Not All Democrats Are Created Equal
With the help of Democrats, Trump will soon sign into law a xenophobic bill that allows undocumented immigrants to be detained without due process.
The Laken Riley Act, a bill introduced by U.S. Sen. Katie Britt, R-AL, which would dramatically increase the requirements for the Department of Homeland Security to detain immigrants, is on track to become the first piece of legislation to be signed into law by the new Trump administration after passing both houses of Congress with bipartisan support.
This is not just any other border bill, Sen. Britt herself has called it “the most significant immigration enforcement and border security related bill to pass Congress in nearly three decades” and it has serious implications for immigrants living and working in the U.S. The Laken Riley Act would mandate that any immigrant who is simply arrested for “any burglary, theft, larceny, or shoplifting offense” be detained before they are even officially charged with a crime. This would include individuals who are arrested under false pretenses, effectively opening the door for the sweeping detainment of immigrants without due process.
Law professor Ilya Somin of George Mason University says that the Laken Riley Act could “potentially could lead to vast wastage of law enforcement resources on people who pose little or no threat to public safety and predictably diverts those resources away from combating real crime.”
Any deterrants that might be in place to prevent a law enforcement officer from arresting an individual they suspect of being an undocumented immigrant without probable cause would be effectively wiped away under the law. In an era where questions about systemic prejudices in policing continue to be justified again and again, the Laken Riley Act promises to keep that can of worms open and flowing.
So, surely this wasteful, xenophobic bill was only able to pass through Congress because of the newfound Republican majority in both houses, right? Wrong. Democrats — the supposed champions of the downtrodden — rallied alongside their Republican “opposition” to pass the Laken Riley Act, completing the party’s pivot to a position on immigration that is nearly indistinguishable from the Republicans’.
Despite the Republicans having a slim 53-47 majority in the Senate, the bill passed with the help of 12 Democrats by a vote of 61-35 before gaining similar bipartisan support in the House with a vote of 263-156.
Those Democrats who voted in favor of this bill — among them New Hampshire Sens. Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen — have exposed the immense hypocrisy inherent in their own rhetoric and the rhetoric of the Democratic party.
Ask these congresspeople what they think of Donald Trump and they are sure to lambast him for his bigotry, not least of which would be his clear xenophobia (see: “all Mexicans are murderers and rapists”). Yet, these very same legislators turn around and not only fail to prevent, but actively support, a piece of legislation that could not be more blatantly xenophobic — let alone blatantly unjust.
All throughout the 2024 campaign season, Democrats warned of Trump’s fascistic tendencies and decried him as a threat to democracy. Mere days after he has assumed office, and they are already aiding and abetting his most fascistic policies. The Laken Riley Act is perhaps the single greatest tool for Trump to use in executing his “mass deportation” agenda.
Democrats made quite a stir when Trump said that Haitians were eating their neighbors’ pets, but as soon as it comes time to debate actions, not words, Democrats seem to fall right in line with the far-right agenda of Trump and his allies. What use is criticizing xenophobic rhetoric if you are going to turn around and support xenophobic policy?
This is why voters stayed home in 2024. The Democrats may talk a good talk, but rarely do they walk a good walk. How can I, as a voter, trust a party that continues to claim they value one thing to my face and then turns around and betrays those very same values? How can I believe that Trump is such a great threat to this country when you roll over and quit fighting as soon as he is reelected? Shouldn’t that be when you fight even harder?
Some Democrats understand this, and continue to reject the attempts by the modern GOP to distort political reality. Unfortunately, many do not, and yet they continue to believe that they are still somehow left-of-center when they continue to kowtow to right-wing framing and fall for evergreen Republican narratives of “supporting law enforcement” being “tough on crime” and “protecting national security.”
The truth is that the American “center” would be the “right” in any other developed democracy. Unfortunately, this means that several of our most prominent “liberal” or “left-wing” political leaders are effectively wolves in sheeps’ clothing. There are obvious instances of this, like Joe Manchin, Kristen Sinema, or even John Fetterman, but there are just as many Republicans-in-Democrats’-clothing who fly under the radar because of the right-wing skew inherent in modern American politics.
What moments like the passage of the Laken Riley Act serve to highlight is that blind loyalty to the a political party, especially one based in a loose collective of identity-based coalitions like the American Democratic Party, can be fraught with unintended political consequences. It is convenient as a voter to check off all the names with “D” next to them, but the reality is that the Democratic party fails to have the same ideological coherence as the Republicans. One can vote Republican down-ballot and reasonably expect each candidate to vote the exact same way on each and every issue — the same is not always true with Democrats who cover a much broader swath of the American political spectrum, all the way from Manchin to AOC.
Voting for party is not the same as voting for issues, and the Democratic party is fracturing over the issue of immigration. While some members of the party remain advocates for a more humane immigration system that embraces the diverse nature of American society, too many have fully bought into the malicious Republican depiction of immigration as a threat to both national security and White American hegemony.
With the Democratic party already displaying a severe lack of moral backbone just days into Trump’s second term, we will likely soon witness the implementation of some of the most draconic immigration policy in modern American history.