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Michael Meeropol: Lies About The Alleged Migrant Invasion

What does the migrant caravan have to do with the recent murderous rampage in a Pittsburgh synagogue?    And what do either or both of these events have to do with economics?   There is an unfortunate linkage that I will attempt to demonstrate.

First of all, a little history:   One of the chief claims of the Nazis as they gained strength during their rise to power in Germany during the period from 1929 to 1933 was that “Jewish international bankers” were exploiting the German people.   The references to Jews as international bankers was a clever way to build on traditional German anti-semitism (which had increased markedly during World War I and especially during the 1923 hyperinflation).   Referencing them as international bankers, meanwhile, built on the legitimate resentment by lower and middle income Germans towards the rich who seemed to be living high off  the hog even during the depression.

The same complaints about rich Jews have echoed throughout American history.  Prominent anti-semites in American history include the radio preacher Father Coughlin, the industrialist Henry Ford and the movie-maker Walt Disney.   Former President Richard Nixon and the evangelist Billy Graham were caught on tape agreeing that Jews controlled the American media and that this was dangerous.   Those Americans who held anti-semitic attitudes (luckily a dwindling minority over the course of the 20th century) usually believed that Jews controlled financial institutions.   The myth of rich Jews with “too much power” was so prevalent during the 20th century that the author Michael Gold wrote a book about Jewish immigrant workers entitled Jews Without Money.

Thus, recent attacks on the Jewish Hungarian billionaire George Soros as a manipulative Svengali who is funding left wing causes recycles a disgusting playbook that goes back well before Hitler.        

There is, of course, an unfortunate reality.   Financiers, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, have much too much economic and political power in the United States.   However, this is true of the super-rich however they make their money.   David and Charles Koch, for example, are billionaires who own paper products companies, pipelines and other oil related firms.   They are incredibly rich and incredibly powerful, and decidedly not Jewish.

[For information on the Kochs and others, check out Jane Mayer’s book Dark Money, The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right (NY:  Doubleday, 2016)]

Run down the list of the families with the great American fortunes – Rockefeller, Ford, DuPont, Morgan, Warburg, Bloomberg --- some are Jewish, some are not.  In Jane Mayer’s book, we meet the Kochs, the Mercers, the Olins, the Scaifes, the Bradleys, the DeVoses, and yes, Sheldon Adelson.   Of this group, only Adelson is Jewish.

Antisemitism diverts the anger of the middle and working classes from the entire class of billionaires to the sub-class of Jewish millionaires and billionaires.  This has an important political benefit.  Instead of a serious discussion of economic and political inequality, ordinary citizens are introduced to a fantasy world that blames a convenient “other” for their difficulties.   German workers could be told the depression had been caused by “Jewish international bankers.”   American workers can be told that the slow growth in wages since 1980 is caused by illegal immigrants.   White American (male) workers can be told that their promotion didn’t occur because an unqualified black person (or a woman) got the job because of affirmative action.   Divide and conquer is the oldest play in any oppressors book.

What better “other” with which to scare Americans today is there than the 4000 people currently WALKING from Honduras through Mexico to the US border in order to apply for refugee status.   Trump calls them an INVASION and has sent the military to the border.

[Most people would never guess from listening to Trump that there have been organized caravans of refugees moving north though Mexico for over 15 years.   Some have been organized by Pueblos Sin Fronteras, (translation:  People without borders).

(The most recent one trekked north in April of this year.   For some details see Nicole Acevedo “Who’s Pueblos Sin Fronteras, the Group Behind the Migrant Caravan that drew Trump’s Ire” April, 4, 2018) 

The reason these caravans exist is because it is extremely dangerous for migrants from Central American (especially women and children) to make the journey through Mexico to the US border.  Women are routinely raped.  Many migrants are beaten and robbed.  So the caravan is a way of giving the protection of numbers to these people. 

By the way, most of the individuals in the caravans never even make it to the US border.   Some stay in Mexico as refugees, others turn back.  Many of those who make it to the border do not cross illegally but present themselves in person to ask for refugee status.   It was from this group of would-be refugees that the families who ended up being separated were drawn this summer.]

The current caravan of migrants is about 900 miles from the US-Mexico border as I write this.  They will arrive in a month maybe.  So why is Trump sending troops there now?   Well, in a month the election will be over.  Those troops at the border will have absolutely nothing to do.  However their presence this coming week will be one more campaign event for Trump  -– paid for both by the US taxpayer and at the cost of interrupting the training of these regulars from our military who might soon be needed elsewhere.

