Eagle Pass, TX, residents want their town back!
Yesterday, we posted about TX Governor Abbott’s theatrics and the inhumanity of using concertina wire to catch children and babies, as well as their parents whose desperate actions to escape their homeland situations are caught in the inhumane concertina wire. Here is a news story with pictures (scroll down) about what the concertina wire looks like.
Eagle Pass is a nice town with a park along the Rio Grande River. Abbott has sent the National Guard in to take over Eagle Pass Park (and apparently the town). Kids can’t play in it, and picnics or other park activities cannot be held there. Instead, the Guard’s equipment, tents, and concertina wire are just running over park grass and the river bank, generally, making a mess.
Residents are not happy. They want their town back, but now that Abbott has sent the Guard in, his next step is to support a “Take Our Border Back Convoy” anti-immigrant group to create more theatrics. Their reputation?
According to the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC), the expectation is that people in the convoy already have a reputation for becoming violent against immigrant communities and their members. LULAC National President Domingo Garcia has warned, “We know that many of them are armed. And many of them have extremist views, especially in terms of the fear-mongering and scapegoating of immigrants and Hispanics.”
Organizers of the convoy deny this, but evidence shows a lot of guns and anger in that caravan.
Eagle Pass’ residents are primarily of Hispanic descent; if LULAC is correct, how will “angry, gun-toting” convoy participants tell the difference between non-documented Hispanics coming over the border and residents? Will local citizens have to show proof of citizenship to go to the grocery store or to work?
What we need are solutions; we need workers in this country, and Republicans are refusing to pass any legislation directed at the sometimes massive numbers of people attempting to enter the US. The record shows that building a wall does not work, separating families does not work, and Homeland Security is caught without the new authorizations and additional workforce it needs to attack the problem.
President Biden has agreed to sign legislation if Speaker Mike and his Republican Majority would act and pass something that begins the path to solutions. Sadly, Republicans prefer making (fanning?) political messes rather than doing the actual work of passing legislative solutions.