Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis released a plan for the southern border this week that uses the word “invasion” at least five times. He later took this rhetoric to hallucinogenic extremes, declaring on Fox News that anyone with drugs who “is cutting through a border wall” should end up “stone-cold dead.”
The specter of a migrant “invasion,” which carries white nationalist overtones, has been a mainstay of Donald Trump’s political vocabulary ever since he ran for president in 2016. But the fact that DeSantis and Trump — the leaders in polls for the Republican nomination — are both all in on this ugly notion shows how profoundly it is capturing the GOP.
Democrats can’t let this moment go unanswered. In coming weeks, opportunities to mount major pushback will arise, and Democrats should make the most of them.
First, DeSantis’s draconian immigration law, which is designed to make life more difficult for undocumented immigrants in numerous ways, is set to take effect on July 1. Already, it has prompted migrants to consider leaving the state. That’s causing panic among Florida businesses that rely on migrant workers. Even Republicans are lamenting the law’s expected impact.
León Krauze: The real tragedy is unfolding on the Mexican side of the border
Soon enough, stories of immigrants and businesses facing hardships could go national. Just as red-state antiabortion laws and school crackdowns have produced viral tales of reactionary excess, so too will the nation train its attention on Florida’s anti-immigrant regime and the carnage it’s producing.
Democrats can seize on this to argue that treating immigration as an invasion, as DeSantis’s law will do, produces terrible real-world results.
“DeSantis policies treating immigrants like invaders will bring an unbelievable amount of social and economic strife to Florida,” Democratic strategist Simon Rosenberg told me. “It’s important Democrats make the GOP’s escalating malevolence central to their 2024 argument.”
Democrats should tie this to DeSantis’s agenda for the southern border, which in some respects is more extreme than anything Trump tried to do. DeSantis loves to claim that Florida is his model for how he would run the country. If his Florida law shapes up as the disaster businesses fear, Democrats can argue that it indicates what might happen if his ethic of treating migrants as invaders shapes national policy.
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Democrats will have another opening when the House GOP drive to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas gains steam this summer. To lay the groundwork for this, House Republicans have transformed “invasion” language into everyday usage. They’ve insisted the nation is “ravaged by an illegal alien invasion” that is plunging us into “third word status,” that the “invasion” is “changing our culture” and that “our sovereignty has been defiled.”
A Democratic aide tells me that some House Democrats have privately discussed ways of engaging the “invasion” notion in a high-profile, forceful and concerted way.
“You will see House Democrats start to push back a lot more on the language,” Rep. Daniel S. Goldman (D-N.Y.), a member of the Homeland Security Committee, said in an interview, noting that it spreads “fear, division and hate.”
What might this look like? Mayorkas is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee in July, and border enforcement officials are scheduled to appear at a House subcommittee hearing next month as well, someone familiar with the planning said.
Democrats can press Mayorkas and those officials on whether “invasion” language incites violence against migrants and the dangers that creates for law enforcement. They can raise the related subject of “great replacement theory,” the idea that elites are replacing native-born Americans with non-White immigrants, and solicit testimony on how this has inspired white nationalist terrorism.
Viral moments are the coin of the realm in today’s politics, and this topic delivers. Earlier this year, when Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) repeatedly (and accurately) accused Republicans of trafficking in great replacement theory, they spluttered with outrage, leading to widespread media coverage.
Taking on GOP “invasion” mania entails making a number of points. One is that as official conduct goes, it’s profoundly deranged to use such terms to describe human beings who are fleeing humanitarian horrors and just want to contribute to our productive economic system.
Another point Democrats might make is that their agenda, while far from perfect, is much more focused on real-world problems at the border than GOP “invasion” critiques are. President Biden has actually restricted a good deal of asylum-seeking at the border, while opening up channels for tens of thousands of migrants to apply for entry from abroad each month.
Time will tell whether that agenda works. But in its effort to incentivize people to apply from afar rather than trek to the border — straining our infrastructure there — it recognizes the undeniable facts that myriad complex forces will inevitably keep driving migration and that if managed well, it would enhance our national interests, not overrun us with conquering hordes.
As DeSantis’s efforts to out-MAGA Trump intensify, the language will get uglier. Democrats often assume they can’t win arguments on immigration. But GOP “invasion” rhetoric has grown truly dangerous, unhinged and disconnected from reality. If ever there were a time to grab the sensible middle-ground on this issue, it’s now.
