Bush’s immigration speech—an appeal to militarism and reaction

The plan unveiled by Bush—the deployment of 6,000 National Guard troops on the Mexican border, the drafting of state and local police to hunt down undocumented immigrants, the issuance of new national ID cards and the setting up of massive detention camps for those caught crossing the border—goes a long way in accelerating the drive to create a police state in America.

Bush began his speech by acknowledging that millions upon millions of immigrant workers have taken to the streets of cities throughout the United States over the past two months to demand their rights as workers and as human beings. He quickly drew an equals sign, however, between this mass democratic and social movement and the activities of a handful of armed fascist vigilantes known as the Minutemen, who have taken it upon themselves to hunt down migrants along the US-Mexican border.

The president then promised to “make it clear where I stand,” which, not surprisingly, is with the Minutemen, insisting that the principal issue is for the US to “control its borders.” That the activities of a group of armed goons on the border counts for more than the social movement of millions speaks volumes about the narrowness and the nature of the political constituency upon which the US administration relies.

This was the first speech delivered by Bush from the Oval Office since he assumed office more than five years ago that did not deal with either the “global war on terrorism” or the US occupation of Iraq. Yet it employed the same appeals to fear and political backwardness that have been the hallmark of the “terror” campaign.

This is a president whose popular support has now sunk to the lowest level recorded for a US president since Richard Nixon was on the verge of being driven from the White House by the threat of impeachment. Bush’s reaction to this massive popular opposition is to attempt to rally the ultra-right and to turn once again to the military.

His solution to the immigration question, despite his protests to the contrary, is precisely the militarization of the US-Mexican border. In addition to the deployment of 6,000 federalized National Guard troops, Bush promised to appropriate billions of dollars for the erection of a “high-tech” wall separating the two countries, equipped with “motion sensors, ... infrared cameras... and unmanned aerial vehicles” to hunt down immigrants seeking to enter the US.

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http://wsws.org/articles/2006/may2006/immi-m16.shtml