Not only is this New York Times op-ed insulting to black people, it’s historically illiterate. It does accomplish the catchy soundbite initiative, which was probably the objective here, but it’s beyond laughable. Behold, folks, we’re in the ‘Juan Crow’ era. That’s right—enforcing generations of immigration laws is now ‘Juan Crow.’ I mean, if you can get through this insanity, power to you:
In its merciless pursuit of people without papers — most of them Latino — and its demonization of asylum seekers, refugees, holders of temporary protected status, Muslims and Palestinian rights activists, the Trump administration is accelerating toward a new, modern nadir of Juan Crow, just downstream of Jim and Jane.
When a sitting U.S. senator refers to New York immigrants as “inner-city rats,” when a Florida governor waxes rapturously about the “Alligator Alcatraz” immigrant detention center, when a presidential administration takes two months to dismantle decades of civil rights law, we must admit that these are acts in a feature presentation of neo-Confederate revanchism targeting brown and Black people. The targeting of the undocumented has a name, after all, based in ugly history and shameful tradition: Juan Crow.
The phrase was popularized by the journalist Roberto Lovato to describe the “matrix of laws, social customs, economic institutions and symbolic systems” that isolate and control undocumented immigrants. The domestic policies of the Trump administration have taken this legacy to a more dangerous place.
The policies of this administration reinstate an era in which the rights conferred to all people in the United States by the Constitution are subject to a sliding scale of extralegal violability depending on one’s race, ethnicity or assumed immigration status. Tom Homan, the so-called border czar, has said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents don’t “need probable cause to walk up to somebody, briefly detain them and question them.” The administration has created a hostile, systematic stripping of basic dignities that works in concert with stymying official methods people are meant to use to seek relief and redress for governmental abuse.
The rest is pseudointellectual drivel. It truly goes off the rails, which you could likely guess when these people whine about how our laws and systems are hell for those who shouldn’t be here.
It’s supposed to be harder for illegal aliens, you clowns. It’s nothing new. History did not begin in 2024, and to equate immigration enforcement to institutionalized racism of the Jim Crow era that targeted Black Americans, who were citizens, is beyond outrageous. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, along with other law enforcement agencies, are booting people who aren’t citizens, who broke the law coming here illegally, and they’re going. One way or another, they’re going. It’s not Juan Crow—it’s the enforcement of the law in this area, which has been an ongoing exercise since forever.
The line “a sliding scale of extralegal violability depending on one’s race” shows the depths of how insane the Left has become on this issue. No one has the right to come here. They can rant all they want, but white progressives are mad that their pool of slave labor is being deported, and their political life’s blood is being desanguinated from our shores. We all know the deal: Democrats want unfettered open borders to overload our country, increase the population, which means increased congressional apportionment, represented by liberals of the same ethnic background. It’s why at least one-third of the entire House Democratic caucus comes from three states.
Just truly amazing stuff.
Editor’s Note: Do you enjoy Townhall's conservative reporting that takes on the radical left and woke media? Please support our work so that we can continue to bring you the truth.
Join TOWNHALL VIP and use the promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your VIP membership!
Join the conversation as a VIP Member