The specter of a migrant “invasion,” which carries white nationalist overtones, has been a mainstay of Donald Trump’s political vocabulary ever since he ran for president in 2016. But the fact that DeSantis and Trump — the leaders in polls for the Republican nomination — are both all in on this ugly notion shows how profoundly it is capturing the GOP.
Democrats can’t let this moment go unanswered. In coming weeks, opportunities to mount major pushback will arise, and Democrats should make the most of them.
First, DeSantis’s draconian immigration law, which is designed to make life more difficult for undocumented immigrants in numerous ways, is set to take effect on July 1. Already, it has prompted migrants to consider leaving the state. That’s causing panic among Florida businesses that rely on migrant workers. Even Republicans are lamenting the law’s expected impact.
León Krauze: The real tragedy is unfolding on the Mexican side of the border
Soon enough, stories of immigrants and businesses facing hardships could go national. Just as red-state antiabortion laws and school crackdowns have produced viral tales of reactionary excess, so too will the nation train its attention on Florida’s anti-immigrant regime and the carnage it’s producing.
Democrats can seize on this to argue that treating immigration as an invasion, as DeSantis’s law will do, produces terrible real-world results.
“DeSantis policies treating immigrants like invaders will bring an unbelievable amount of social and economic strife to Florida,” Democratic strategist Simon Rosenberg told me. “It’s important Democrats make the GOP’s escalating malevolence central to their 2024 argument.”
Democrats should tie this to DeSantis’s agenda for the southern border, which in some respects is more extreme than anything Trump tried to do. DeSantis loves to claim that Florida is his model for how he would run the country. If his Florida law shapes up as the disaster businesses fear, Democrats can argue that it indicates what might happen if his ethic of treating migrants as invaders shapes national policy.
Press Enter to skip to end of carousel
Democrats will have another opening when the House GOP drive to impeach Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas gains steam this summer. To lay the groundwork for this, House Republicans have transformed “invasion” language into everyday usage. They’ve insisted the nation is “ravaged by an illegal alien invasion” that is plunging us into “third word status,” that the “invasion” is “changing our culture” and that “our sovereignty has been defiled.”
A Democratic aide tells me that some House Democrats have privately discussed ways of engaging the “invasion” notion in a high-profile, forceful and concerted way.
“You will see House Democrats start to push back a lot more on the language,” Rep. Daniel S. Goldman (D-N.Y.), a member of the Homeland Security Committee, said in an interview, noting that it spreads “fear, division and hate.”
What might this look like? Mayorkas is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee in July, and border enforcement officials are scheduled to appear at a House subcommittee hearing next month as well, someone familiar with the planning said.
Democrats can press Mayorkas and those officials on whether “invasion” language incites violence against migrants and the dangers that creates for law enforcement. They can raise the related subject of “great replacement theory,” the idea that elites are replacing native-born Americans with non-White immigrants, and solicit testimony on how this has inspired white nationalist terrorism.
Viral moments are the coin of the realm in today’s politics, and this topic delivers. Earlier this year, when Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) repeatedly (and accurately) accused Republicans of trafficking in great replacement theory, they spluttered with outrage, leading to widespread media coverage.
Taking on GOP “invasion” mania entails making a number of points. One is that as official conduct goes, it’s profoundly deranged to use such terms to describe human beings who are fleeing humanitarian horrors and just want to contribute to our productive economic system.
Another point Democrats might make is that their agenda, while far from perfect, is much more focused on real-world problems at the border than GOP “invasion” critiques are. President Biden has actually restricted a good deal of asylum-seeking at the border, while opening up channels for tens of thousands of migrants to apply for entry from abroad each month.
Time will tell whether that agenda works. But in its effort to incentivize people to apply from afar rather than trek to the border — straining our infrastructure there — it recognizes the undeniable facts that myriad complex forces will inevitably keep driving migration and that if managed well, it would enhance our national interests, not overrun us with conquering hordes.
As DeSantis’s efforts to out-MAGA Trump intensify, the language will get uglier. Democrats often assume they can’t win arguments on immigration. But GOP “invasion” rhetoric has grown truly dangerous, unhinged and disconnected from reality. If ever there were a time to grab the sensible middle-ground on this issue, it’s now.
