Earlier this week, AG Alberto Gonzalez appeared on CNN with Wolf Blitzer and the issue of his grandparents’ immigration status emerged.
From the transcript:
GONZALES: Well, three of my grandparents were born in Mexico. They came to Texas. My parents — both my parents were born in Texas extremely poor. My mother…BLITZER: When they came to Texas, were they legally documented, were they un-legally documented?
GONZALES: You know what? It’s unclear. It’s unclear.
And I’ve looked at this issue, I’ve talked to my parents about it and it’s just not clear.
But in any event, my mother had a 2nd grade education — my father had a 2nd grade education, my mother had a 6th grade education. And my father worked construction.
And so, for me, my life has — represents the American dream.
Indeed.
Think Progress has the video.
While it be would foolish to state that by the third generation the children of migrant workers will be members of the Supreme Court of Texas or working in the White House, however, the notion that by the third generation these folks would be fully integrated into US society tracks with what I have noted before.
h/t: Sully
May 17th, 2024 at 1:35 pm
As I understand it (please correct me if I’m mistaken), until 1965 there was no limit placed on the number of immigrant visas that could be approved from Mexico. So the issue of whether or not Gonzalez’ grandparents were legal or not is probably not particularly relevant. If they were not, it only means that they didn’t bother to get paperwork that they could have easily gotten.
May 17th, 2024 at 1:45 pm
I will confess to being a tad sketchy on the pre-1965 rules.
However, I don’t think that there were no rules whatsoever–as if that was the case, why have the Bracero program (a guest-worker program that originated in WWII and ended in the early 1960s)?
More to the point, however, is that my point was about assimilation, and not really about legality/illegality.
The current illegals come to work, and are likely uneducated. However, the test of assimilation is with the children and grandchildren.
Gonzalez is certainly a grand example of assimilation.
May 17th, 2024 at 2:09 pm
Thomas Sowell did some great work on this back when he was at the Urban institute. he compared Mexicans to the Southern Italians of yesteryear.
May 17th, 2024 at 6:51 pm
When I first read anything about Gonzales’ ethnicity, he was from El Salvador. What happened to that ( or am I remembering wrong).
May 17th, 2024 at 8:00 pm
You are probably thinking about Miguel Estrada, who was bornin Honduras and was appointed by Bush to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, and eventually withdrew his name after a Democratic filibuster kept his name from the floor.
May 20th, 2024 at 9:38 pm
When is someone going to call out the Heritage Foundation on their hypocritcal immigrant scaremongering? At the same time they are saying the US as we know it is going to end with incerased immigration (both legal and illegal) they are expanding their own staff through immigrant hires:
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Immigration/wm1076.cfm