|
 he
specter of massive dual citizenship is haunting the upcoming Bush-Fox
meeting. Mexico wants "regularization." This means "green
cards" or legal work status for approximately three million
illegal immigrants from Mexico leading to eventual American citizenship.
However, under a 1998 Mexican law these new American citizens could
retain "Mexican nationality" and even their children,
who are born in the U.S., could claim Mexican dual citizenship.
Linda Chavez,
a leading pro-immigration Hispanic Republican warned of the unique
challenge of Mexican dual citizenship to American national cohesion.
She said, "although some other countries…allow dual nationality
— no other nation sends as many immigrants to the United States
or shares a common border…for the first time millions of U.S.
Citizens could declare their allegiance to a neighboring country."
America is
the most successful immigrant country in the history of the world.
Our success is based on what could be called "patriotic assimilation"
in which immigrants transfer political allegiance from their birth
country to the United States and become Americans as loyal as any
descendants of the Mayflower. This core American principle should
be at the heart of the current U.S.-Mexican negotiations on the
status of illegal Mexican immigrants.
Today, American
negotiators are focused on how best to help Mexican President Vincente
Fox's reform policies while strengthening border security in the
new post-9/11 world. The desire to help Fox makes sense. Fox is
the first Mexican president since the revolution (1910-1920s) to
seriously attempt free-market and democratic reforms. An economically
stronger and more democratic Mexico is good for the U.S. as well
as for the Mexican people, and would help alleviate the illegal
immigration problem in the long run.
However, there
are two points that American negotiators should keep in mind while
they consider how best to help President Fox. First of all,
President Fox's success will ultimately depend on how well he handles
the intricacies of Mexican domestic politics. A knowledgeable pro-Fox
American commentator, Michael Barone, notes that the new president's
efforts to deal with the Chipas rebels, tax reform, official corruption,
and the Mexican Congress (his party is in the minority) have stalled.
In the end, there is only so much the Bush administration and the
U.S. Congress realistically can do to help President Fox, as admirable
as their motives may be.
Second,
while working cooperatively on many issues, American negotiators
must, at the same time, counter Mexican actions that challenge our
core national interest in assimilating immigrants as patriotic Americans
with undivided political loyalty to the United States. Writing in
National Review (October 12, 1998) Jorge Amselle (like Linda
Chavez, a pro-immigration Latino Republican) warned that, "The
Mexican government through its promotion of bilingual education
and of dual nationality and voting is actively subverting the assimilative
process of Americanization…."
Amselle was
referring to the official Mexican government policy of acercamiento
("getting closer" or "establishing a bond")
to "Mexican communities abroad," meaning both Mexican
citizens living in the United States and Mexican Americans who are
U.S. citizens. This policy was started by the old PRI regime and
has been considerably expanded by Fox. The spirit of this policy
is exemplified by Juan Hernandez, a Texas-born Mexican-American
dual citizen, who is Fox's cabinet minister for Mexicans Abroad.
Hernandez told
Nightline that "we are betting" that Mexican-Americans
who are American citizens (even after several generations) will
"think Mexico First." Hernandez and other Mexican officials
continually repeat the refrain that Fox is the leader of 120 million
Mexicans, 100 million in Mexico and 20 million in the United States.
Since this concept would, by definition, include not only Mexican
migrants who sometimes work north of the Rio Grande, but also millions
of American citizens of Mexican descent, many of whom were born
in the United States — it is clearly in contradiction to traditional
American principles of civic assimilation and immigrant loyalty.
Two years ago,
before Fox became president, his current national-security adviser,
Adolfo Aguilar Zinser, advocated a policy in which the Mexican government
would work politically with the "20 million Mexicans"
in the U.S. to advance Mexican "national interests." In
El Siglo de Torreon on May 5, 2000, Zinser attacked American
attempts to stop illegal immigrants from crossing the border. He
declared that "Mexicans are subjected every day to mean-spirited
acts and their rights are permanently threatened by ambitious politicians
who are hunting for the Anglo vote." After disparaging the
"reactionary Senator Jessie Helms," Zinser recommended
that Mexico "find allies in the U.S. political system"
particularly among "Liberal Democrats, labor unions, civil
rights organizations, and social movements."
Last month
The Californian (Salinas) reported on February 26 that the
Mexican counsel general in San Jose, Marco Antonio Alcazar, told
Mexican-American fifth and six graders at a school in Salinas that
because of Mexico's dual-nationality law they have "the right
to automatically obtain Mexican citizenship." Alcazar declared,
"This is exciting because there are many children, who were
born in the United States, whose parents are Mexican. And these
children have the opportunity now to enjoy two different nationalities…"
Alcazar gave the school "complete collections of educational
books from the Mexican government, intended to help students understand
Mexican history and culture."
How different
the schools are today from those that educated the children whose
parents came through Ellis Island. In those far off days, the children
of Italian immigrants did not study the exploits of Garibaldi and
Mazzini in American public schools with textbooks provided by the
Italian government. Instead, the emphasis was on assimilating the
children of immigrants by teaching them about American heroes such
as Washington and Lincoln.
The words and
actions of Hernandez, Zinser, and Alcazar tell us that some Mexican
policies represent a challenge to America's interest in assimilating
immigrants as loyal Americans. Even President Bush's point man in
Congress on Mexican border issues, Congressman Chris Cannon (R.,
Utah) is concerned about Mexico's promotion of dual citizenship.
Cannon told the National Journal (March 2) "You need
to be clear about where your loyalties are."
Of course,
despite these problems, it remains in America's interests to encourage
economic and democratic reforms in Mexico. Thus, Brookings scholar
Robert Leiken has suggested, in a report for the Center
for Immigration Studies, that private sector development aid
for Mexico focus on investment and infrastructure in those poor
zones in the southern and central parts of the country where most
immigrants originate.
In short, American
negotiators with Mexico should be able "to walk and chew gum
at the same time." They should defend American interests in
post-9/11 border security and in the patriotic assimilation of new
immigrants, while promoting trade and to the extent realistic helping
to strengthen Fox's admirable economic and democratic reforms.
|
