STRAINED TEXAS-MEXICO RELATIONSHIP (UNLIKE CALIFORNIA-MEXICO RELATIONSHIP WHICH IS GETTING BETTER): 2 Articles
(1) Article: “Richard Parker: Texas’ new war with Mexico brings political, economic costs” – by Richard Parker for The Dallas Morning News, published and updated on May 20-21, 2015.
Excerpts: [Beginning article] “For decades now, Texas has maintained a complex, strong and even subtle relationship with its biggest and most important neighbor, Mexico. Until now, that is. Quite suddenly, with the tea party holding the reins of power in Austin, Texas is turning suddenly and decidedly anti-Mexican. Republican Gov. Greg Abbott has snubbed officials of bordering Mexican states. The Legislature is in near hysteria about the border while requiring local police to inquire about citizenship status and cutting off in-state tuition to children of undocumented immigrants – the most draconian anti-immigrant measure since California’s ill-fated Proposition 187. Continuing down this path will bring not just political costs but economic ones for Texas business… No state has benefited more handsomely from NAFTA than Texas… Historically, Texas governors have treated their Mexican counterparts with deference. Ann Richards invited counterparts from Mexico’s neighboring states to her inauguration in 1991. So did George W. Bush in 1995… At each of his inaugurations, Rick Perry welcomed his counterparts warmly, calling them ‘special friends.’ But the 2014 election yielded a crop of Republicans hostile to Mexico – and Mexicans. As the Texas Tribune reported, conspicuously absent at Abbott’s swearing-in were the governors of the neighboring Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Coahuila and Chihuahua. It turned out they were not invited… The Legislature is preparing to spend up to $800 million on border security… Regardless, facts don’t stop Abbott from claiming – as he did last year – that the Islamic State might infiltrate Texas, a claim repeated by the state’s top law enforcement agency only to be disputed by U.S. intelligence agencies. Abbott also said that 3,000 recent murders were committed by unauthorized immigrants, a statistically impossible claim that Texas Politifact labeled a ‘pants-on-fire’ fabrication. The crackdown is about to extend from the border to college campuses and city streets. The Legislature is poised to deny in-state tuition to Texas students who are children of unauthorized immigrants… rendered nonresidents of their home state, these students would see their tuition double. Effectively kicking tens of thousands of tuition-paying students out of college would be reminiscent of when California voted to deny all public services to any unauthorized immigrant. Defeated in the courts, Proposition 187 also spelled the beginning of the end for Republican power in California…” [End article]
(2) Article: “California is the new Texas on border relations” – by The Editorial Board for The Sacramento Bee, dated March 14, 2015.
Excerpts: [Beginning article] “Texas and California – two states that are big enough and diverse enough to be small countries – joined the United States before and after a war with Mexico in the mid-1800s. Since then the two states’ paths have diverged, as have their relationships with the nation’s southern neighbor. Now those dynamics are changing yet again, possibly to California’s benefit… As the Dallas Morning News recently reported, Texas is now seen widely as hostile to Mexico, while California is building ever closer ties with the country – and with the Mexicans who come here… In California, meanwhile, Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature hosted Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto, and Brown has courted investment from Mexican business interests. California once again has begun issuing driver’s licenses to undocumented immigrants, reversing a ban brought about by legislation signed by Wilson in 1994. California’s Dream Act laws now offer financial aid to undocumented students, and the state has limited the interaction between local law enforcement and immigration authorities in ways that have reduced deportations. Polls show that California voters are more accepting of immigrants than ever… Now California is the one, from a public policy point of view, leading the way in terms of how to rethink, engage and create new trans-border ties with Mexico… Meanwhile, even if there were no economic benefit, California’s evolution has been worth it. Building close ties with Mexico, rather than engaging in a war of words, or worse, is the right thing to do.” [End article]
>>>>LINKS:
http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/latest-columns/20150520-richard-parker-texas-new-war-with-mexico.ece
http://www.fresnobee.com/opinion/editorials/article19539906.html
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