DHS Claims America Is 'Not A Nation Of Immigrants'

In today’s episode of The Trump Administration Is A White Nationalist Organization, And Here’s Your Proof, on Sunday, the Department of Homeland Security posted a video featuring DHS Deputy Assistant Secretary Micah Bock, who appeared to be taking on the role of professor of whitewashed history, with a message for Americans aimed at dispelling a “lie” that, well, is demonstrably not a lie at all.

“This week, it’s important to dispel a lie that has permeated American political thought for some time. America is not a nation of immigrants,” Bock said. “We are a nation of citizens. And it is because of those citizens that we are an exceptional nation.”

Actually, Bock would be right to say calling America a “nation of immigrants” is inaccurate — if he had come to that conclusion for the right reasons.

Before I explain why Bock would be wrong even if he was kind of right, here’s what The New Republic had to say:

The United States, of course, is a “nation of immigrants.” That’s not a lie. No American citizen, with the exception of Native Americans, has a family history that does not involve some form of immigration to the United States. 

The phrase “a nation of immigrants” was popularized as the title of President John F. Kennedy’s 1958 book that argued the nation was strengthened by the steady flow of immigrants from around the world. Trump’s Secretary of State Marco Rubio previously called this book a reminder “of our shared dreams, goals, and destiny as a nation,” writing that Americans “must remain mindful that there is much more that unites us than divides us.” 

TNR’s take gets us closer to the truth, but it still misses the mark.

The ancestors of Black Americans were not immigrants; they were enslaved people who were brought here by force. That’s a very necessary distinction that shouldn’t be glossed over, because, just like the Trump administration is moving to edit history to remove the part where white people came here by boat, too, it’s also trying its best to remove slavery, Jim Crow, and all other forms of anti-Black systemic racism from libraries, classrooms and museums across the country. “We are not a nation of immigrants” is of the same brand of pseudo-patriotic propaganda as “America is not a racist country.”

So, outside of Native Americans and Black descendants of enslaved people, yes, America is, indeed, a nation of immigrants — which brings us back to Bock.

Bock went on to suggest that “the first duty of our government is to defend its people’s wellbeing, way of life, and to safeguard our country’s heritage.” He insisted that our immigration system had been “molested and abused by previous administrations without concern for preserving our country’s traditions, customs, or quality of life.”

In the caption of the video tweet, DHS noted that the U.S. motto, “E Pluribus Unum,” means “Out of many, one,” but then the department tried to amend the motto into some homogeneous countryman nonsense.

“One Nation. One Culture. One Shared Heritage,” the post read.

Yeah — I really wish they would come right out and say it’s a country for white people.

Just go ahead and speak your truth.

After all, who is Bock speaking to when he talks about our Americans’ “shared heritage”? Which heritage would that be? Are we talking about the same heritage Republicans claim to protect while defending Confederate flags and monuments?

That ain’t my heritage. That ain’t my culture.

If we all share “one culture,” how come the reactions to things happening in pop culture, such as Bad Bunny headlining the Super Bowl halftime show next year, have been so polarizing? Bad Bunny is a U.S. citizen from Puerto Rico, and many Americans are fine with him gracing the Super Bowl stage and singing all the Spanish-language songs he wants to sing, while other Americans of our so-called “one culture” are losing their MAGA minds over the decision, and suggesting Bad Bunny be replaced with much older and whiter artists, who, in their minds, will appease a wider audience. House Speaker Mike Johnson suggested 82-year-old country singer Lee Greenwood because, according to Johnson, he “appeals to a wider audience.” Welfare king Brett Favre suggested “Try That in a Small Town” singer Jason Aldean — the guy who got dragged across social media for making what many Americans clocked as pro-lynching music — because, in Favre’s mind, Aldean is “someone who loves this country and that everyone could relate to.”

Really? “Everyone” can relate to Aldean?

Again, isn’t it clear that by “everyone,” these people just mean white people? Isn’t the “one culture” they’re purporting to protect a culture of whiteness? Isn’t it Caucasian heritage — whatever that is — and the white American “way of life” that they’re trying to “safeguard” by speaking against multiculturalism?

Because that’s what Bock’s message was really about. It was a speech against multiculturalism, which comes straight out of the framework for white nationalism and white supremacist ideology.

When we say President Donald Trump is a white supremacist who is running a white nationalist organization, this is why.

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DHS Posts Video Claiming It’s A ‘Lie’ That America Is A ‘Nation Of Immigrants’ was originally published on newsone.com