Deportation Nation: Trump Fascism Marches On—And, Thanks To Third Way & CAP, Dems Still Don’t Get It

Since When Do We Fight Fascism With Focus Groups? Open Borders? No— Open Eyes, Please

"America's Melting Pot" by Nancy Ohanian

“Left” politics prioritize equality, social justice and collective welfare over individual privilege and traditional hierarchies. The term originated during the French Revolution, when supporters of revolutionary change sat on the left side of the National Assembly. Core principles that generally define left politics across different contexts include:

• Economic equality: Opposition to extreme wealth concentration and support for redistributive policies. This ranges from social democratic welfare states to socialist collective ownership and, at least in theory, to communist abolition of private property.

• Social hierarchy critique: Challenging systems that create or maintain unequal power relationships, whether based on class, caste, race, gender, or other factors. Left movements typically advocate for the rights of marginalized groups.

• Collective action and solidarity: Emphasizing community solutions over purely individual ones, often through labor unions, social movements and state intervention in markets.

• Progressive change: Supporting transformation of existing systems rather than preservation of traditional arrangements.

• Internationalism: Historically, left movements have emphasized solidarity internationally, viewing social problems as interconnected globally.

The specific manifestations vary enormously by culture and historical period but what remains consistent is the fundamental orientation toward reducing inequality and empowering those with less power in existing social arrangements. This differs from “right” politics, which typically emphasizes tradition, hierarchy, individual responsibility and market mechanisms. 

Yesterday, a trio of NY Times reporters began their essay on the woes of the Democratic Party’s policies on immigration by defining the decriminalization of illegal border crossings— which Republicans define as “open borders”— as “leftward policy.” But they got that wrong. The right has been successful in covering up the most obvious thing about immigration policies: Many employers— especially, but not exclusively in agriculture, construction, hospitality, other labor-intensive sectors and Big Tech— benefit significantly from access to lower-wage immigrant workers. These traditionally “conservative” business interests lobby for— and demand—  expanded guest worker programs, reduced enforcement and  other policies that maintain a cheap labor supply while keeping workers in precarious legal situations that limit their bargaining power. Of course, this creates a fundamental split within conservative movements between economic elites who want labor mobility for profit maximization and cultural/nationalist populists who oppose immigration on identity grounds, as well as working-class conservatives who view immigration as wage competition. The U.S. Bracero Program, European guest worker programs and various agricultural visa schemes have been championed by business interests aligned with the GOP and European conservative parties while facing resistance from labor unions (as well as from populists and nationalist conservatives, who have gained power since the 2016 presidential election).

Never forget— as the media has conveniently managed to— that these policies serve capital interests by maintaining a reserve of workers with limited rights who cannot easily organize or demand better conditions. This depresses wages and working conditions for all workers, which is why labor movements have historically opposed such arrangements. The result: immigration policies that maximize labor supply while minimizing worker rights— a system that benefits  employers while maintaining worker vulnerability.

Well beyond what Lisa Lerer, Jazmine Ulloa and Reid Epstein included in their essay, let’s not lose track of the fact that the relationship between left politics and international borders is complex and varies significantly across different left traditions and contexts. Some left theorists— with virtually no support outside of immigrant communities and university campuses— argue that borders maintain global inequality by restricting labor mobility while allowing capital to move freely and see border controls as perpetuating privilege based on accidents of birth and enabling the exploitation of workers in poorer countries. From this view, freedom of movement is a human right and borders serve primarily to protect the wealth of privileged nations. Democrats have tended to support a perspective that requires defined borders to maintain redistributive policies and worker protections, contending that unrestricted immigration can undermine labor standards and social cohesion necessary for progressive political and social projects. Contemporary left parties in wealthy nations often struggle between humanitarian concerns about migration—  and for the generally mistreated migrants brought into the country by conservative business interests— and concerns about impacts on their working-class constituencies. (It’s also worth noting that progressive parties in Latin America, Asia and Africa tend to view emigration as brain drain that weakens their societies, even while viewing remittances and some diaspora connections as beneficial.)

The establishment perspective represented by Lerer, Ulloa and Epstein, emphasizes the xenophobic drift in the populist U.S. politics encouraged by Trumpism. They wrote that “Last year, 55 percent of Americans told Gallup that they supported a decrease in immigration, nearly twice as many as in 2020, and the first time since 2005 that a majority had said so. The embrace of a more punitive approach to illegal immigration includes not only white voters but also working-class Latinos, whose support Democrats had long courted with liberal border policies. ‘When you have the most Latino district in the country outside of Puerto Rico vote for Trump, that should be a wake-up call for the Democratic Party,’ said Representative Vicente Gonzalez of Texas, who saw Trump win every county in his district along the border with Mexico. ‘This is a Democratic district that’s been blue for over a century.’”

How the Democrats reached this point, and their continued struggles on immigration, is a decades-long story of political failures, missteps, misreadings and misplaced bets— and some shrewd Republican moves.

