http://themilitant.com/2018/8204/820404.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 82/No. 4 January 29, 2018
(front page)
Both of the bosses’ parties have disdain for
immigrant workers
AP Photo/ Mark Lennihan
Ravi Ragbir, center, at March 2017 New York protest against
deportations, was arrested Jan. 11.
BY JOHN STUDER
AND SETH GALINSKY
NEW YORK — Over the past few months the Donald Trump administration has
carried out a series of moves that threaten the ability of a number of
immigrant workers to live and work here. They began phasing out the
Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program for some 800,000 young
people and announced the ending of Temporary Protected Status for more
than 200,000 Salvadorans, Haitians and Nicaraguans. On Jan. 10
immigration agents carried out coordinated raids at 98 7-Eleven stores,
arresting 21 people and telling store owners they had to submit to
immigration “audits.”
The raids were a follow-up to Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids
under the Barack Obama administration that ended up with charges filed
against a number of store owners for employing workers without papers.
Over the last few weeks ICE detained three immigrants associated with
the sanctuary movement, including Trinidadian Ravi Ragbir, a leader of
the New Sanctuary Coalition here; Haitian Jean Montrevil, also an
activist in the coalition; and Eliseo Jurado, the companion of Ingrid
Encalada Latorre, a Peruvian immigrant who has taken refuge in a church
in Boulder, Colorado, that offered her sanctuary to fight her
deportation. Hundreds protested Ragbir’s detention outside an ICE jail
here Jan. 10.
At the same time, President Trump has explained he thought it was
possible to reach a broader bipartisan deal on immigration “reform” that
would reverse some of the above measures. The “deal” he floated was to
exchange new steps to open the door to DACA youth, some TPS participants
and legalization of other immigrants in exchange for stronger controls
on the border, restrictions on visa “lotteries” and visas for family
members, and, of course, funds for a wall.
When his administration announced the moves to cancel the DACA program
and TPS, Trump said explicitly his goal was to force Congress to come up
with a replacement immigration plan.
“If we do this properly, DACA, you’re not so far away from comprehensive
immigration reform,” Trump told Democrat Richard Durbin, senator from
Illinois in a Jan. 11 meeting with members of Congress. “And if you want
to take it that further step, I’ll take the heat, I don’t care.”
Some liberals urged the Democrats to make the deal. “Take a Deal for the
Dreamers,” headlined the Washington Post editorial Jan. 10. “Build the
Wall.”
A number of conservative anti-immigrant groups and individuals were
outraged at Trump’s negotiations. “It’s shaping up to be a disaster, a
calamity,” complained Steve King, an infamous anti-immigrant congressman
from Iowa.
Then, after a second closed-door meeting the next day, things blew up.
Democrats claimed Trump called Haiti and African nations “s--thole
countries.” Durbin said Trump’s comments were “hate-filled, vile and
racist.” Some Republicans who attended the meeting say Trump never said
the phrase attributed to him.
“The language used by me at the DACA meeting was tough,” he tweeted.
“But this was not the language used.”
“Never said anything derogatory about Haitians other than Haiti is,
obviously, a very poor and troubled country,” he also tweeted. “Probably
should record future meetings — unfortunately, no trust!”
The dispute was grabbed by most liberals, the middle-class left and
Democrats in the self-proclaimed Resistance, who claim Trump is somehow
qualitatively different than other Democratic and Republican
spokespeople for the capitalist ruling families.
Despite their feigned indignation, every wing of the capitalist
political spectrum bears similar sentiments toward the peoples of the
colonial and semicolonial world, and, for that matter, toward the
working class in the U.S.
For the ruling class, immigration “reform” means increased control over
the flow of immigrants to ensure a sufficient pool of cheap labor. The
rulers all want greater flexibility to turn immigration on and off as
the hiring needs of the employing class shift.
This includes a steady supply of workers without papers, who they expect
to be able to exploit more cheaply and intimidate from fighting back
against exploitation and dangerous working conditions.
And they seek to scapegoat these workers in an effort to divide the
working class and lower the wages and conditions for all.
‘Guest’ worker visas rise
With a decreasing number of newly arrived immigrants, agribusiness has
sought to increase the number of so-called guest workers, who receive
temporary work permits.
According to the Miami Herald, the use of workers with temporary guest
worker visas has increased sevenfold in California since 2011. Many
landscaping, construction, cleaning and other business also came to rely
on Salvadoran, Haitian and other workers who had Temporary Protected
Status.
Mark Drury, an executive with Shapiro & Duncan, a plumbing, heating and
cooling firm in Rockville, Maryland, told Inc. magazine that workers
with TPS “are the best as far as immigrants, because they’ve had to stay
crystal clean in order to renew their status.”
The question for the working class and others who are in solidarity with
immigrants is how to unite the working class and end the deportations of
all workers in the U.S. today. Demand amnesty for all immigrants now!
Related articles:
Immigrant teen wins over gov’t move to deny right to abortion
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