Republicans Are Taking Out Their Obama Hate On Dreamers and Child Refugees

image

In the animal kingdom, a relatively universal trait all animals share is protecting their young and it is not uncommon for members of a group to share in caring for the young as part of their communal responsibility to ensure propagation of the species. Human beings are no different, but as difficult as it is to imagine, there are people who express an unnatural hatred for children that has been building in Republican ranks over the past five-and-a-half years. The Republican hatred for children is now manifesting itself in their cruel intentions for children of Hispanic descent, and in the case of one Texas Republican, children of Palestinian descent. But that is the subject of another article.

It takes a special kind of inhumanity to target children who find themselves living in America either because their parents emigrated from Mexico to seek a better life in the so-called “land of opportunity,” or fled unrelenting danger and violence to seek refuge and immigration officials’ assistance at America’s southern border. Of course, there is a midterm election on the horizon and Republicans dependably use immigration as a campaign issue, but they have singled out Latino children for their wrath to incite their xenophobic base and take advantage of their deep-seated racial animus toward President Obama.

Texas Governor Rick Perry has went to extraordinary measures to target Central American child refugees he claims are a clear and present danger to the national security of the United States, and Texas. On Sunday Perry lied about children from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador claiming “that some of them are from countries that have substantial terrorist ties whether it’s Pakistan, Afghanistan, or Syria.” Even Perry, a barbaric Texan who has seen his fair share of Hispanic children, knows the refugees are not of Middle Eastern descent and certainly do not have “substantial terrorist ties” to Pakistan, Afghanistan, or Syria, but he knows that Republican voters respond to fear-mongering, even if it is fear of children. After all, the refugee children pose such an existential threat to big bad Texas that Perry called up the National Guard to accost them for seeking immigration assistance according to the Bush Republican law passed in 2008.

To get more stories like this, subscribe to our newsletter The Daily.

It is curious why Perry did not object vehemently directly to his predecessor, George W. Bush, when he signed the law giving refuge to Central American child refugees. But that was before the brown children became pariahs, criminals, vessels for all manner of diseases, and national security threats after Americans elected Barack Obama as President. In fact, House Republicans suddenly found Hispanic children brought to America by their parents and lived most of their lives in America the object of their hatred to the point they passed a bill demanding President Obama deport well over half-a-million children back to their home countries. However, the prescient question Republicans must answer is why now?

If Republicans have always hated the so-called “Dreamers,” why did they not pass legislation ordering George W. Bush to deport them or face impeachment at any time between 2001 and 2009? Of for that matter, why did they support and pass an immigration law Ronald Reagan signed in 1986 giving millions of undocumented immigrants amnesty? For eight years Republicans controlled the White House with George W. Bush, including six years controlling both houses of Congress, as well as controlling the House since 2011, and yet they waited until last week to demand Dreamers be deported forthwith. If they truly hated undocumented immigrant children at the level they claim, and knew they presented a clear risk to national security and Americans’ health, they had more than ample time to pass legislation reflecting their hatred of brown-skinned children for whatever reason they are in this country.

Eight years was more than enough time to demand mass child deportations, militarize the southern border, and threaten impeachment proceedings if Bush did not execute the law and ship the Dreamers back to Mexico en masse. Obviously, if Republicans knew that immigrant children were “drug mules, had terrorist ties to Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Syria,” were deliberately infecting Americans with exotic diseases exclusive to the African continent, and were invading America, they should have taken swift action to protect national security; particularly during the Bush’s fear-mongering campaign according to its “war on terror” after 911.

Many Republicans claim the President Obama is unwilling to deport 550,000 Hispanic children because they are valuable during elections, but they or their parents cannot possibly cast ballots, so it is something else. The man who crafted the legislation demanding Obama deport the Dreamers, Representative Steve King (R-IA), claims Republicans are finally cracking “down on immigration because our nation’s borders were established by god and disrespecting the borders is disrespecting god’s will,” so apparently deporting Dreamers en masse is now a blasphemy issue that did not exist during 8 years of the Bush administration. King also said if Dreamers of legal age attempted to enlist in the military to fight for a country that increasingly hates them, they should be immediately deported.

DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) was appalled at the Republicans’ vile anti-immigrant statements and said, “This rhetoric is insulting, unacceptable, and harmful,” but she must know that is the precise purpose of the overt Republican expression of hate toward brown young people. Republicans desperately want their base to know that their representatives in Congress possess the same level of hatred toward brown-skinned children as they do, regardless they lived in America most of their lives, or are seeking refuge at the southern border. Xenophobia, like racial animus, is a dependable campaign strategy for Republicans and they know that their bigoted supporters make no allowances for innocent children because their hatred for people of color knows no bounds.

it is no surprise that Republicans have hatred for immigrant children because they have shown nearly the same level of contempt for all American children, regardless of color, who are stuck in poverty. Despite America’s untold wealth, Republicans were unfazed by the news that this nation had the second highest rate of children living in dire poverty in the world, and in fact, went to great lengths to make the top spot with Draconian cuts to domestic anti-poverty programs specifically targeting children. But, in their defense, Republicans never supported deporting them, calling up the National Guard to confront them at the border, or lusted for a Benjamin Netanyahu-type leader intent on “ethnic cleansing” to eradicate them like Dreamers or children seeking refuge at the southern border.

Americans have to face the fact that Republican hatred for President Obama has finally reached a level that has them specifically targeting children as surrogates for the African American in the White House. Republicans have likely always hated immigrant children, but when they had a Republican in the White House for eight years, and control of both houses of Congress for six of those years, they did not pass legislation to deport them en masse while holding an impeachment threat over Bush’s head if he did not comply.

This overt Republican hatred of children is more than just an attempt to scuttle immigration reform, or garner support from their xenophobic base leading up to the midterm election because they have had control of the House since 2011 and did not pass specific legislation to deport the Dreamers, call for invading Mexico, dream of an “ethnic cleansing” campaign, or militarize the southern border. It is true Republicans oppose immigration reform, are pandering to racists, and would likely enjoy “cleansing” America of brown-skinned children, but it is more probable their rage toward Dreamers and Central American child refugees is because they are surrogates for President Obama; the real source of Republican hatred toward brown-skinned children.


Copyright PoliticusUSA LLC 2008-2023