Fight Trump, not migrants!

Donald Trump’s acceptance speech for the Republican presidential nomination was mostly his usual reactionary rant aimed at winning cheers and votes on the most vile, misogynist, racist and anti-immigrant basis.

In his record-length 90-minute speech, Trump rambled about a number of issues, including attaching amendments to the right to abortion access; calling for the firing of the president of the United Auto Workers, Shawn Fain; blaming China for COVID-19 and supporting the apartheid state of Israel.

Without a doubt, the one issue that especially whipped up Trump’s MAGA right-wing supporters into a total frenzy was his attacks on immigrants, especially those he slandered as “illegal.” These attacks were nothing new, harking back to his first election victory in 2016.

His vile disdain for immigrants, especially those undocumented workers and their families forced to cross the U.S.-Mexico border and confront the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and fascistic border patrol, has been Trump’s calling card.  

A new element arose, because just five days earlier, he had narrowly escaped an assassination attempt.  

For the first 15 minutes, he worked on drumming up a lot of sympathy from the delegates about the shooting, saying: “I’m not supposed to be here tonight.” He even paid homage to one of his supporters, Corey Comperatore, who was killed during the assassination attempt, by kissing the late firefighter’s helmet on stage. Trump credited the Christian deity for his own narrow escape.

But after that 15-minute piety break, Trump picked up his usual trope of scapegoating migrants, falsely blaming our working-class comrades for taking away jobs from U.S.-born workers and accusing the new migrants of vile crimes, like rape or other sexual abuse – the latter a crime he was convicted of himself. 

Like the Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels, Trump counts on his constant repetition of this Big Lie to win over U.S. workers whose jobs were lost, because their rich bosses found it more profitable to eliminate them. 

When Trump uses the disgusting term for migrants, he is referring to a majority of foreign-born workers, including those who are documented, refugees and temporary residents, including workers and students. He also accused migrants of taking away “Black jobs” in a disgusting effort to drive a wedge between Black workers and migrant workers, both of whom face racist discrimination as well as the exploitation all workers face.

Under capitalism, any loss or lack of jobs comes from the bosses who control economies, not from the workers, who have to sell their labor power to survive.  

Attempt to divide and conquer

Of course, Trump’s racist diatribe is not only about falsehoods. In reality his white nationalist rant is hate speech, potentially laying the basis for physical violence.  Migrants are forced into low-wage jobs, with little to no benefits and terrible working conditions in restaurants and in the fields. These workers risk life and limb to come to the U.S., often because of the lack of jobs in their home countries due to imperialist plunder of Global South economies, often because imperialist wars have wrecked their home countries.  

Many migrants die desperately trying to cross the treacherous border either by foot or in overcrowded, overheated trucks, or they wind up in concentration camps called detention centers, painfully separated from their families. 

Neither Trump nor the Democratic administration are friends to migrants, as the Biden administration has imposed more legal restrictions on migrants entering the U.S. The only difference between the two is the tone of their political rhetoric.

While Trump and Biden and their pro-capitalist parties seek to serve the interests of the billionaire ruling class with tactics to divide and conquer U.S.-born and foreign-born workers, the working class on a global scale must fight to build class solidarity with the most oppressed, especially migrants. This is the only way for the global working class to effectively unite to fight back against their oppressors to win the collective power they deserve.

If capitalist exploitation knows no borders, then worker internationalism must know no borders.