Blaming the immigrants is not the answer

Imagine living in an agricultural community that, since the passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement, has suffered tremendous financial hardship. Local corn, grown there for generations, can no longer compete against the corn imports from the United States, which are heavily subsidized by the U.S. government.

To clothe your children, your wife has taken to sewing their underwear out of old flour sacks. They lack shoes. Your family eats protein maybe once a week. Meals mostly consist of "chicken" soup, without the chicken — a watery broth of tortillas. The only hope seems to be to go work in the U.S.

While it may break your heart to leave your children behind, knowing your youngest may not even remember who you are upon your return, you make the only rational decision a family-centered person can. You give up everything and join the countless numbers of people who have left their communities empty of working-aged men.

Not many of us could sit back and watch our children or elderly parents suffer hunger and destitution without doing something to ease their suffering and improve their lives. Missing from so much of the immigration debate is the humanity of the undocumented immigrants who are making sacrifices most of us cannot even imagine.

It is only through an understanding of the complex circumstances that lead people to migrate that we can create a constructive, humane, realistic and just immigration policy. Blaming undocumented immigrants is not the answer.

We also need to examine the role of race in the current immigration debate. The success of right-wing Republicans in galvanizing the House to pass legislation that would classify undocumented immigrants as felons reflects an appeal to racism and hate in Americans.

Xenophobia is nothing new in America. In economic hard times, politicians and other civic leaders historically have succeeded in redirecting the public's attention to symbolic policy issues that target the most vulnerable, voiceless and marginalized. To an American of Asian, African, Middle Eastern, Jewish, Irish, or Southern or Eastern European ancestry, this, unfortunately, isn't news. Immigrants from these groups know all too well what it is like to be needed for one's labor, but despised for one's presence.

The current immigration debate focusing on Latinos is no different. Whether one is a proponent of earned citizenship, tougher border enforcement or another guest-worker program, or is engaged in the ongoing debate about whether immigrants cost or benefit society, Latinos in America are experiencing prejudice, discrimination, cruelty and mistreatment from this latest round of scapegoating.

The House's appeal to racism, sadly, is finding resonance. According to an April 7 USA Today/Gallup poll, more than 80 percent of Americans believe that "illegal" immigration is out of control. Furthermore, despite the overwhelming show of solidarity across racial groups in protest marches across the country, a Time poll taken at the end of March showed that 49 percent of Americans would not change their views on undocumented immigration following the protests.

The bottom line is that the 40 million Latinos in this country are not accepted or seen as real Americans, regardless of their legal status. The current debate on immigration reminds us of this fact.

People need to remember some fundamental American values, such as the Golden Rule and what it means to walk in the footsteps of another. If we can honestly put ourselves in their shoes, we may see that most of us would make the same decisions that undocumented workers have made. Regardless of the law, we would make the sacrifices necessary to do the best we can for our families.

We've been down this road before. Recall the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act and the Gentlemen's Agreement of 1907, halting new Japanese immigration in exchange for nondiscrimination against those of Japanese descent already in the U.S., as examples of racist immigration practices in America's past.

Instead of focusing on unjust immigration laws, public leaders across the spectrum have hypocritically taken the stance that undocumented workers are "lawbreakers" who need to learn to "follow the rules" and "do it the right way."

They should take note that laws can be, and are often, wrong. When half the American population could not vote until 1920, were women wrong to demand the law changed?

Instead of hiding behind the façade of law, we should remember the humanity of undocumented immigrants. We all lose when we discriminate against one another. We are a better country than to fear those we should welcome.

María Chávez is an assistant professor in Seattle University's Institute of Public Service and the university's political science department.