{"id":21140,"date":"2019-03-01T19:27:03","date_gmt":"2019-03-02T00:27:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/live-immigrationreform.pantheonsite.io\/?p=21140"},"modified":"2019-03-01T19:29:51","modified_gmt":"2019-03-02T00:29:51","slug":"immigration-and-the-white-nativist-myth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2019\/03\/01\/immigration-and-the-white-nativist-myth\/","title":{"rendered":"Immigration and the White Nativist Myth"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Economist<\/a><\/em> has American immigration all figured out. Donald Trump doesn\u2019t want to build a wall to protect Americans. All that stuff about national security<\/a>, public safety<\/a> and American sovereignty<\/a> is just secret code for white racism. According to The Economist<\/em>, \u201cThe president appears to be motivated less by genuine concern for the state of the border than by his white supporters\u2019 feelings of anxiety over demographic change.\u201d

What evidence do the high-falutin\u2019 pundits across the pond provide for this assertion? Well, according to The Economist<\/em>, \u201cWhile the white population is on the cusp of declining, most states have flourishing Hispanic communities.\u201d And Trump\u2019s \u201cwhite supporters\u201d elected him to \u201cdefend them against the diversifying of American society that many fear.\u201d

There\u2019s only one problem<\/a>. That\u2019s a big pile<\/a> of what the Oxford\/Cambridge types who write for The Economist<\/em> would call \u201ccodswallop.\u201d

First off, according to the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research<\/a> at Cornell University, Trump received 8 percent of the African-American vote, 28 percent of the Hispanic vote, 36 percent of the Asian vote, and 36 percent of the \u201cOther Minority\u201d vote. So, claims that Trump supporters are monolithically white are pure fiction.

Second, claims that Caucasians are rapidly becoming a minority in the United States are widely disputed. And its not just conservatives who have recognized that fact. The unabashedly liberal New York Times<\/a><\/em> has stated, \u201cThe question of whether America will become a majority-minority nation \u2014 and when that might happen \u2014 is intensely disputed, of enormous political import and extraordinarily complex.\u201d

So, what\u2019s really behind the support for Trump and his calls for strict, effective immigration enforcement? In a word, \u201cpolitics.\u201d But not in the sense that most of us are used to using that word \u2013 meaning the swampy<\/a>, back-room dealings associated with Washington, D.C. Donald Trump revived the debate about politics as Aristotle<\/a> defined it: The notion that a political community exists to ensure the welfare of its citizens and can only function if it builds civic friendship between its members.

The current immigration debate in the U.S. isn\u2019t about race, it\u2019s about where the boundaries of our political community lie, who is entitled to become a member of our that community and what is expected of aspiring members.

As the British philosopher Sir Roger Scruton<\/a> put it, \u201cgovernments are elected by a specific people in a specific place, and must meet the people\u2019s needs \u2013 including the most important of their needs, which is the need to be bound to their neighbours in a relation of trust. If we cease to maintain a \u2018specific people in a specific place\u2019, then all political principles will be pointless, since there will be no community with an interest in obeying them.\u201d

Trump perceived this and appealed to Americans\u2019 sense that they were losing their identity as a specific people possessing a specific place. That\u2019s why his \u201cMake America Great Again\u201d (MAGA) slogan resonated with American voters.

The Trump immigration agenda is simply a natural extension of the ethic Scruton describes. Rather than setting up racial divides, it seeks to re-establish civic friendship amongst Americans (including those would-be Americans who obey our laws) and re-establish trust that the government is pursuing the well-being of the American people.

Of course, if you\u2019re a posh talking head at The Economist<\/em> that\u2019s an inconvenient truth. It prevents you from setting up Trump as the big Blue Meanie<\/a> opposed to all things good and globalist.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Economist has American immigration all figured out. Donald Trump doesn\u2019t want to build a wall to protect Americans. All that stuff about national security, public safety and American sovereignty is just secret code for white racism. According to The Economist, \u201cThe president appears to be motivated less by genuine concern for the state of<\/p>\n

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