Jorge Garcia, a 39-year-old Michigan man, was deported this week after his wife and 15-year-old daughter bid him a tearful goodbye, according to The Washington Post. His 12-year-old son stood quietly nearby as Garcia was led away.
That scene is being repeated around the country these days as the administration of Donald J. Trump steps up its efforts to expel undocumented workers. Garcia, a landscaper whose wife and children are citizens, came to the United States when he was 10 years old and has no apparent criminal record. But current officials of Immigration and Customs Enforcement are not just seeking out dangerous criminals for deportation; they are also going after hardworking Mexicans, Guatemalans, Haitians and others without papers.
Soon enough, the nightmare that has engulfed the Garcia family may be extended to thousands of younger adults who consider this country their home. Trump has rescinded protections that allowed nearly 800,000 young adults, known as “Dreamers,” to remain in this country legally.
He has no problem casting out young college graduates, successful business owners, hardworking future doctors, lawyers and engineers. (Garcia was too old for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — or DACA — program enacted by President Barack Obama; it applied only to those who were 31 years old or younger in June 2012.)
Democrats are working feverishly to try to protect the Dreamers, but it’s not at all clear that they will be able to work out a deal with recalcitrant Republicans. That’s because so many GOP voters are dead-set against any policy that extends legal protections to darker-skinned immigrants.
Surely, it is clear by now that the president and his most loyal supporters harbor a deep-seated bigotry against people of color. Trump’s base may not be a “basket of deplorables,” but they certainly include a cohort of resentful white nationalists who are uncomfortable with the demographic change that is diminishing their cultural hegemony.
The election of the nation’s first black president — a man named Barack Hussein Obama — was a blinking neon symbol of that change. That’s why Trump chose to enter the political stage as a birther, claiming that Obama was illegitimate: It was a visceral appeal to all those whites who couldn’t stomach the idea of a black man in the Oval Office.
If you are not yet convinced, consider the remarks Trump made in a White House meeting last week, when he used a vulgar term to describe nations in Africa and the Caribbean, according to some people who were in the room. He wanted to know why the U.S. couldn’t attract more immigrants from Norway, which just happens to be one of the whitest countries on the planet.
For the record, Trump belatedly claimed that he didn’t say that. However, he has long waged war on the truth, so there is no reason to believe him.
Besides, he has a long record of trafficking in racist remarks — including his assault on Mexican immigrants as drug peddlers and “rapists.”
As for immigrants from those (expletive) countries, let’s take a look at the research. According to a recent report from the Migration Policy Institute, those who migrate from sub-Saharan Africa are better educated than native-born Americans.
“In 2015,” according to the report, “39 percent of sub-Saharan Africans (ages 25 and over) had a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared to 29 percent of the total foreign-born population and 31 percent of the U.S.-born population. Nigerians and South Africans were the most highly educated, with 57 percent holding at least a bachelor’s degree, followed by Kenyans (44 percent), Ghanaians (40 percent), Liberians (32 percent), and Ethiopians (29 percent).”
Those newcomers are making this country stronger, more vibrant, more productive. Of course, they are also making it browner.
For Trump and many in his base, that overshadows everything else.
Cynthia Tucker is a former winner of the Pulitzer Prize for commentary. Her syndicated column appears each Saturday.