Activists in swing Michigan county are alarmed by Hispanic voters backing Trump despite his anti-immigrant rhetoric

Dan Soza has seen the harsh realities of Donald Trump’s immigration policies up close and so he is alarmed that many Latino voters in Saginaw, Michigan, do not take seriously the former US president’s threats of mass deportations.

As a child welfare officer in Saginaw, Soza places young unaccompanied refugees in foster families and watched the Trump administration’s separation of children from their parents at the Mexican border in 2018 with alarm. He said the cruelty of that policy, and the former president’s threats against refugees legally in the US, should serve as a warning that Trump might do what he says.

“A lot of people who are Latino or Hispanic – whether it be in Saginaw, Michigan, or in the country – when they hear him say those things, they don’t think he’s talking about them,” said Soza.

What really worries me is that people don’t remember their history. This has happened before. We’ve seen mass deportations before and when it happened American citizens were deported.”


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  • dan1101@lemm.ee
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    12 days ago

    How can Latinos not realize how much Trump hates them? It’s his main topic, how the dirty immigrants are pouring across the border bringing crime and taking American jobs. He and his cronies say it over and over with every speech.

    • InverseParallax@lemmy.world
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      12 days ago

      Because they’re not immigrants anymore, he’s not talking about them, you see, they’re white now.

      Irish and Italians did something similar for a while.

    • jonne@infosec.pub
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      12 days ago

      Because they got there legally, he’s not talking about them. Except they don’t realise that they’re voting for a world where border patrol will still harass them based on how they look.

      • Vanon@lemmy.world
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        12 days ago

        And by their names and associations in a database somewhere. I bet there are even some cowards that think voting for him will somehow save them. (Spoiler: It won’t, and he’s laughing at these fools helping exterminate them.)

        • 418_im_a_teapot@sh.itjust.works
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          11 days ago

          Kris Kobach removed Kansas voters from the voters’ roll because they had foreign-sounding names (many hispanic). Sure, he got in trouble for it in court, but it was too late to affect the election results. And Trump later appointed him to his election interference commission.

          They have the database already. Minorities will be targeted regardless of citizenship.

    • Wrench@lemmy.world
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      12 days ago

      Their Spanish channels are ridiculously overrun with right wing propaganda. My wife is Venezuelan, and it’s crazy the crap her parents believe. And they are sweet, non-hateful people. But they live in a little bubble where all the news fed to them is through a right wing filter, and they don’t believe it because it’s not like they’re watching Fox News or something.

  • snooggums@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    Hell, this history was like 4 years ago when he was president and deporting Hispanic immigrants and still hasn’t shut up about his border wall or being harsh immigrants. It isn’t ancient history or anything.

    Do they think that his recent focus on Haitian immigrants means he likes Latino immigrants now?

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      12 days ago

      Haitians are Latino, because Haiti is part of Latin America. I’m guessing MAGA Latinos don’t care for that fact, however.

        • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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          11 days ago

          “Why would a colony of a Latin country feel like they’re a colony of a Latin country” lol

          Then again, I’ve heard a few Brazilians say they’re not latinos.

        • sepi@piefed.social
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          12 days ago

          Because french, spanish and portuguese are romance languages. You don’t know this?

          • 100@fedia.io
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            12 days ago

            yeah and all europeans are the same group of white caucasians right? their culture and opinions must be very unified!

            go back to school

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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              12 days ago

              What are you even talking about?

              Are French Guianans Latino? Are Belizeans Latino? Are you Latino if none of your ancestors are Spanish but all of them are Mayan? Are the people on the other half of the island that Haiti is on Latino? Do you become Latino of your parents are Haitian and they move to the Dominican Republic and you’re born there?

              Or are you suggesting that you can’t be black and Latino? Because 60 million plus Afro-Brazilians would definitely challenge you on that one.

          • snooggums@lemmy.world
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            12 days ago

            Also, the people in the former Portuguese colony of Brazil are Latino.

            You don’t say!

            …former Spanish and Portuguese colony label?

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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              12 days ago

              Interesting how you had nothing to say about Belize and French Guiana.

              Also funny how people on the Haiti side of the island are, according to you, not Latino, but people on the Dominican Republic half of the exact same island presumably are, correct?

              Is someone of Haitian ancestry that gets born in the Dominican Republic Latino?

    • Arsecroft@lemmy.sdf.org
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      12 days ago

      I heard this years ago and it stuck in my brain: Everyone wants to be the last immigrant.

      Turns out latinos can be just as short-sighted and selfish as everyone else, because there is no actual difference between humans that look different, despite the hundreds of years of propaganda to the contrary.

  • rsuri@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    They act like it’s somehow makes no sense for Latinos to support Trump, but let’s be honest: it makes no sense for anyone to support Trump.

  • Masterbaexunn@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    Fuck these ladder snatching pricks. These “I got mine so fuck you” mother fuckers. Every single one of them.

    Most Americans today are 4th generation at best. Fuck you if you were halfway decent cared about your dumbass ancestry.com results more then helping the billionaire capitalist fucking pig that made them available to you, the maybe you’d see that these FUCKS raped your ancestors and gaslit you into believing if you pay your taxes you can be one of them. Latinos, you’ll always be brown.

    • beanlink@lemmy.world
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      12 days ago

      Yup and Cubans do this especially in South Florida. The funniest part is when all the cheap labor started to leave the state and all the old condo buildings they had their grandparents in are being kicked out due to special assessments. They now want the government to step in and prevent those special assessments or get them reduced so they can stay on fixed income.

