Ethnic Cleansing and the War on Immigrants: A Program of Resistance

The Trump Administration made the demonization of migrants, particularly those from México and Latin America, its main political rallying point, and ramped up an ethnic cleansing campaign aimed at the forced removal of more than 11 million undocumented workers from the US.

To gain public support for his policies, Trump has fomented fear of the “other,” painting immigrants as criminals, terrorists, rapists — sub-humans looking to harm “real” Americans. Trump also aimed to prevent new migrants from entering as a way to “make America white again.” He even ripped thousands of children from their parents to “punish” those asylum seekers who have the audacity to think that the US might grant them safe haven.

What principles should guide our resistance to this ethnic cleansing? We can start here.

1.   Practice internationalism. Chican@/Mexican@ organizations and activists and the Left must build ties with social movements in México as a key element of strategy for freedom and self-determination for Chican@s/Mexican@s in the US, as well as to support the movement for genuine independence and social change in Mexico.

2.   Workers (of the world) Unite! Ethnic cleansing is a workers’ issue. The labor movement can — indeed it has to — play an active and aggressive role, not just because unions have significant numbers of Latin@ members, but because strengthening worker rights abroad stops the global race to the bottom.

3.   Build Black-Brown unity. Together, the Black and Brown populations in the US represent more than 80 million people in the South and the Southwest. A “Sunbelt Strategy” that unites our two social movements could anchor a united front of all oppressed people of color and a significant minority of white working people. A common campaign against the mass incarceration of Black people and the ethnic cleansing of Latin@s could be a major launching point for melding these forces into the foundation, the beating heart, of the United Front that can lead the working class out of capitalist barbarism.

4.   Build unity on the Left. The current moral outrage should motivate left organizations to meet, to talk, to strategize, and to collaboratively support the growing and massive resistance movement that has developed around these issues.