“We got led astray by the 2016 and the 2020 elections, and we just never moved back,” said Senator Ruben Gallego of Arizona, who introduced an immigration and border security plan in May. “We looked feckless, we weren’t decisive, we weren’t listening to voters, and the voters decided that we weren’t in the right when it comes to what was happening with the border.”

What the party does to change its approach— and to change how voters see Democrats on immigration— may be the most consequential and difficult decision it faces as it searches for a path back to power.

But while there is party-wide agreement that Democrats have a problem on immigration and border security, there is no consensus on how to fix it.

Some are pushing for a course correction they see as overdue. A soon-to-be-released proposal from the [very corporate and very right-wing] Center for American Progress, the party’s leading [and worst] policy shop, embraces restrictive ideas long championed by conservatives, including making it harder for migrants to qualify for asylum.

Neera Tanden, the center’s [hideously conservative, always wrong] chief executive, said the plan acknowledged a reality that Democrats had long resisted: They must embrace new immigration restrictions in order to have the credibility with voters to fight the far more expansive plans of the Trump administration.

“I’m happy to argue with Stephen Miller or anyone else about why they are wrong,” she said. “But the way we’re going to be able to do that is to also honestly assess that the border has been too insecure, that it allowed too many people to come through and that we need to fix that.”

Many on the left vehemently disagree, insisting that more conservative policies will only aid what they see as an insidious and ambitious effort by the Trump administration to demonize and deport Black and brown immigrants who have been in the country for years, remaking the fabric of a nation that once took pride in its diversity.

“Democrats have to stop talking about the issue of immigration within a Republican frame,” said Representative Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts. “This has nothing to do with law and order. This is about power, control, terror, and it is about racism and xenophobia. Donald Trump wants to make America Jim Crow again, and then some.”

… It was under President Bill Clinton, a Democrat, that Congress broadly expanded the grounds for deportation and that border enforcement officers saw their ranks increase sharply. The next Democrat to win the White House, Barack Obama, promised to pass comprehensive immigration legislation, including a pathway to legal status for an estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants.

Seeking Republican support, Obama also pursued aggressive enforcement, deporting more undocumented immigrants in his first term than any president had since the 1950s. But his attempts to balance the two priorities ultimately failed: His plan to modernize the immigration system stalled in Congress, while his executive actions to aid undocumented students, workers and families were challenged in the courts. Disillusioned advocates denounced him as the “reporter in chief.”

Then came Trump, who rode down the golden escalator at Trump Tower to announce his presidential campaign with promises to build a “great wall” along what he described as an out-of-control southern border and to expel migrants he condemned as criminals, drug traffickers and rapists.

As Trump competed for his party’s nomination, Hillary Clinton was under pressure in the Democratic primaries from Senator Bernie Sanders on the left. Immigration activists persuaded her to break with Obama’s approach— not to mention her husband’s— and pledge not to deport illegal immigrants beyond violent criminals and terrorists. But that promise fueled Trump’s candidacy more than it helped hers. He hammered away at her, saying she wanted to “abolish” the country’s borders.

After Trump won, Democrats moved even further to the left in opposition to what they saw as the cruelty of his policies.

Elected Democratic officials echoed activists’ calls to “abolish ICE,” ban deportations, decriminalize border crossings and end detention. Their efforts focused mainly on curtailing enforcement and standing up to Trump. They said little about the economic and social benefits of expanding legal immigration.

Trump’s restrictive policies, particularly the separation of children from their families, inspired a broader backlash: By the time he left the White House, more Americans favored increasing immigration than opposed it for the first time in six decades of Gallup polling.

But soon after President Biden entered office, illegal crossings at the southern border began to increase, as pandemic lockdowns were lifted and would-be migrants in Central America responded to Washington’s changed tone.

… Congressional Democrats tried to step in, striking a compromise on a bipartisan border bill that would have made illegal entry more difficult while allowing admitted migrants to receive work permits more quickly. But Trump pressed Republicans to torpedo it, to deny Biden a victory and keep the issue inflamed heading into November.

In New York that February, immigration and border politics overtook a special House election. Tom Suozzi, a Long Island Democrat, prevailed after adopting a hard-line approach, calling for a temporary shutdown of the border and for deporting migrants who assault the police.

Suozzi attributed his win to a willingness to take tough stands, as the Biden administration waited for legislation that would never happen.

“I don’t think that the voters moved to the right,” he said. “I think they voted more for the Republicans because they felt that they were not getting attention paid to their concerns.”

Biden finally responded to the crisis in June, issuing an executive order preventing migrants from seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border when crossings surge— the most restrictive border policy any modern Democrat has instituted.

Unlawful crossings plummeted. But it was too late to change voters’ perceptions. Trump maintained his advantage on the issue when Vice President Kamala Harris replaced Biden on the ticket.

Trump campaigned in front of signs reading “Deport Illegals Now.” He interpreted his victory as a mandate to push through an even more aggressive immigration agenda that would reach beyond the mass deportation of undocumented immigrants and into a broad swath of American life.

