This UnGodly Sanctuary Cities’ ban about which I have written previously, now heads to the Governor Greg Abbott’s desk.
I wonder what he’s going to offer us Texans by way of justification or rationale at its signing?
To be sure, justifications for SB4 — that the governor is in the act of conjuring up at this very moment — will predictably flow mightily in rivers of language meant to obscure the unspeakable, state-sponsored violence that lurks beneath rhetoric’s force and surface. Will it camouflage as “safety,” “security,” “peace,” or “freedom?” Will the governor speak honestly, if at all, about the intoxicating profits that passage of this bill into law means for the for-profit, prison corporations? What is his relationship to them anyway?
If only we could fashion a discourse that could resonate with you and the Freedom Caucus within the legislature. Regardless, for you and others to extol the virtues of de facto militarism through policy is as unjust as it is horrifying. And what a waste of human and economic resources that immigrants signify. And what a squandering of the public trust and the moral authority that automatically attaches to your office.
Governor Abbott, neither Mexicans nor Mexican Americans or Latinos/as, generally, are at war with you, Texas, or this country. Not only do we not have to re-fight the Battle of the Alamo, but you can actually speak to us, speak to our leadership, and engage in civil discourse with Texas Hispanics. Thankfully, they still hold fast to the notion of a Texas and world where sensible and meaningful policies can be derived to the benefit of all, despite lines of party, class, ethnicity, and race.
A conflict-free universe involving the “Mexican- or Mexican-immigrant problem” — as it gets cast by political pundits—is admittedly, not entirely possible. But that doesn’t mean that we have to go to war with them — as this is what your signing of SB4 into law would represent.
Please, Governor Abbott, do not fall on the sword of a hopeless, racist agenda with its head in the sand with respect to the inexorable browning of Texas and America, as a whole.
In the long run, this flight toward a “romance of history,” as it were, that this fake war against Mexicans represents is cowardly, little more than an attack on the laboring poor, a predation on society’s most vulnerable.
Be on the right side of history, Governor Abbott, and veto SB4. To do otherwise is to cave in to a callous — if not homicidal — expression of human cruelty and dehumanization. This is not only perverse and shameful, but anathema to the cause of peace and democracy.
I join with all people of good faith who see the injustice in this law and its overtones of war, militarism, fragmentation, violence, and division.
