Observations of a Caribbean-American Political Activist: with Errol Louis in Mind.

Rock Hermon Hackshaw

Ten years ago, Bill Clinton signed into law an anti-terrorism measure, that has turned out to be one of the worst pieces of legislation impacting on the Caribbean and Latin-America. One of its provisions included repatriating immigrants-both legal and undocumented- for  infractions here. It also expanded deportation programs which targeted those undocumented, even though undocumented aliens are amongst the most law-abiding (with the obvious exceptions, of course) of people living here. Within a year, some were deported for as simple a thing as jumping the subway turnstile in New York City. Initially, there were many who seemed to see no problem in all this, after all, if you are residing in a host country, it behooves you to obey the law - probably, even moreso than if you were still residing in the country of your birth. Well, not really. Only one country saw the deeper problem that this new policy would manifest. That country was Argentina.