Latino Immigration Patterns

In the Rothenberg section, "Immigration Enforcement as a Race-Making Institution" grabbed my attention on the facts of the Latino immigration patterns. A lot of the details reminded me of my father. Back in the mid-1980s, my dad crossed the border in a not so legal manner. In the Rothenberg book, it mentioned the dramatic increase of undocumented immigrants coming into the United States around the 1980s. I chuck at the idea that my father is part of that statistic. My father would tell me stories of him as a kid. My father was in a huge family of eight. In order for my grandpa to support everyone, he asked some of his older children to work at an early age. He would ride his bike around trying to sell gum to earn some extra income to attend

school. Once he was twenty, he decided to make a bold move and be the first one of the family to move to the United States. Other of my father’s stories included his experience moving to the United States. Some of the rhetoric he experience was also a trend that was mentioned in the book. The rise of “Latino Threat Narrative” was something my dad experienced in his early years of upon arriving in the United States. Much like the previous decades, the rhetoric of “no Mexicans allowed” as a copious amount of Latino immigrants started to move into the community. I believe that type of rhetoric has never stopped, especially in the state of Arizona. Much like slavery has evolved, the same occurred with intimating the undocumented community. The most prominent example would be the infamous SB 1070 and former Sheriff Joe Arpaio. Not forgetting to include the banning of Mexican-American studies in a state where the Mexican descent makes up almost 50% of the population. With the Trump’s presidential election, I do not expect this type of rhetoric to slow down anytime soon.