As I begin writing this, I’m sitting in the Houston airport waiting for my flight back to Veracruz. It’s a short flight, the most painful part of it dealing with the rude check-in people (quit chiding me for not putting my baggage tag on right — I don’t work here, man!). And this after having to buy basically an extra ticket just to check baggage.
Really, the airlines’ insults are endless.
Before my travels, I wasn’t sure what to expect. I live in Mexico full-time and mostly gauge what’s happening in the U.S. through news stories and my sister’s observations. From the outside looking in, the U.S. currently seems hands-down bonkers. An administration openly hostile to half its citizens, ready to designate them as domestic terrorists? No money for anything except billionaires and plain-clothed masked secret police? What the hell is going on up there?
My Mexican friends asked if I was nervous about going back. “Yes,” I’d say.
Granted, not for my personal safety, though the presence of open carry laws — in Texas, no less — does make me nervous. More than anything, I was nervous about potential hostility from those who might (correctly) clock me as a member of “the left” during a time when the left is being labeled as, basically, demons by the slim minority in charge. Would I run into my most hostile MND commenters in real life? If I did, might they try to…punch me? The anger and sense of righteousness on “the other side” — which is weird, because they’re clearly winning pretty much every battle — is palpable.
I’m happy to report that they were mostly viewed from afar. No one tried to pick a fight with me — well, almost no one. One kid checking me out at Target wanted to lecture me about how Israel basically ran the world. I’m with Claudia — and the rest of the world — on my view of Israel’s actions in Gaza, though this kid’s complaint sounded more like a thinly-veiled “the Jews are a secret cabal, you gotta believe me.”
Of course, that’s just my impression after 10 days. My sister, who works in higher education, is noticing a lot more: politicians wanting access to course plans and syllabi, for instance. Demonstrations against abortion, which I categorically do not get. Again, they won — abortion is illegal now in Texas. What are they protesting? An increased presence of both ICE and law enforcement checkpoints in general, specifically the further south you go.
One of her students recently told her that his father was taken by ICE. An acquaintance, an elementary school teacher, cried as he told her about four kids taken from his class during the school day. Then there’s the issue of military-style immigration raids in Chicago. And all the while, “the left” gets accused of outrageous violence? What is happening?
The violence against both Mexicans and other immigrants that we’re seeing play out north of the border is heartbreaking. Unfortunately, it’s not new: we’ve gone through many waves of anti-immigrant sentiment before, especially if those immigrants happen to not be white. Sure, Trump is doing what he said he’d do — and more!
Most people believed him when he said that they’d focus on criminals. Did the many Latinos that voted for him believe him? I so want to know.
In the end, that’s not what’s been happening: people who’ve lived in the US for a very long time are getting snagged up too, and sometimes killed. Even having the proper papers doesn’t seem to matter right now. If we don’t like you, you can’t be here, constitutional right be damned!
And in an almost split-screen reality, there are Latinos, in Texas at least, showing pride and even defiance. In Waco, a truck with the Mexican flag splayed on its hood drove through the neighborhood. “Impressive!” I said aloud as I gaped. Several homes further south had Mexican flags swaying outside in front. Some without even US flags!
In the current environment no one is safe, but plenty of people are not afraid.
And Texas is Texas, and Latinos are the largest ethnic group in the state, after all. Things are happening, but white guys with ski masks and combat boots are outnumbered. Thank goodness.
Beyond Texas, there’s plenty of defiance as well. Take the NFL: Bad Bunny will be performing the half-time show! And according to our very scary Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem, ICE will be all over it. (Incidentally, Bad Bunny has said he would no longer give concerts in the US because of the risks of raids on his audience. I guess the half-time show was too fancy to pass up!)
Do I think the NFL is trying to take a stand against the Trump administration?
Well, no. With such a seemingly defiant move, though, you can bet there’s going to be record viewership.
But there’s plenty more. Remember when Mexican actor Diego Luna guest-hosted Jimmy Kimmel’s show? He was not subtle about his political views, even as Trump’s anti-immigrant machine was rumbling.
And, September 15-October 15 was Hispanic Heritage Month! Even at the Target with the antisemitic check-out kid, they were selling Celia Cruz shirts.
Then there’s NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts, which’ve been featuring more and more Latino, many Mexican, artists. Grupo Frontera‘s is by far my favorite, and if you haven’t seen the recent Macario Martínez one, it’s also well worth a listen. Flor de Toloache, filmed almost nine years ago, is another favorite of mine.
Can you tell I’m really into Tiny Desk?
My point is this: right now, there’s the Trump administration, and a few people who agree with absolutely everything they do. But that group of people are not the majority. Plenty in the US are outwardly celebrating Latinos, many of them Mexicans, despite their immigration status. This, I am proud of.
The government is one thing; culture is another.
For now, I pray that our culture of accepting and celebrating new immigrants can overcome this ugly period of rejecting them, breaking up families and destroying lives. It’s a dark time up there right now. Let’s hope our larger desire to accept and love another wins out over our most tribal and exclusionary instincts.
Sarah DeVries is a writer and translator based in Xalapa, Veracruz. She can be reached through her website, sarahedevries.substack.com.
