OPINION: Americans, let’s be proud of our immigrant heritage

Except for Native Americans who were here before the initial English settlers, all of us are immigrants or have immigrant ancestors. We should be proud of that. By definition, immigrants are people who venture forth, showing bravery and initiative to seek a new life in a new land.

Instead, immigrants have often been seen as threats and generated animosity. The Scotch-Irish who followed the initial English settlers in the early 18th century were caricatured as coarse and animalistic. Subsequent immigration of Scandinavians, Slavs, Mediterranean and Far Eastern people also have been reviled. Haitian immigrants are currently being villainized.

The New Yorker magazine recently published a summary of Donald Trump’s “outrageous pronouncements on immigration.” Titled “Fear Campaign,” this article, by Jonathan Blitzer, reveals a danger to our country that should be shared:

“Donald Trump’s most outrageous pronouncements on immigration are rarely shocking for long; they’re usually eclipsed within days, if not hours, by even more grotesque claims. Last year, in what should have been an enduring political scandal, Trump blamed immigrants for ‘poisoning the blood of our country.’ He has repeated his solution — mass deportation — so often that it’s become a campaign slogan. In a national Scripps News/Ipsos poll last month, 54% of those asked agreed, either ‘strongly’ or ‘somewhat,’ with Trump’s call, including a quarter of Democrats. Maybe people can’t imagine what an action like that would entail; or, worse, maybe they can.

Either way, the acceptance of such hostile thinking is, at least in part, a function of how relentlessly Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, lay all America’s problems at immigrants’ feet. Mass deportation isn’t just their immigration platform; it’s their response to questions about affordable housing, the economy, and inflation. Last month, Trump said of undocumented immigrants that ‘getting them out will be a bloody story.’ There was hardly time to parse his meaning before he was standing on a Presidential-debate stage in Philadelphia, lying about Haitians in Springfield, Ohio.”

Clearly, our borders should be rigorously patrolled to protect the public from drug smuggling and other criminal activity. Further, without limiting numbers, we would be rapidly overrun.

But let’s look at facts, not rumors. Statistically, it has been shown that immigrants commit fewer crimes than the average U.S citizen, not more. That stands to reason. People desperately seeking life in our country want to be seen as an asset. And so, they can be! In Springfield Ohio, for example, the city’s mayor reported that Haitians have been a boon to companies with large workforce needs, and their presence has led to the development of new businesses.

Let us appreciate that we are a nation of immigrants. Our ancestors were brave and venturesome enough to seek a new life in the “New World.”

Janet McCabe is a member of Alaska Common Ground and a graduate of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.

The views expressed here are the writer’s and are not necessarily endorsed by the Anchorage Daily News, which welcomes a broad range of viewpoints. To submit a piece for consideration, email commentary(at)adn.com. Send submissions shorter than 200 words to letters@adn.com or click here to submit via any web browser. Read our full guidelines for letters and commentaries here.