The Guadalajara Reporter

Alabama comes to Mexico as that state’s economy falters under the stigma of adopting Arizona’s harsh immigration

Alabama in Mexico? More Mexicans than you’d expect are aware of the fallout of Alabama’s radical new immigration law. They have family members or friends working there, or fleeing work there. The severe immigration law copied the law drafted by former Arizona state Senator Russell Pearce, who was recalled November 8. Pearce was a favorite of the Tea Party. Both were aimed, said supporters in both states, to make life so uncomfortable for illegal immigrants that they would leave. Alabama’s new law appears to be wreaking more economic havoc than its extremist conservative leaders expected.

Farmers are toting up their losses — the cost of crops left to rot as workers flee. Any township, district, or county can calculate diminishing revenues as taxpayers move away. Alabama already is “at the low end of states in employment and economic vitality” studies show. It’ll get worse, residents of “The Heart of Dixie” say. A number of them clearly note the loss in productivity as they stand in line for hours to prove their citizenship in any transaction with the government. They predict officials won’t rush to announce the already obvious losses. The cost of the state’s maimed business reputation may be harder to immediately assess, though some residents have taken that measure already. Alabama is known for wooing foreign auto makers. And in recent years Mecedes-Benz, Honda and Hyundai have set up shop there. Then, acting on the new law, Tuscaloosa cops busted a visiting Mercedes manager for driving without his license, and jailed him as an illegal immigrant. The bloom began fading from the foreign investment flower patch. Quickly, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial page invited one and all to come to Missouri: “We are the Show-Me State, Not the Show Me Your Papers State.”

The immigration imbroglio won’t go away. Certainly not for Latinos here or there. It has invaded a place of fertile eccentricity: the Republican primary debates. This may seem to some merely a north-of-the border “matter.” It isn’t. That this process is kindling local outrage among Mexicans may seem startling, but it’s just as intricate for some foreigners. For centuries most Mexicans have been familiar with homegrown racial and class prejudice. Now more of them than ever are reading and watching “the news.” A dicey thing for bigotry-ladened authoritarians, no matter how clever their disguises. Many young people are scrounging up used PCs. In good part it’s a consequence of education, an idea much praised by many foreign residents and visitors reluctant to learn Spanish. At first it was simply porn on school computers. Now it’s nourishing a more skeptical population.

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