America Is No Longer …(“a nation of immigrants”)
This week the Trump Administration, specifically USCIS, removed the words “America’s promise as a nation of immigrants” from its website in what is just the most recent demonstration of aggression towards immigrants. If America were no longer a nation of immigrants, it would simply cease to be. And yet, while we know that won’t happen, and its immigrant history cannot be undone, it is painful to see this ongoing campaign of aggression.
The entirety of the statement changed from:
“USCIS secures America’s promise as a nation of immigrants by providing accurate and useful information to our customers, granting immigration and citizenship benefits, promoting an awareness and understanding of citizenship, and ensuring the integrity of our immigration system.”
To:
“U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services administers the nation’s lawful immigration system, safeguarding its integrity and promise by efficiently and fairly adjudicating requests for immigration benefits while protecting Americans, securing the homeland, and honoring our values.”
I know that this should not come as a surprise, given the constant false narratives put forth by this administration against immigrants over the past two years, equating immigrants with terrorists, gang members, and generally as “deplorables.” However, I always thought “nation of immigrants” was one of those most fundamental values that make the U.S. “America”. I thought there was nothing more sacrosanct than that “American Dream” that has brought immigrants- adventurers, workers, entrepreneurs, refugees, asylum seekers- from all shores, choosing to make this place their home, a sancutary, “land of the free and home of the brave,” and contribute to it. The USCIS director, Francis Cissna (son of an immigrant), tried to explain away the change, noting that “a bureaucratic statement isn’t the place for such a sentiment…Those sorts of things belong chiseled in stone or chiseled in our hearts,” he said.
But government policy has to be in black and white. Policy is not written in our hearts, nor in stone. The Director went on to say:
“What we do at USCIS is so important to our nation, so meaningful to the applicants and petitioners, and the nature of the work is often so complicated, that we should never allow our work to be regarded as a mere production line or even described in business or commercial terms. In particular, referring to applicants and petitioners for immigration benefits, and the beneficiaries of such applications and petitions, as ‘customers’ promotes an institutional culture that emphasizes the ultimate satisfaction of applicants and petitioners, rather than the correct adjudication of such applications and petitions according to the law. Use of the term leads to the erroneous belief that applicants and petitioners, rather than the American people, are whom we ultimately serve.”
Even if one looks beyond the contradiction in this statement in regards to how “applicants and petitioners” are viewed, Mr. Cissna fails to recognize that those petitioners ARE AMERICANS. The very Americans that he “ultimately serves” in most instances. Whether born in the U.S. or naturalized, they are U.S. citizens, they are Americans. And this is where we have to be careful — where will the next round of distinctions be made? Between naturalized and U.S.-born Americans?
I arrived to the U.S. at the age of 4 through sheer fate more than faith. In a privileged position, I could have chosen to live almost anywhere in the world. But I chose to become a citizen, I embraced the “faith” and chose this country because of its values, because I believed (and still hope) that it is a beacon of light in the world, that “shining city on a Hill” that’s big enough for all of us. The values that bought me in to the “American Dream” were openness, generosity, diligence, creativity, fairness, respect- for laws and for people, and leadership.
I know that I am not alone in my concern for how these values have been damaged since the results of the 2016 election. Like many, I believed the election of Donald Trump would be bad news. The image at the top of this post is one I took of the area where he was inaugurated just a couple days after the event. It struck me because I felt deeply that he did represent a “demolition” of sorts of what I consider to be American values, but my estimations didn’t do reality justice. This administration’s words and actions have done lasting damage to the fabric of American society, to our values, to our discourse, our institutions, and to our self-esteem. Because words matter. Countless research has shown us as much.
Words matter, and there are little boys and girls, immigrant men and women, people of all colors, creeds, and sexual preferences who today question whether they belong. Whether they are wanted. It gets even harder when you are explicitly, unequivocally, told that you don’t really fit the mission statement.
America is no longer, when the government is stifling people and stifling speech. This administration’s hateful rhetoric and actions have stifled speech, and in so doing, chipped away at the following institutions:
· USCIS — “U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services”, no longer doing the immigration part.
·Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) — Yes, remember how “climate change” is no longer a thing according to the EPA? America is no longer, when we’re not leading on pressing global challenges.
· DREAMers — Repealing DACA, shattering one DREAMer’s life at a time. America is no longer, when we go from passing a GI Bill to failing our young people, the future of this country.
· Healthcare — Working to repeal coverage for those who need it the most.
· Threatening our democracy — Promoting lies about “illegals” voting, while there is real, honest-to-god, manipulation of our electoral system being perpetrated by at least one foreign government.
· Corruption — If there was ever one thing for which Americans were highly regarded, it was that our officials, especially our President, were of unimpeachable character (ok, for most of our history), particularly when it came to the world stage. America is no longer America if we don’t preserve rule of law, particularly at the highest levels of government.
· Racism and Prejudice — There are words that were essentially banned from being socially acceptable for reasons that are not of “political correctness”, but because words become culture, and hateful words become hateful acts. Today, those words are back.
The irony of this latest affront is that the rates of immigration to the U.S. have actually decreased in recent history. And the percentage of the population who are immigrants is no higher than at other points in history, it is at a rate similar to what existed in 1910.
Obviously, I am also aware that the values I mention have always been largely aspirational— the U.S. has a history of treating immigrants unkindly, and has never been perfect in following any of the value systems mentioned, but we tried. We held those aspirations, we made the effort. We’ve had leaders who encourage us to get there.
And while removing this language can’t change the fact that the U.S. was in fact built by immigrants, it reveals (once again) the bias and broader xenophobic agenda harbored by this administration and the immigration extremists who hold leadership positions within it.
For a bit of hope, I leave you with Raye Zaragoza, a woman whose Mexican, Taiwanese, Japanese and Native American-mixed identity has inspired her musical career. Because hate can’t be the face of the American Dream:
“‘American Dream’ tells the story of my family and challenges the outdated concept of the American Dream with its white picket fence and house in the suburbs, because it’s never been truly inclusive of all American people. In the last year alone, the American people have been under a constant barrage of distressing news, a “fake news” war waged by our President against the free press, and day after day our country feels increasingly divided. Hatred and fear have an overt national presence like nothing we’ve seen in our lifetimes. It’s time to rise up, turn off the television and take a stand. The days of apathy are over — either we do something about the injustice happening around our country, or we admit to being a part of the problem. We can rewrite the American Dream into a new storyline that looks out for all of us. It’s a big task, but as the chorus of the song says, ‘Change is a choice, and it can start with me.’”
