Immigration has been a central issue in U.S. politics for decades. That won't change anytime soon as a humanitarian crisis continues to unfold at the southern border.
In his new book "Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The United States, Central America, and the Making of a Crisis," immigration expert Jonathan Blitzer points to steps taken by the U.S. over the years as key contributors to the issues we're facing.
For example, he says U.S. support of Latin American dictators — granted in an attempt to thwart the spread of communism during the later years of the Cold War — played a significant role in people wanting to flee those countries and come north of the border. This came at the same time that the U.S., through the 1980 Refugee Act, created modern asylum as we know it, providing a pathway for people facing persecution by their governments to come here.
"And so, you immediately all through the 1980's have this collision of the promise of asylum, as it was supposed to exist to provide protection to people in need, and the realities of geopolitics, the fact that the United States was allied with regimes that were persecuting people and driving them out of their home countries," Blitzer told KCUR.
"The geopolitics kind of overtook the premise and principle of the asylum system. What happened was, through the state department, the U.S. government denied — in very, very intense, high rates — asylum claims brought by people from El Salvador, from Guatemala, fleeing persecution in the region because the U.S. couldn't acknowledge the legitimacy of their claims. Because that would be a tacit acknowledgement of what its allies in the region were doing."
- Jonathan Blitzer, staff writer at The New Yorker, immigration expert, author
Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The Making of an Immigration Crisis, 6 p.m. reception, 6:30 program Tuesday, May 14 at the UMKC Student Union, Room 401, 5100 Cherry St, Kansas City, Missouri 64110. Registration is free and open to the public.
