Racism and the Denial of Immigration Reciprocity

I have an espe­cially expe­ri­enced per­spec­tive on the real­ity of how Latin American coun­tries treat the immi­gra­tion issue. I am a vic­tim of immi­gra­tion fraud. In 2009 I was approached by Bolivian immi­gra­tion offi­cials because of the color of my skin and was later detained due to a lack of doc­u­men­ta­tion result­ing from the fraud com­mit­ted against me. Racial pro­fil­ing? Papers please?

Been there, done that. The Story: Part One ; Part Two ; Part Three.

Bolivian law was changed in December 2007 to require new, com­pli­cated, applied-and-paid-for visas of United States cit­i­zens enter­ing Bolivia. Whereas before Americans could enter Bolivia and receive a stamp grant­ing them 90 days of tourist entry, now Americans must pay over $100, pro­vide exten­sive doc­u­men­ta­tion, and sub­mit an appli­ca­tion in order to have 90 days of tourist entry. The argu­ment made in favor of this pol­icy change: reci­procity. America has immi­gra­tion restric­tions, there­fore Bolivia will have immi­gra­tion restric­tions. Reciprocity.

In the spirit of reci­procity, then: Why are so many of the peo­ple who sup­port Bolivia’s abil­ity to inves­ti­gate cit­i­zen­ship actively oppos­ing the United States’ abil­ity to inves­ti­gate legality?

Bolivia’s polic­ing of immi­gra­tion mat­ters is openly racist; Arizona’s polic­ing of immi­gra­tion mat­ters is just.

In 2009, my friend and I were the only peo­ple approached in the entire bus ter­mi­nal that day. We were the only peo­ple detained. We walked into the ter­mi­nal and were imme­di­ately stopped. Why? Only because our skins are pale. We were stopped only because of the color of our skin. We were vic­tims of racism. I was par­tic­u­larly struck (emo­tion­ally) by the poster hang­ing on the wall in the hall of the immi­gra­tion deten­tion office… the poster was a PSA about need­ing to strug­gle against racism. Funny: none of the vic­tims of racism depicted were white. I felt very much neglected as I was threat­ened with third-world jail as a result of my pale skin.

The Arizona law is fun­da­men­tally dif­fer­ent from the Bolivian sys­tem. The Arizona law empow­ers police to inves­ti­gate immi­gra­tion legal­ity when a per­son has already been stopped for another legal rea­son. They can­not ran­domly pull peo­ple over because of their skin color.

I, as a “white” per­son in Bolivia, South America, was stopped and inves­ti­gated because of the color of my skin.

Someone else, as a per­son of any color in Arizona, United States of America, can be inves­ti­gated under rea­son­able sus­pi­cion only if they have been stopped for another legal reason.

Bolivian Law: Racist.

Arizona Law: Just.

Interested in more infor­ma­tion regard­ing what the Arizona law actu­ally means? Read Heather Mac Donald’s arti­cle.