March 05, 2008
Memo From Mexico,
By
Allan Wall
Border States Feel Strain…In Mexico!
In January, a delegation came to Arizona from
the Mexican state of Sonora, Arizona’s neighbor to
the south,
to complain about Arizona’s recently-enacted law that
cracks down on illegal immigration.
There’s nothing new about Mexican officials
meddling in U.S. immigration policy. They’ve become
quite accustomed to it. Needless to say, foreign
officials shouldn’t deter
Arizona’s lawmakers from doing what needs to be
done.
But there’s another angle to this story, which
illustrates the special predicament of
Mexican Border States, and the role those states
might play in the future.
Mexico has
six states that border the U.S. From east to west,
they are:
Tamaulipas ,
Nuevo Leon ,
Coahuila
, Chihuahua,
Sonora , and
Baja California.
These six states are among Mexico’s more prosperous
states. They are not major sources of emigrants to the
U.S.
According to a
2007 Mexican government report prepared for the
Mexican House of Representatives, the 5 principal
“emigrant-expelling states” are in Central
Mexico. They are:
Michoacan (President Calderon’s home state, said to
have
more of its people dwelling in the U.S. than in the home
state),
Jalisco,
Guanajuato (Vicente Fox’s home state) ,
the state of Mexico and
Veracruz.
Below is a table I have prepared, comparing each
state in terms of GDP per capita, the percentage of
Mexico’s total poor living in each state, and its HDI—Human
Development Index— a scale used by the United Nations
which compares countries and states based upon life
expectancy, education levels and standard of living.
Mexico’s HDI is 0.829, and its HDI ranking is #52
worldwide,
not too shabby. The U.S. has an HDI of 0.951 and is
ranked #12. Mexico’s
neighbor Guatemala has an HDI of 0.689, and is
ranked at #118. Mexicans, however, don’t compare their
country with Guatemala.
Just looking at these two tables, you can see there
is a significant difference between Mexico’s Border
States and its principal “emigrant-expelling”
states, although the latter are not Mexico’s poorest
states either.
If you want to skip all the statistics, just click
here to see this map of Mexico which makes it quite
clear.
Northern Mexicans perceive Mexicans from farther
south as being different. Consider this recent incident
from the border state of Chihuahua.
In that state, Mexican Indians from the south of the
country come to work in the fields. (Doing work
Chihuahuans
won’t do?) Recently, it was suggested that hostels
be constructed for these laborers. But a certain Adrian
Jose Serrano, government functionary of the Agricultural
workers program, told campesino activists that it
wasn’t worth it because, “they [the laborers from
southern Mexico] are
dirty, they don’t bathe or clean their rooms”,
and that “these workers have another culture, they
are people who come from the south of the country”.[Los
jornaleros agrícolas “son sucios y no se bañan”, dice
burócrata de Sedeso,
By Matilde Pérez U, La Jornada, October 26, 2007]
What if an American official said “These Mexicans
have
another culture, they come from
Mexico”? Can you imagine the
outcry?
Another Chihuahua official, of the State Human Rights
Commission, Roberto Dominguez, said that the workers are
“a social problem for the state” and defended
the failure of Chihuahua ranchers to pay them social
security.
There are also – ahem –
racial differences between northern Mexicans and
their fellow citizens from farther south. Generally
speaking, northerners are whiter. (When the Spaniards
arrived, what is now northern Mexico was
sparsely populated).
Recent work done by
the Mexican Genome Project has estimated that the
population of the state of Sonora is 55% European.
Long-time VDARE.COM readers may recall
an article I wrote several years ago, on how Mexican
immigration officials (in Sonora) tried to expel some
Mexican Indians (from the eastern state of Chiapas),
believing
them to be Central Americans.
When a northern Mexican travels in southern Mexico as
a tourist, he may be called a “Spaniard” or even
a “Gringo” – that’s a rich irony!
So this is what’s happening: Mexicans from all over
the country, especially from the principal
“emigrant-expelling” states, go to northern Mexico
and cross the border into the U.S.
However, when they get deported, or if they fail to
cross, they often stay in the border town on the Mexican
side.
The populations of Mexican border cities such as
Tijuana, Ciudad Juarez and
Nuevo Laredo have swollen with people from other
parts of Mexico (and
other countries) who often decide to stay rather
than go back home. And, these cities also attract some
law-breaking Americans on the lam from U.S. territory.
Because of the great influx of humanity in Tijuana,
the city
started staging mass weddings to marry people from
other regions of Mexico who wound up staying there, some
of whom didn’t even have birth certificates. This last
Valentine’s Day, the city
hitched 600 couples at one whack.
Not only do the Mexican Border States wind up with so
many frustrated border crossers and deportees, their
more dynamic economies and higher salaries attract
internal migrants from other parts of Mexico. All six of
these Border States now have significant proportions of
their populations who were born elsewhere: Coahuila
14.3%, Chihuahua 18.6%, Sonora 16.8%, Tamaulipas 26%,
Nuevo Leon 22.1% and a whopping 43.6% of the Baja
California population. (Source:
El Almanaque Mexicano 2008).
Let’s imagine what might happen if our country really
got serious about
enforcing the law and controlling the border.
Utilizing a combination of
effective border fencing, employer sanctions, and a
cutoff of benefits, we could actually achieve a
steady out-migration of Mexican illegal aliens. Some
would be deported, others would
self-deport.
But where would they all go?
Answer: They would go where deportees are already
going—the Mexican Border States. When the border is
tightened, the Mexican Border States feel the pressure
first.
Needless to say, you would hear plenty of bellyaching
about U.S. “xenophobia”
and “racism.”
But if the U.S. stands firm, Mexican border state
residents and leaders would be forced to turn their gaze
on their own federal government. They would ask the
Mexican government why it was permitting their region to
be used as the human dumping ground of the North
American continent. And they would start putting
pressure for change where it belongs – on the Mexican
government.
If they banded together, Mexican border states could
form a formidable coalition. The region accounts for
about a quarter of Mexico’s GDP. It is the home of some
of Mexico’s largest metropolitan areas: Monterrey,
Tijuana, Ciudad Juarez, Torreon, Mexicali, Tampico and
Chihuahua. The region’s states and cities are led by
savvy political leaders who know how the Mexican
government operates. Such a regional coalition could put
a lot of pressure on Mexico City.
In fact, the aforementioned Sonora situation afforded
a small hint of the direction things could go. Sure,
Sonora’s officials carried out the requisite Gringo
bashing and bellyaching over the Arizona law. But they
are also making plans to deal with the influx of
deportees in ways that don’t involve the United States.
At a press conference, Sonora’s governor
Eduardo Bours questioned Mexico’s own policies
when he said that
“We must seek
opportunities in our country. It’s easy to blame them
[Americans] and do nothing ourselves”.
Exactly! Now you’re talking!
If the United States really gets control
of its own border and
immigration policy, it will disproportionately
affect Mexican Border States. And when those states’
leaders realize that we aren’t going to budge, they will
go after the
Mexican federal government and demand change.
Not only would we be getting our own house in
order—indirectly, we would be helping Mexicans
get their house in order too.
American citizen Allan Wall (
email
him) resides in Mexico, with a
legal permit issued him by the Mexican government. Allan
recently returned from a tour of duty in Iraq with the
Texas Army National Guard. His VDARE.COM articles are
archived
here; his FRONTPAGEMAG.COM
articles are archived
here his "Dispatches from
Iraq" are archived
here his website is
here.
