Recently, “liberal” National Public Radio’s “Fronteras” program staged a “town hall” in Texas to discuss the DREAM Act, a proposed law to allow immigrant youth without papers to stay in the U.S. and go to college or join the military. The composition of the panel and the conduct of the event showed that the purpose was to promote racism and fascism. Anti-racist students from local colleges came to confront this panel.
In preparation, we passed out a leaflet on our campus and at the town hall that criticized the DREAM Act as a tool to force immigrant youth into the military. It exposed the composition of the panel: Lt. General Ricardo Sanchez, who had approved the torture at Iraq’s Abu Ghraib prison and is now running as a Democratic candidate for the Senate; a member of the racist, vigilante Minutemen/Border Watch; George Rodriguez, the head of a regional “Tea Party” organization; as well as an immigrant student and an immigration lawyer.
We called on students, teachers and workers to unite as one working class to “smash all borders and the capitalist profit system.” On the day of the event, we brought signs with slogans like “Workers’ Struggles Know No Borders.”
As the event opened, the moderator, who had selected the panelists, gave each a few minutes to speak. None of the liberals took a critical approach to the Dream Act. In defending youth who were “illegal through no fault of their own” and who could “contribute” to U.S. society, they demonized undocumented parents as “law-breakers.”
When pressed by a college student, General Sanchez reluctantly admitted that the DREAM Act would force people into the military since “dreamer” students would not be allowed federal financial aid for college or work permits. But, he continued, this was good for the military since immigrant soldiers were more likely than citizens to complete their service “honorably.”
Neither of the open racists addressed the DREAM Act. Each repeatedly called for more deportations and more militarization of the border. As the Tea Party’s Rodriguez ranted that the “illegality” of immigrants came before immigration reform, the crowd broke their silence with boos and hisses and calls of “YOU ARE A RACIST!”
The majority in the audience were anti-racists, including pro-Dream Act activists from local colleges and a large group of Latino high school students. During the Question-and-Answer segment, speakers challenged the Minuteman/Tea Party positions. A high school student denounced the term “illegal alien” as dehumanizing and racist. A teacher asked the Minuteman if he would have “teachers perform the duties of ICE agents?” and if he would deport students attending the forum. His reply was “yes,” teachers should be required to turn in “illegal” students and that he would deport youth without papers “in a heartbeat.”
As the crowd began to boo, the Tea Party’s Rodriguez chimed in to attack teachers for spreading “liberal ideas.” When the teacher called out the Minutemen/Tea Party as “Nazis,” the audience responded with cheers and applause.
The next speaker, an activist from Veterans for Peace, continued the theme by asking the panelists if they were familiar with Kristallnacht [the 1938 event when the Nazis attacked Jewish homes and began expelling foreign-born residents of Germany]. At this point the moderator, who had allowed the Tea Party far more opportunity to spew its racist anti-immigrant filth but had repeatedly tried to silence anti-racist comment, adjourned the forum.
The meeting ended with a chant of “DREAM Act Now.” Despite the good reception of our leaflet and our success in exposing the Dream Act as a racist military draft, we had limited influence over the chanting. Instead the overt racism of the Tea Party made support of the DREAM Act seem the “lesser of two evils.” Liberal NPR had used Tea-Party racism to build support for an anti-working-class piece of immigration reform.
But we have real opportunities to stretch these limits.
As people left the meeting room, Minutemen threatened the out-spoken teacher and a high school student. Students rallied to their defense. They took our signs and joined us in chanting “Minutemen, Nazis, KKK — Racist, Fascist go away!” The police quickly rescued the racists from the anger of the students. Since then, the Tea Party/Minutemen have launched an attack on the teacher, bombarding his school with calls and e-mail demanding his firing. Their demands have been publicized on the internet and in the local and national press. While the school system has so far refused to fire the teacher, no one should count on this.
We are developing a plan of action to continue the struggle against racism on our campus and to build support for the teacher and his students among our neighbors, coworkers and fellow students. Attacks against immigrants have intensified since the town-hall event, revealing the necessity of anti-racist, communist politics. We will continue to follow up with our friends and strengthen our contacts so that next time we can shut them down.
Friends in Texas