Blame Mexico First

There are many aggravating tropes that keep reemerging in the debate over immigration policy but one of the worst is that every problem with the U.S. immigration system is the result of the supposedly perfidious Mexico.   Changes in Mexican law and policy certainly have an impact on immigration to the United States but it is not true that our laws would operate wonderfully even if foreign governments had policies to support them.  Those who blame Mexico should, at the minimum, get their stories straight. In many versions of this tale, the Mexican government is hypocritical because its immigration laws are strict yet it complains about laws like SB 1070 in Arizona and the deportation of Mexican citizens from the United States.   Talk radio show host Rush Limbaugh famously used this rhetorical tactic when sarcastically (maybe?)proposing a series of immigration reforms that mirrored the worst of Mexican immigration law in 2007.           The Mexican government fiercely criticized the passage of Arizona ’s SB 1070 in 2010, a bill that forced state and local police to enforce federal immigration laws.  When then-President of Mexico Felipe Calderon visited the White House and intended to complain about the law directly to President Obama, Representative Ted Poe (R-TX)said, “I wonder if they’ll discuss whether or not Calderon supports his own country’s immigration policy.”  Both Limbaugh and Poe rightly criticized Mexico’s famously restrictive, self-destructi...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs