United States
What to Expect from Trump on Deportations and the Southern Border
As Donald Trump made clear throughout the presidential election campaign and since he became president-elect, closing the southern U.S. border and deporting massive numbers of people is a number one priority.
On November 6, Trump national press secretary Karoline Leavitt said on Fox News that Trump has "a mandate to govern as he campaigned, to deliver on the promises that he made, which include, on Day 1, launching the largest mass deportation operation." He is talking about deporting an estimated 13 million people without government documentation, who are living and working in the U.S., many for decades. Such mass deportations would be done without due process, likely using raids by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and are estimated to cost more than $315 billion.
On November 10, Trump announced that Tom Homan, the former acting director of ICE who backed his "zero tolerance" policy in his first administration, will be joining the Trump Administration as his "border czar." Trump said on Truth Social that Homan will be "in charge of our Nation's Borders, including, but not limited to, the Southern Border, the Northern Border, all Maritime, and Aviation Security."
"Likewise, Tom Homan will be in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin,' Trump said. Homan is already promising workplace raids and said family separation could be avoided by deporting the family together (i.e. deporting children born in the U.S. in the name of not separating families).
Trump
is persisting with this plan not only because he is himself a
racist,
tyrant and quite prone to commit crimes against humanity, all of
which are true. He is also doing so because he thinks that by
doing so he can unite the military and avert civil war. By declaring
immigrants and
refugees "enemies within" the United States and acting to remove
them, he hopes to bring all the racists on board.
Trump represents the U.S.
person-of-state whose main job is to preserve the Union. As part of
this effort to unite the military, he is also targeting what he
calls
"every migrant criminal network" to justify criminalizing people
deemed to be gang members,
or human and drug traffickers and labeling them "terrorists."
Already, military officials are talking with officials in Mexico concerning the need for "transnational cooperation," and intervention by the U.S. military and policing forces to "help fight organized crime."
The presidential election and elections to Congress and the Senate did nothing to diminish the problem which remains of the danger of open violent civil war among the ruling factions and against the peoples rising to demand a different direction for the country. Doing everything possible to strengthen the power of the president to act with impunity is the Trump agenda, as it would have been for Kamala Harris also and it is in fact already being implemented by the Biden Administration in myriad ways. Biden is already engaged in closing the border and interning people in Guantánamo, away from the reach of U.S. obligations in the treatment of asylum seekers.
As president, Trump is also tasked with eliminating barriers in the Constitution to permit greater use of the police powers and impunity of the presidency against rival factions and especially against the peoples, including use of the military inside the country, and against powers held by state-level authorities.
For example, in terms of relations with the states, Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey, when asked if state police would help Trump's deportation efforts, said, "No. Absolutely not." "I do think it is important that we all recognize that there is going to be a lot of pressure on states and state officials," she added. "Every tool in the toolbox has got to be used to protect our citizens, to protect our residents and protect our states and to hold the line on democracy and the rule of law as a basic principle," she said.
Massachusetts, like New York, Illinois, and California, have seen a large influx of immigrants and refugees in the last year. To pit the peoples against each other while justifying removals, the claim is made that the refugees are the source of insufficient funds for housing, education, health care etc., especially in cities like Chicago and New York City. Massive war funding along with funding for the many policing agencies, and paying the government debts, are not mentioned when scarcity of funds is raised.
Immigration enforcement is evidently seen as one means to impose the will of the president through coercion and force. It can serve to break an existing barrier concerning powers of the states and their state policing agencies and National Guard, both controlled by the Governor of the given state. It can also be used to justify greater and harsher repression of the people in the name of "national security," using federal policing agencies and the military, if need be, as Trump puts it.
In this regard, already a bill has been put forward in the House of Representatives, possibly for a fast-track vote without debate, called the Stop Terror-Financing and Tax Penalties on American Hostages Act, also known as H.R. 9495. It would grant the Secretary of the Treasury Department unilateral authority, without evidence or explanation, to revoke the tax-exempt status of any nonprofit organization deemed to be a "terrorist supporting organization." This would effectively prevent them from getting donations and grants and force many to shut down. It would serve to increase use of "terrorism" charges against students and many others, and to increase the police powers of the presidency.
It can be seen that besides waging turf wars, the problems being addressed by Trump are not mainly those of closing the border per se. His attempts to preserve the Union by increasing federal policing powers and undermining resistance and unity among the peoples is what the peoples of the U.S. are preparing for.
This article was published in
Wednesday, November 13, 2024
Article Link:
https://cpcml.ca/ITN2024/Articles/TI54491.HTM
Website: www.cpcml.ca Email: editor@cpcml.ca