      I would have more empathy if only they had it for others that were not them. Part of the reason why Obama got rid of wet foot dry foot policy for them.

      • Flocklesscrow@lemm.ee
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        11 days ago

        Man, it’s been like that in Miami for decades. A super weird dynamic of old guard Cubans clinging to an incredibly outdated view of world politics, and their younger, deeply Capitalist generations who are consumed with enriching themselves.

    • linearchaos@lemmy.world
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      11 days ago

      I think the problem is they came from a place where ladder snatching was the default. Their ancestors just a couple generations ago and probably their relatives at home are still dealing with the same levels of open corruption that we’re just seeing here. They were taught and raised to snatch the ladders up. They’re ready to play the game for all it’s worth because they’ve been taught They need to play the game and how to play the game.

    • Fuck_Team@lemmy.one
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      12 days ago

      The article actually says the Catholicism in Latinos is decreasing but Evangelical Christianity is rising. If that’s the case then Evangelical Christianity seems to be more of the cause

  • JaggedRobotPubes@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    This is not any more weird than literally anyone supporting him. They’re all voting aggressively against their own self-interests.

  • ZeroCool@slrpnk.net
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    12 days ago

    We’ve seen mass deportations before and when it happened American citizens were deported."

    This is the terrifying reality that these fools don’t realize. Trump’s Schutzstaffel will not care about your legal status. You could be a fourth generation citizen but if your name is even vaguely Hispanic sounding you will not be spared when they start rounding people up. You will be guilty until proven innocent. It’s a serious mistake not to take MAGA at their word when they promise mass deportations.

  • nemonic187@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    He’s absolutely talking about all of us, no matter what our citizenship status is. That lady and all those who support him will be the first ones to get shipped the fuck outta here because they already have their addresses and phone numbers. There’s a special place in hell for people that sell out their own kind.

    • InverseParallax@lemmy.world
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      12 days ago

      That’s absolutely not true!

      My wife should be ok, because she’s white! I, otoh, was born in the NY (or, according to Southerners “no, where are you from, REALLY?!?!”) so I’m fucked.

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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        12 days ago

        I’m Jewish, my daughter is Jewish and queer, and my wife is a librarian, who they want to be able to imprison for lending out the “wrong” books to children.

        Basically we’re all fucked. I’m glad I have dual citizenship with the UK. Getting my wife over is going to be a problem though.

        • Juvyn00b@lemmy.world
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          12 days ago

          Given the details here, it initially sounds like you’ll have issues getting your wife over to the UK because… Checks notes… She’s a librarian lol

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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            12 days ago

            What part of “my daughter is Jewish and queer” is unclear to you?

            Also, what part of “who they want to be able to imprison for lending out the “wrong” books to children” is unclear to you?

  • badelf@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    12 days ago

    If you ignore history, you are doomed to repeat it:.

    First they came for the Communists And I did not speak out Because I was not a Communist

    Then they came for the Socialists And I did not speak out Because I was not a Socialist

    Then they came for the trade unionists And I did not speak out Because I was not a trade unionist

    Then they came for the Jews And I did not speak out Because I was not a Jew

    Then they came for me And there was no one left To speak out for me

    by Martin Niemöller, a German Lutheran pastor and theologian born in Lippstadt, Germany, in 1892.

  • Hydra_Fk@reddthat.com
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    12 days ago

    On one hand id love to see the leopard eating their faces, but on the other another 4 years of trump in office and on TV every day make me wanna puke.

  • Rolando@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    Kind of a clickbait headline but there are some interesting parts in the text… It’s worth keeping these in mind when doing election outreach in the US.

    "… I feel like we, as Latinos, are traditionally conservative.”

    “traditionally conservative” is a tautology, and this statement is a bit exaggerated, but Latinos do often have strong values associated with family, religion, work, and other things that conservatives try to “own”.

    Paschall said that if there is racism, it comes from white liberals who tell her that, as a Latina, she should not support Trump. She describes that view as “so deep-rooted that they don’t even realise they’re being racist”.

    I disagree with Paschall’s assertion. However, while white liberals call Republicans “weird”, those same white liberals often come across as weird to people who don’t share their ideas. DISCLAIMER: I think Republicans are weird and agree with white liberals more often than not. I’m just describing some of the attitudes I see here in my battleground state, so we can communicate better during voter outreach. END DISCLAIMER

    There are other factors at play. The proportion of Mexicans crossing the border to work without visas has dropped sharply in recent years with much larger numbers of people now coming from Central and South America as refugees. They sometimes face hostility from more established Latino communities, about 60% of which are of Mexican ancestry.

    There’s a tendency to think of Latinos as some monolithic people, but this paragraph describes one way that isn’t true. Even if you only consider those with the right to vote, there’s a tremendous difference between say a third-generation Cuban-American, a recent Central American naturalized citizen in Nevada, a second-generation Puerto Rican in Georgia, and a Tejano whose family has lived here for hundreds of years. Each of them have a wide variety of priorities and opinions, it’s not all about immigration. And if they vote for Trump it’s not just that they’re brainwashed or ignorant, a lot of times they’re holding their nose in the same way a lot of people on the left are holding their nose to vote for Kamala. (Not me! I think she’s all right! In fact I just recently signed up to help her campaign, I hope it’s not too late…)