CounterVortex

At an April 29 rally in Michigan to commemorate the first 100 days of his term, Donald Trump focused on his border crackdown and deportations above all else. While he touched on the economy and bragged of firing “unnecessary deep state bureaucrats” in his speech, his racist attacks on migrants took center stage. Those attacks accelerated and entered uncharted territory the following week: the administration launched massive immigration raids, targeted sanctuary cities in an executive order, prosecuted migrants for breaching a recently declared “military zone” near the border, separated families, and even deported US citizens.

At his rally, Trump aired a video that depicted troops taking migrants into El Salvador’s notorious counter-terrorism prison known as CECOT. The crowd responded by chanting “USA.” Meanwhile, a contradictory picture began to emerge as to the nature of the Trump administration’s attempts—or lack thereof—to secure the release of Kilmar Abrego García, a Maryland man who the government admits was wrongfully deported. During an ABC interview on April 29, Trump admitted that he “could” secure Abrego Garcia’s release if he wanted to, an admission that contradicted the White House’s previous argument that his return was in the hands of the Salvadoran government. Days later, after having spent weeks bashing Abrego García as a violent MS-13 gang member—including by circulating a doctored photowith MS-13 tattoos superimposed on his fingers—the White House reportedly sent the Salvadoran government a diplomatic note to inquire about securing his release. While Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele reportedly turned down the request, it remains unclear as to whether the note was a genuine attempt to release Abrego García, or a performative effort to comply with a Supreme Court order to “facilitate” his return.

Much of the latest outrage with the Trump administration’s immigration policy centers on the news that three US-citizen children had been deported to Honduras on April 25, a move that, according to one federal judge, was clearly “illegal and unconstitutional.” The cases were similar: two mothers, detained and fast-tracked into deportation proceedings after arriving for routine check-ins with ICE officials, were allegedly not given the option to leave their US-born children in the United States. In the first case, a two-year old US citizen was deportedalongside her pregnant mother against the wishes of the father. In the second, two young children, one of whom has a rare form of late-stage cancer, were deported alongside their mother. In both cases, the families were taken hours away from the site of their appointments and forbidden from communicating with their family members or lawyers.

The administration has claimed that the mothers requested their children be deported with them and argued that if they had not deported the children, the media would have criticized them for “separating families” (the government is in fact separating families, including the case of a toddler who was placed in foster care after her parents were sent to El Salvador and Venezuela). Reports emerged that week that the administration is pursuing a policy that effectively constitutes “backdoor family separation.” ICE officials are targeting unaccompanied immigrant children under the pretense of conducting “welfare checks,” with the goal of deporting them or prosecuting their adult sponsors. According to an internal ICE document obtained by the National Immigration Project advocacy group, agents will target children with ties to alleged “gang or terrorist ties/activities,” a focus that activists fear will enable the government to fast-track deportations.

The Trump administration unveiled another innovation to the United States’ deportation machine: criminally prosecuting migrants for entering a newly created military zone along the US-Mexico border. Historically, crossing the border without documentation has not carried severe penalties. But on April 18, the administration established the “New Mexico National Defense Area,” which enables authorities to impose harsh criminal charges on migrants and asylum seekers. Twenty-eight people were charged April 28 with “violations of security regulations”—a charge that carries penalties of up to $100,000 in fines, a year in prison, or both.

The government’s open disregard for the rule of law, detention and deportation of its own citizens, and reliance upon broad-day abductions by hooded agents to spread fear, have led many to draw parallels between the Trump administration and Latin American dictatorships during the Cold War. According to reporting by The Guardian, many family members of deported migrants see disturbing echoes of that era in Trump’s United States. A leading human rights activist interviewed in the piece described the deportation of Venezuelan migrants to El Salvador as a form of “enforced disappearance.” The anguish, uncertainty, and fear expressed by the relatives of deported migrants is certainly reminiscent of the trauma of those who endured the region’s most violent regimes: “It’s mentally exhausting to be constantly thinking about how he is and what he’s going through,” the brother of a Venezuelan man sent to CECOT told The Guardian.

From NACLA Update, May 2

Note: The newly declared “National Defense Area” at the southern border stretches from El Paso to San Diego and constitutes an extension of the military bases at Fort Bliss, Tex. and Fort Huachuca, Ariz., and incorporates the Roosevelt Reservation, a 60-foot wide strip along the border in New Mexico, Arizona and California which is now transfered from the Interior Department to the Pentagon. There is a carve-out for “Federal Indian reservations.” The National Defense Area is to be patrolled by the US Northern Command’s Joint Task Force Southern Border. (DoD News, DoD News, Presidential Memorandum, WRAL, MSNBC)

Photo: WikiMedia via Jurist