I am Kyle's self-indulgence

Yesterday I saw my home of Fremont, Nebraska on the national news, though for a not-so-auspicious reason. They recently passed a law that would prohibit local businesses from hiring, and local landlords from renting to, illegal immigrants. Like the recent Arizona law, it unconstitutionally gives local governments the power to enforce federal law and make life more difficult for illegal immigrants already living in the US. Even if you have no problem with the immigration side of it, though, such legislation is an open invitation for racial profiling. After all, how many white people do you think will be called upon to prove their citizenship?

The racial element of this immigration debate was revealed to me in a particularly ironic way recently. The town I live in now doesn’t have the Hispanic population that Fremont has, and in my four years teaching at this school I have known of only one student who was in America illegally. But she was never the subject of ridicule or persecution. Nobody is going to demand to see her proof of citizenship. Nobody is passing laws to keep her from renting an apartment. Why? Because she had immigrated illegally from Canada.

Embedded in the debate over illegal immigration there is a very basic assumption that mostly goes unspoken, but must be acknowledged: People in America do not have a problem with illegal immigrants: they have a problem with illegal Hispanics immigrants. And no matter how many times people insist that they are just wanting to enforce the laws on the books, the underlying truth is that what they are tyring to do is keep illegal Hispanic immigrants out of America. And as long as that is true, any strict enforcement of immigration law in Fremont or in Arizona is just going to lead to Hispanic-Americans being stopped on the street, Hispanic-Americans being accused of coming her illegally, and Hispanic-Americans being asked to prove their citizenship just to find a place to live.