, out of the 82,250 criminal prosecutions, half are
for immigration. The U.S. spends $17.9 billion on immigration enforcement. Anti-terrorism
rhetoric justifies the spending and criminalization of immigration while
the programs remain ineffective; zero terrorists have been apprehended as a
result of these laws, yet they persist. Furthermore, the recidivism rate has
increased seven percent, from 17% to 24%. So, why then, aren’t we doing
something different? All we need to do is look at where the money is going and we have the answer.
If we really wanted to address the immigration ‘problem’ we
should first start by seeing migrants as sentient beings who have hopes and
dreams and who are people affected by U.S. imperialism, unfair trade policy,
militarization and racism.
I sat in the federal courtroom last Friday listening to the
sounds of the shackles while 70 anxious migrants awaited their sentencing. The
rattles of the chains were occasionally drowned out by the repetition of the
“grand explanation of rights.” The accused passed through the courtroom like products on a conveyor
belt to get their three-minute hearing from the McJudge. Each of them
enters into a guilty plea bargain, supposedly without being rushed, intimidated
or forced. But what other option do they have?
That is the key question. It is not just the question we should answer when we ask about the criminal justice process and whether it delivers real
justice. We should also think about it when we ask ourselves why these men and women would leave their
homes to travel through treacherous conditions, ride precariously on the tops
of trains, expose themselves to freezing temperatures, put themselves at great risk for sexual assault,
cross miles of desert where if the heat and lack of water doesn’t kill them,
either a drug cartel or the border patrol might. Is it because they are
criminals and they can’t be bothered with the expensive and arduous process to
enter the U.S. legally?
Or, perhaps it’s because they were pushed off their land by large-scale
agro-industry growing mutated versions of what was once a subsistence crop for
small farmers, perhaps the Maquiladora set up in the free trade zone by Nike
found cheaper labor in Indonesia and the mothers that supported their children
on minimum wage jobs now have nothing, perhaps the heightened military
and drug cartel violence from which people flee their homes out of fear, or
maybe it is because being a third generation of a Mexican American family who
came to the United States under the Bracero program during WWII when the demand
for labor in the U.S. encouraged migrants to cross the border freely you have
relatives here and you just want to be with your family.
So, next time we hear about “Illegals” who steal American
jobs, burden the health and welfare system and threaten the American culture, I
urge us to take a step back and really think about whether we believe that in our heart of hearts. If we can’t find the moral ground and compassion, we could engage the facts and try to find the logic in the militarization and
criminalization of immigration. I hope that Operation Streamline won’t be there long enough for you to see, but if it is, you too could witness the inhumane and McDonaldized judicial process that has been normalized through increasing anti-immigrant
sentiment that dehumanizes people and criminalizes a response to law that
favors private corporations and fuels the military-industrial complex over people.
Photo: Ted Robbins/NPR
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