Trump's America is not the America I know and love

Yahoo

2 days ago

A child celebrates Independence Day | Getty Images Creative
Autocrats and authoritarians share certain traits.
They don't recognize checks and balances nor the institutions tasked with imposing them.
They do not recognize the rule of law. Laws that do not suit simply do not apply.
So, a country's governing documents such as a constitution are malleable. Truth is what they say it is, facts be damned.
Critics who challenge this – journalists and the organizations they work for, law firms, universities, disagreeable judges, artists, etc. – are in for punishment and derision. They are cast as unelected elites, liars and betrayers of the country's ideals, the better to silence or mute their influence.
But perhaps most importantly, autocrats and authoritarians must identify enemies for the rest of us to hate. Anyone who's not part of their tribe, ideologically, ethnically, racially, by gender or sexual orientation is a target. If they speak another language, all the better.
President Donald Trump has focused for years on targeting immigrants.
Trump himself is a descendant of white immigrants and is married to one, but that's where he makes an exception.
He has accepted white South Africans as refugees while dismantling protections for people from countries he once described as sh–holes. Which is to say, refugees who aren't white.
He claims white South African refugees are the victims of extreme violence. As descendants of apartheid adherents, they are members of a group that has retained its privilege in South Africa. They are certainly not victims of genocide, as Trump claims. The data shows that they are less likely to be the victims of violence than Black South Africans.
Trump's executive order to enshrine English as the country's official language – America for English-speaking Americans only – is another example of whites-only tribalism.
Long ago, the languages of European immigrants like Trump's forebears were thought to delay assimilation and demonstrate traitorous loyalty to other countries. But these days, the fear is rooted around Spanish of the Latin American variety and the languages of immigrants from Asia and Africa.
Around the globe, people in other countries think a populace fluent in many languages is an advantage, not a deficiency.
But Trump's American is one of proud provincialism.
In any case, immigrants already recognize English as the indispensable language of commerce and success in this country.
Ask any child of immigrants. My parents desired that I master written and spoken English, though the price was less literacy in their native language – Spanish.
My proficiency in English brought my parents the most pride.
Now, for many people, speaking perfect English is a matter of safety. Trump is deporting immigrants of color under an assumption they are members of criminal gangs. But in many cases there is plenty of evidence that those charges are misplaced, and people are being deported without due process.
Trump is carelessly rounding people up and sending them to a hellhole prison in El Salvador and to other countries he would assuredly describe as sh—holes — even to a dysfunctional non-country such as Libya, in the midst of a civil war, without giving them time to respond to the charges against them.
He has long labeled immigrants as terrorists, although there is little discernible link between immigrants and terrorism.
Under his broad definition, importing drugs to satisfy Americans' appetites for illicit substances is a terrorist threat, not a public health issue.
Even when the administration is forced to admit error in deporting people who have a legal right to be here, it is not returning them. See, Abrego Garcia, mistakenly deported to a notorious El Salvadoran prison.
Like many citizens of color, I've become hardened to Trump's racist animus. We've been cast as job stealers, criminals and a threat to American culture. This is the same animus that made the civil rights movement necessary.
Not so long ago, we thought the pendulum had swung to a more equitable, inclusive country.
But then more than 77 million Americans voted for Trump for the purpose of making America great again.
A country led by an authoritarian leader who thumbs his nose at the rule of law is not the America I know. And it certainly isn't great.
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