Race and Immigration

I have said repeatedly that anti-immigration activists don't care one whit about the legality of immigrants. They care strictly about their race.

To replace deported Mexicans and Central Americans in meatpacking plants, employers have turned to legal African immigrants, particularly Somalis.

Via Rick Perlstein, the response is predictably racist, at least in Shelbyville, Tennessee.

The Tyson plant where the Somalis and other Muslims work decided to give the workers a Muslim religious holiday off instead of Labor Day. People in central Tennessee went berserk. Quite ironic given the anti-union attitude so prevalent in that part of the South.

If you really want to see how race trumps legal status in immigration debates, read the comment thread to the original newspaper story. But I warn you, the extreme racism is vomit-inducing.