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"An Anti-Immigrant Movement in Oregon, Too?" (Issue #18, August 1994)
The anti-immigrant fervor is reaching a crescendo in California. This November, Californians will vote on the "Save our State" initiative which would deny education and health services for all undocumented people, require all teachers, health professionals, and local law enforcement to become Immigration Service informants and sharply increase discrimination generally. Oregon does not yet have a "Save our State" movement, but major pieces are in place here to spawn one. Therefore, we believe the time has come to seriously analyze the forces that propel such movements.
We start our analysis by identifying the factors that shape immigration and how immigrants are received and accepted in the U.S. Immigration serves as a barometer of U.S. domination and foreign policy, and of corporate exploitation within the U.S. and abroad. The list of top-ranking "sending" countries reads like a "who's who" of U.S. intervention and multi-national corporate penetration: Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Cuba, Puerto Rico, The Dominican Republic, Haiti, The Philippines, Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos. Whether immigrants are tolerated or repulsed depends heavily on two factors: racism and the level of class resentment and friction in the U.S.
When economic conditions turn bad in this country, the government--backed by a reactionary, racist core--deflects responsibility by carrying out mass arrests and deportations, further militarizing the borders, and restricting legal immigration. Immigrants are invariably assigned the blame for low wages and unemployment, but also for crime, disease, and every other social malady. Economic crisis, combined with growing immigrant communities, has made California ripe for anti-immigrant hysteria.
The pattern in Oregon is no different. Oregonians cautiously welcomed the large numbers of mexicanos brought here in the early 1940's to fill the agricultural industry's wartime shortages. In 1944, workers were deported for demanding better wages. In 1953, during Korean-War-era recession hundreds were deported from Oregon, part of "Operation Wetback". In 1982, at the depths of the Reagan recession, the INS launched "Operation Jobs" nationally to deport workers occupying jobs"intended" for U.S. citizens. In Oregon, INS agents deported 100 workers from a Forest Grove nursery; all but six of the citizen replacement workers left after one day of work. Since 1980, INS has repeatedly targeted Mexican reforestation workers, spurred in part by collaboration and political pressure from white workers (including some from cooperatives) who blamed Mexicans for "stealing their jobs". In nearly fifteen years, thousands of workers have been deported, cheated out of millions of dollars in unpaid wages, but not a single one of these white worker has been restored to "his" job.
In short, an anti-immigrant climate here remains alive and well. We see seven factors, present today in Oregon, which suggest that this "climate" could develop into an active movement: immigrant communities' dramatic growth; increasingly visible organizing efforts among immigrant workers; smoldering class resentments--especially within the forest products industry--about declining wages, dislocation and employment insecurity; the ascendency of the Oregon Citizens Alliance and its politics of scapegoating; a predominant mentality of scarcity and competition (for health care, pension benefits, natural resources, education opportunities, etc.); the mass media's magnifying and stereotyping effects on all of these; and lastly, the example and influence of California. About the only ingredient not yet manifest in Oregon is the type of crisis atmosphere which the Right is expert at manufacturing.
The prospects for an organized anti-immigrant movement in Oregon add urgency to building bridges between communities, based on common long-term interests, and to strengthening immigrant organizations by showing visible support. Strong leadership from immigrant organizations will be essential in any coalition effort to defeat an anti-immigrant movement.
PCUN will soon announce plans to take our organizing to a new level of struggle and call for even greater support. Consider your response as preparation for taking on the immigrant-bashers.