High school students are getting arrested at traffic stops. Children are being handcuffed outside courthouses. Restaurant workers are being hauled from kitchens during their shifts. And when protests erupted, the administration deployed the military in Los Angeles and arrested or manhandled many people, including high-profile Democratic officials. 

But as Democrats publicly oppose the president, they have privately traded recriminations over their failure at immigration politics.

Latino civil rights organizations are busy with “listening tours” to understand how Democrats misunderstood voters. Party strategists are conducting surveys and focus groups on immigration and border security. Some immigration advocates are warning that unless Democrats determine how to go on the offensive, they will keep losing elections.

In a private briefing for Democratic senators recently, Andrea Flores, a border official in the Biden White House who is the migration policy expert at FWD.us, a bipartisan advocacy group, blasted the party’s failure to make the case for immigration and its benefits, according to people in the room. She urged Democrats to lay out a clear vision for how to fix the immigration system— something she said the Biden administration had failed to do.

Democrats trail Republicans by as many as 41 percentage points in whom voters trust more on immigration and border security, according to polling released in May by Third Way, a [right-wing] think tank. Still, Trump’s sinking approval ratings on immigration give some Democrats hope that voters will listen if the party has something new to say.

“The vast majority of Americans, including Republican voters, are appalled by Trump deporting a child who’s recovering from brain cancer, or appalled by Trump deporting students simply for writing an opinion piece in a student newspaper,” said Representative Greg Casar of Texas. “Democrats can’t be scared about talking about immigration. We have to recognize that Trump’s overreach is also not popular with the American people.”

Casar and Pressley expect to reintroduce proposed curbs on mandatory detention and a ban on privately run, for-profit detention centers.

More moderate Democrats say easing up on the border and fighting over incarceration won’t win back working-class Democrats.

Gallego insists that what Americans want is simple: a secure border, deportation of dangerous criminals and a humane path to legal status for families already in the country. If Democrats fail to provide that, he argues, they will continue to pay a price.

“We have to be able to present an idea of what border security looks like that is not Donald Trump,” he said. “And when we actually say what Donald Trump is doing wrong, we need to be able to point to what we would be doing right.”

What we’re witnessing now is the catastrophic failure of establishment Democratic cowardice (thanks Third way, Neera Tanden and the procrastinators who ran the Biden show)— a party so paralyzed by fear of right-wing talking points, it abandoned both its values and its base. Who know longer knows that the so-called “center” is a mirage; it’s where bold ideas go to die and where Republican-lite proposals get laundered through think tanks like CAP before being sold back by the corporate media to voters as “realism,”realism, in this case, means human suffering on an industrial scale. It means mass deportations, family separations, surveillance states and border militarization— all in service to a narrative crafted by white nationalists and corporate exploiters. As Pressley and Casar understand, you don’t fight fascism by echoing its talking points. You fight it by refusing to cede moral ground, by organizing unapologetically, and by standing with the people being crushed beneath the boot.

Emily Berge, Eau Claire City Council President and progressive congressional candidate (against Trump lackey Derrick Van Orden) has some actual experience dealing with this. “Republicans,” she told us this morning, “went on the offensive here in Eau Claire when we were set to welcome refugees two years ago. As soon as they heard that a non profit was opening their doors to settle refugees in Eau Claire, the local Republican Party hosted an anti immigration meeting the very next day. They started organizing area ‘Patriot’ groups to come at the City and me, demanding that the City Council vote on if we should ‘accept’ refugees. I, as City Council President, did not succumb to their demands; I refused to be put on the defensive because we were doing nothing wrong. The City Council does not decide (nor should they) who can or cannot live in our city. Instead of getting on the defensive, I was clear on our stance that Eau Claire welcomes all; it doesn't matter where you are from. You can be moving from the small town next door or halfway across the world. Things were hot for a while as there were angry emails, protests, they put my phone number on a billboard but it's important to stand in the heat because that's when it matters most. The community needs to see our leaders standing up for what is good, for what makes us strong... whether it be in a mid size midwestern city or in our nation.” Agree? Consider supporting Emily’s grassroots campaign here.

Yesterday, Michigan progressive Donavan McKinney pointed out that “We cannot afford to waste one single Democratic seat, especially in safe Democratic districts; we need fighters, not Members of Congress like corrupt Shri Thanedar, who voted to say Thank You, ICE while representing in name only nearly 80,000 Latino residents in Michigan’s mighty 13th district.”

If Democrats expect to survive this— let alone win— they need to stop running scared and start fighting for a humane, progressive vision of immigration that includes secure borders and is rooted in dignity, rights and economic justice. That means rejecting Neera Tanden’s Beltway death spiral. That means exposing Trump’s “deportation army” not just as cruel, but as the shock troops of a corporate agenda that treats migrant workers like disposable tools. It means making the case— every day— that solidarity, not scapegoating, is the only path forward. This isn’t just about immigrants. It’s about whether we live in a society where billionaires and bigots get to write the rules— or whether people who believe in justice are finally ready to rewrite them.

"Let's Fix This" by Nancy Ohanian