The reason these military personnel with have nothing to do at the border is because by law, the active duty US military is not permitted to engage in any law enforcement activity on US soil.  That is why we have a National Guard.   It is pitiful to see Trump supporters believing that somehow the deployment of the military to our southern border is necessary to protect our country from an unarmed group mostly of women and children who are seeking refugee status.   As I have mentioned in other commentaries, there is a law on the books as to how the US government MUST respond to people who present themselves in person at the border and request asylum.   Those who loudly proclaim that the “caravan must be stopped” seem content to ignore US law.

[The fear of this caravan of migrants reminds me of the effort in the 1960s by supporters of the War in Vietnam to warn that if we don’t “stop the communists” in Vietnam we will have to fight them in California.   Senator William Fulbright quipped that he considered this an insult to the United States Navy.   Trump promised “extreme vetting” for all potential immigrants.   Is he confessing total incompetence in fulfilling that promise by sending troops to the border?   Has he totally failed to start “extreme vetting”?   He does supposedly run the government, right?]

Unfortunately, despite the idiocy of the actual arguments behind it, the scare mongering works – sometimes with deadly consequences.

The first step toward those deadly consequences is to promote the idea that illegal immigrants (refugees are mixed in with these folks in the minds of too many of our fellow citizens) take jobs away from Americans.  Nowadays, you would think no one would believe that any more – we still have all the so-called “illegals” in the country and unemployment rates are VERY low.   So, with unemployment low, the argument can be restated that these immigrant workers lower wages.

[Though there has been debate among economists as to whether an influx of low skill immigrants (legal and illegal) depresses wages of some low-skilled American workers, there is no question that overall increasing immigration leads to higher economic growth and overall increases in wages.  The lagging of wages in general since around 1980 is more the result of the slowness of the recoveries from the various recessions, as well as the decline in union membership and the decline in the purchasing power of the minimum wage.   For an exploration of some of the issues, with reference to competing economic analyses, see Amita Kelly, “FACT CHECK:  Have Immigrants Lowered Wages For Blue Collar American Workers?” (August 4, 2017) available from NPR.ORG.]

The second step towards those deadly consequences is what got the attention of the synagogue terrorist --- Blame “the Jews” in the person of George Soros or HIAS, a refugee-aiding charity, for financing the caravan.  HIAS stands for the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society.  It was founded in 1881 to help settle Jewish Refugees in the United States – many of whom were fleeing anti-semitic pogroms in Europe.    In 1975, the State Department asked that organization to help settle thousands of Vietnamese refugees in the United States.   In recent years, the organization has expanded its mandate to work with refugees all over the world and of many different faiths.   Though they have worked with Central American refugees in the past and will continue to advocate for them, they have not played any role in “financing” the caravan.   Neither has the billionaire George Soros, though his foundation has given some support to Pueblos Sin Fronteras (as has the Ford Foundation).

While most people who believe the lie that “the Jews” are attempting to inundate the United States with dangerous people (Trump asserts without any evidence that narco-gang members are in the caravan as are many “middle easterners”) do not pick up a gun to fight back, one sick individual did.   He found a synagogue that had hosted a fund-raiser for HIAS and murdered eleven Jews at prayer and wounded four police officers.

The man with the gun pulled the trigger.   But his mind was poisoned by fear of a non-existent migrant invasion and the singling out of a Jewish financier George Soros.   That fear was stoked by Donald Trump --- he cannot escape blame.

In response to this terrorist attack on the synagogue, I gave a donation to HIAS.   Anyone interested can do the same at their website www.hias.org

I also shared a visceral personal reaction, aimed at the (thankfully) minority of American Jews who support Donald Trump and the general right-wing agenda in this country.   I wrote:

This is my response as an American Jew to the atrocity committed at the Pittsburgh Synagogue recently.    There are too many members of the Jewish community (Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump perhaps the more sinister examples) who forget that we once were slaves in Egypt and, instead, identify with today’s pharaohs. 

These Jews (a relatively small minority of the American Jewish community) embrace their “whiteness” and their “successes” and wonder why “those other people” — especially blacks -— can’t “do what I did.”   This recent atrocity is a wake up call to all Jews who identify as white and “real” American --- especially to those who go further and have drunk the Trump kool-aid.

Despite Jared and Trump’s kissing the rear end of Netanyahu and being “pro-Israel,” the racism and xenophobia that Trump utilized to gain power will not stop with blacks and immigrants.   The modern day Nazis make no such distinction -— We Jews — all Jews —  have to take sides -— and I take the sides of all the “others” who Trump and his racist supporters have targeted.

Michael Meeropol is professor emeritus of Economics at Western New England University. He is the author with Howard and Paul Sherman of the recently published second edition of Principles of Macroeconomics: Activist vs. Austerity Policies.

The views expressed by commentators are solely those of the authors. They do not necessarily reflect the views of this station or its management.

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