Rep. Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) made a racist argument on Thursday to justify mass immigration into the United States.
During a House Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration Integrity, Security, and Enforcement hearing, Nadler used his opening statement to slam Republicans — claiming only Democrats are interested in solving the border and migrant crises — and made his case for why the U.S. needs more immigrants.
Why does American “need” more immigrants, according to Nadler? So they can pick crops.
“We need immigrants in this country,” he said. “Forget the fact that the farm — vegetables would rot in the ground if they weren’t being picked by many immigrants — many illegal immigrants!”
America not only needs immigrants to pick vegetables, Nadler went on to say, but he wants the immigrants to replenish the American population.
“The birth rate in this country is way below replacement level, which means our population is going to start shrinking, and the ratio of people on Social Security and Medicare is going to increase, relative to the number of people supporting them,” he said. “This is a problem faced by every major country in the world. Few countries, however, have the means to solve this problem through immigration.
“People want to immigrate to the United States. They do not want to immigrate to China or Russia. We are very lucky in that respect, and we should promote it,” he added.
All of Nadler’s arguments — that the U.S. needs migrants to work farms, to increase the domestic birth rate, and to fix Social Security and Medicare’s insolvency problems — are dehumanizing because they reduce migrants to their bodies.
It’s true that migrants often accept employment in agriculture, trade industries, and service work. But it is dehumanizing to assume that simply because someone is a migrant, he will work in those industries. It is also dehumanizing to consider only what migrants can do for America rather than to see them as people.
It should go without saying, but apparently it needs to be said: Migrants — like any other person — can benefit society beyond their ability to pick crops, have more babies, and pay into the social safety-net systems.
Republicans, meanwhile, want increased border security, to tamp down on illegal immigration, and to improve mechanisms for legal immigration.
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