Full Disclosure: Ruben Navarrette Jr. declined an invitation to write op eds for La Política while Professor Rubén Rumbaut has accepted our offer. Neither decision influenced this post.
Nationally syndicated columnist Ruben Navarrette Jr. today publishes a piece about the wildfires that forced him and many other San Diego residents to flee their homes. In the op ed, written and sent out to clients earlier this week Navarrette said:
“Unfortunately, there were those who took advantage of San Diego’s generosity. After police announced on Wednesday that they would be going through the stadium to check driver’s licenses and make sure everyone there was truly an evacuee, several hundred people headed for the exits.
“Then there were the six illegal immigrants who – in a despicable act – are suspected of trying to steal truckloads of relief supplies from the stadium. The scoundrels wound up being arrested by Border Patrol agents, who were there to help local enforcement with evacuations and crowd control – and not to enforce immigration law. “
University of California at Irvine Professor Rubén Rumbaut received an advance copy of the column and sent the following email to the columnist (the copy below reflects a few minor edits by the Professor to eliminate some personal details. Please also note that both Navarrette´s original article and Rumbaut´s response were written before the early reports of the immigrants having stolen relief supplies were discredited.):
“Estimado Ruben,
“I read your column, “America’s most flammable region,” with more than my usual interest. “Take it from a refugee:” your description of your own evacuation process was as poignant as your descriptions of the larger context of the events were eloquent and enlightening. It is hard to believe that in a seeming nanosecond “the largest evacuation of U.S. civilians since the Civil War” could take place right in our own front yard. But I’m glad to know you’re well and back home and not skipping a beat in your writing.
“San Diego is the closest thing to home I’ve known in the U.S. I have family there (including my stepdaughter), many friends and colleagues, and many memories. Here at UC Irvine many of my students missed classes because they had to go down to San Diego to help parents and family evacuate, or were themselves evacuated. We have our own big fire in Irvine (the Santiago fire, set by an arsonist), not yet controlled, but the flames have not gotten closer than 10 miles from our home, so it’s been mostly smoke and ashes we’ve had to contend with, not the brunt of the catastrophe that has befallen San Diego (yet again, a mere 4 years after the last one). Your line that “It turns out that America’s Finest City is also America’s most flammable” is memorable. New scars and all, though, I’m with you on your last line: it’s a fine city.
“But… if you’ll permit me a constructively critical observation: I’m not with you when, at the end of your piece and without anything else to balance the point, you picked on those ‘six illegal immigrants who — in a despicable act — are suspected of trying to steal from the stadium. The scoundrels wound up being arrested by Border Patrol agents, who were there to help local enforcement with evacuations and crowd control — and not to enforce immigration law.’
“I don’t know what in fact happened — but I know that, at a time when xenophobia and the immiseration and scapegoating of Mexicans/Latinos in particular are again at historic highs across the country, your words just add fuel to another “most flammable” of circumstances.
“Whatever you may have intended, readers of your column will take away a message (and almost predictably extrapolate a syllogism) of generalized bigotry: “ALL illegal immigrants steal despicably, ALL (or most) illegal immigrants are Mexicans/Latinos, therefore Mexicans/Latinos are despicable thieving scoundrels.” What’s more, “San Diego’s generosity” must therefore have come only from NON-illegals, and hence probably from NON-Mexicans/Latinos. In this morality tale that came out of nowhere, even the uniformed Border Patrol was there just to help people out, not to conduct warrantless raids in Qualcomm’s parking lot; those six scoundrels forced them to morph back into enforcers.
“But here in Orange County, and in San Bernardino County, the fires were criminally set, with evil intent: not by immigrants (legal or illegal), but by native-born arsonists — one of whom was shot to death by police as he tried to escape in a truck, another was arrested after a motorcycle chase to Hesperia, others are being sought… Now that is truly “despicable,” and it has zero to do with immigrants of whatever status. Yet not a word about that in your column.
“As to generosity: My wife listens daily to Spanish radio from Los Angeles, especially the Show de Piolín por la Mañana, a top-ranked show in the region, hosted by disk jockey Eduardo “Piolín” Sotelo, a Jalisco-born radio personality (who I believe regularized his own immigration status along the way): they organized a huge caravan (including a 48-foot truck) filled with donations generously given by the Spanish-language audience, including legal and illegal immigrants: see http://www.univision.com/content/content.jhtml?cid=1328843#p . They drove all the way to Qualcomm to distribute their gifts, and two bands came along to provide entertainment and fellowship. From Santa Ana in Orange County, Mexican restaurants organized donation drives and they brought tons of food to Qualcomm, prepared by immigrants, legal and illegal. That’s generosity too.
“There is good and bad in all of us. But singling out “six illegal immigrants” for special opprobrium without further comment by a leading and respected journalist is the sort of visceral slip that, by feeding into the anti-immigrant animus of the Zeitgeist, can help make America’s Finest City into America’s most flammable, in a way I know you did not intend.
“I hope you know that I wouldn’t take the time to offer these observations if I did not respect your work, and your words, immensely.
“Que vayas por la sombrita, como decíamos en Cuba,
tu amigo tocayo,
Rubén”
Rubén G. Rumbaut
Professor of Sociology
University of California, Irvine
http://www.faculty.uci.edu/profile.cfm?faculty_id=4999
Tags: Immigration
