From Truthout
The US Must Take Responsibility for Asylum Seekers and the History That
Drives Them
A boy receives help to get into the back of a truck as migrants from poor
Central American countries -mostly Hondurans- move toward the United States
in hopes of a better life or to escape violence are offered a ride along the
Mexico City-Puebla highway in San Marcos, Mexico, on November 5, 2018.
Donald Trump has ordered regular army troops to the US-Mexican border as a
caravan of a few thousand impoverished migrants slowly marches toward the
boundary.
Pedro Pardo / AFP / Getty Images
By David L. Wilson, TruthoutPublished November 10, 2018
Most people are capable of holding two or more conflicting ideas on any
given issue. Immigration is no exception.
A large segment of the US public was horrified in May and June when they saw
the Trump administration snatching toddlers away from Central American
mothers who arrived at the US border seeking asylum. Many would still be
appalled if they knew that the White House is seeking to continue the
practicein a different form. Most undoubtedly feel genuine sympathy for
young people trying to escape violent gangs or abusive partners. Still, a
lot of these same sympathetic Americans dont actually want the asylum
seekers to come here.
Some may be influenced by administration efforts to induce panicabout
immigrants invading the US for instance, President Trumps decision to
send troops to counter the latest migrant caravan, even though US Army
plannershave concluded that only a small percentage of the migrants will
likely reach the border.
But others look around at failing schools, collapsing infrastructure,
neighbors dying of drug overdoses or going without affordable medical care,
and they ask themselves whether the United States can really spare any of
its limited resources to help people from somewhere south of the border.
When they hear Fox News commentator Laura Ingrahamsaying, Its not our
problem, and President Trumpat the United Nations telling migrants to stay
home and [m]ake their countries great again, they tend to nod in
agreement.
These are real concerns. One of the most important questions before
immigrant rights activists today is whether were going to take these
concerns seriously and make a sincere effort to address them.
Burning Your Neighbors House
Anyone who has followed the history of US involvement in Latin America and
the Caribbean knows that the current crises in the region are absolutely
our problem.
The US government and US companies have dominated much of this hemisphere
politically, economically and militarily for more than a century. Theres no
shortage of studies and articlesdescribinghow US-backed policies and regimes
have driven migrationhere over the decades, especially from Mexico, Central
America and the Caribbean. Investigative journalist Allan Nairnsummed the
case up forcefully on Democracy Now! in 2016. Many of the undocumented
Guatemalans now living in the United States fled a genocidal campaign that a
US-backed military regime carried out against their countrys Indigenous
population in the 1980s, explained Nairn, who reported from the country at
the time. And then Americans complain, he continued. Well, you know, if
you go and burn down your neighbors house, dont complain when, as they run
from the flames, they come on to your lawn.
But a decently large segment of the US population knows nothing about their
governments role in spurring immigration. On the contrary, people
misguidedly think of US foreign policy as humanitarian, characterized by
much too generousgiveaways to ungrateful foreigners. After all, they rarely
hear anything to the contrary, since US foreign policy is basically
bipartisan. Establishment Republicans and Democrats hold the same views on
most of the issues, and the corporate media follow their lead.
The US relationship with Hondurasprovides a textbook example. In June 2009,
the Honduran military overthrew the countrys relatively progressive
president, Manuel Zelaya Rosales. President Obama and then-Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton gave de facto supportto the coups organizers, who
solidified their position five months later with a highly suspect
presidential election. In 2017, another questionable electionfurther
consolidated the coup regime by handing right-wing President Juan Orlando
Hernández a second term. Trump endorsedthe election results.
Crime increased significantly after the coup, with the homicide ratejumping
from an already high 60.8 per 100,000 in 2008, to 81.8 in 2010 and 91.4 in
2011. But most US political and media actors ignored the correlation between
the right-wing takeover in Honduras and the rising violence that sent asylum
seekers fleeing to the United States.
The Responsibility to Engage
So what can immigrant rights activists do to break through the silence about
the link between immigration and US policies?
We could encourage the corporate media to provide more nuanced coverage.
Many reporters on the immigration beat understand migrations root causes,
but in the absence of pressure from the other side, they end up giving into
more conservative editors, or else just reflecting the environment in which
they work. Still, its unrealistic to expect the media to do all our work
for us.
Fortunately, many groups are already working to provide context for
migration to the US. For instance, Witness for Peace, founded in 1983 by
faith-based peace activists in response to US funding of the right-wing
contra rebels in Nicaragua, recently concluded a Northwestern speaking
tourwith journalist Jennifer Ávila addressing threats to the free press in
Honduras. When reporters are kept from investigating, Ávila noted, the
government is free to continue the corruption and repression that drives
people in her country to undertake dangerous journeys to the US border.
Meanwhile, María Luisa Rosal, an organizer for School of the Americas (SOA)
Watch, was touring campuses in the Midwest and California to promote her
organizations upcoming annual November gatheringat the US-Mexico border,
which will bring US and Latin American activists together for rallies,
panels and workshops on such topics as organizing for the right to stay.
This is a term Mexican activists coined for peoples right not to have
policies imposed on them that force them to leave their homes. SOA Watch was
started in 1990 to draw attention to the role of the US Army School of the
Americasmilitary training program (renamed the Western Hemisphere Institute
for Security Cooperation in 2001) in producing Latin American human rights
abusers. SOA Watch activists say their focus is currently on raising public
awareness of militarized US foreign policy as a principal root cause of
migration.
Efforts like these need broader support. Grassroots education is hard work,
but it pays off. Right now, we have an important opportunity to end, once
and for all, the delusion that the US government is acting as the worlds
benevolent big brother.
We dont lack examples of US-supported regimes giving people reasons to
flee; each week seems to bring new ones. On October 21, the Guardianreported
that the trial for the March 2016 murder of Honduran environmental and
Indigenous rights activist Berta Cáceres was now in chaos. Cáceres one
of the best known and most popular grassroots leaders in Honduras, and a
2015 Goldman Environmental Prizerecipient was killed while leading a
struggle by the Indigenous Lenca against an internationally
financedhydroelectric project. The accusedinclude a manager from the
Honduran company owning the dam and three active or former military
officers; two of the officers received trainingfrom US military programs.
Irregularities in the trial suggest that the defendants may get off with
acquittal or a light prison sentence.
The US political class isnt paying much attention to these developments;
its too busy obsessing over the migrant caravan, which in fact, originated
in Honduras. But the Cáceres case points to the sort of treatment Hondurans
and other Central Americans can expect when they try to make their
countries great again.
