This blog begins by challenging my readers to explore the truth of the current southern border crisis. I can think of no better way to start this journey than to recall the deadly mass shooting at the Walmart store on August 3, 2019, in El Paso, Texas. For those of us who call the Rio Grande border home, this one event galvanized our hearts and shook us to the very core of our collective experiences. Now, four years later, Professor Gilberto Rosas invites all Americans as well as those of us who live in la frontera to see, with bright clarity, how this horrible incident came about and how it continues today.
Rosas deploys eyewitness testimonies recalling not only the El Paso massacre but also other day to day incidents along the border that compile into one voice shouting for reason, humanity, fairness and all the opposite, chaotic noises that daily resonate along the border. Border crossings in the past decade along the River were never as bad as crossings are now. Perhaps, readers, there are reasons why over ten thousand have died trying to cross the border in the past few years and a million more are detained, abused, tortured, and refused lawful entry. Professor Rosas with surgical precision cuts through our prejudice and political bombast, of both political parties, and lays open the truth behind why our homeland has been degraded, dehumanized, and demonized.
The unpleasant truth starts in the U.S. where narcotic addiction runs amok with no effort to legalize, tax, and rehabilitate. Instead, the normal is to repress, abuse, and enable. Cartels are flooded with money from the sale of narcotics flowing freely. This money facilitates legal acquisition in states such as Texas, purchases of military grade weapons and ammunition. With additional weapons of mass destruction, cartels control the local governments of Central America and Mexico and the means of production for more narcotics in their major American markets. This is the deadly twenty-first century triangle trade: drugs, money, guns. The political and social groundwork for control of local government began over 150 years ago. American interference with Central American nations and Mexican governments where U.S. involvement clearly preferred the destruction of locally elected, left leaning governments in favor of American instigated coups installing right wing, fascist governance. The die is cast for political upheaval and social chaos that cause mass migration to the U.S. with legitimate cries for asylum.
The truth is unsettling. The chaos erupting on our border is also unsettling. Indeed, we are now, more than ever, morally obligated to help and assist those who come to us for asylum from events precipitated by our own actions. When shall we see fair and equitable immigration reform?
