Member-only story
The Real ‘Migrant’ Crisis
Why don’t Republican vote-getters focus more on the opioid epidemic than on the ‘migrant crisis,’ which, to be clear, is a xenophobic trope? It’s not ‘illegal migrants’ who are coming for our jobs; it’s multinational syndicates coming for our neighborhoods.
It’s drugs, not people.
It’s illegal trade and terrorism, not people. (1, 2)
Figure 1.2: State-based armed conflicts, by type, 1946–2017
Whether they are drug cartels or oligarch monopolists or global energy multinationals pulling the strings, the ‘migrant’ crisis appears on the surface synonymous with crime, which nativist politicians stroke in their campaigns. Beneath the stats, however, beneath the xenophobia, is increasing private investment in the export of crime.
Figure 1.4: Global refugee population, 1951–2017
Recall The Panama Papers imbroglio which attempted to connect the dots between syndicates and their…