Doug Ford showed up at the Conservative convention last week and didn't say anything about immigration. But, Martin Regg Cohn writes, that doesn't mean he hasn't made himself known on the subject:
While Ford had the decency to avoid diversity on this occasion, our premier still makes no apologies for stirring things up. On the same day Justin Trudeau made his first courtesy call at Queen’s Park last month, Ford issued a statement blaming and berating Ottawa for a “crisis” of “illegal border crossers.”
“This mess was 100 per cent the result of the federal government,” according to the premier’s office — a crisis triggered by a Trudeau tweet, the Tories claimed. Notwithstanding Ford’s troll-like taunts, I’m not aware of anyone encouraging anyone to make unauthorized crossings anywhere. While Ford recites his lines, and incites his followers, he ignores the facts.
And the facts are more complicated than what we're told:
After an accidental encounter with a Colombian family of refugee claimants this month along the Vermont border, I learned from Canadian and U.S. officials that the current surge isn’t about tweets, but timing. In fact, the flow of migrants is a two-way traffic jam: The Americans told me their border patrols regularly intercept Mexicans trying to enter the U.S. via Canada, after first flying here (visa-free tourism was restored in 2016), then circling back south. Meanwhile, the patrols regularly intercept Latin Americans going in the opposite direction, having already made it into the U.S. from the Mexican border — before heading for Canada (they often tip off their Canadian counterparts, allowing the RCMP to intercept asylum claimants across the border for legal processing).
The point is that despite the president’s Twitter-trashing, Mexicans still sneak into America via Canada. U.S. border guards tell me it was American media coverage of Trump’s tweets that had spooked Latin Americans into heading for Canada, not an unnoticed Trudeau tweet about Canadian values.
Facts, however, don't matter to the Conservatives. They like to stir the pot -- and they're good at dog whistle politics:
In truth, we can’t generalize about the motivations of any individual migrant. The only certainty is that by pressing people’s buttons, resorting to dog whistles, or blaring into political megaphones, our premier is giving people ammunition and permission to think the worst of migrants.
It doesn’t take much to stir things up. Ford knows, and Lord knows, that Canadians and Ontarians are no better than anyone else. Polling data consistently shows we are perfectly capable of prejudice and hostility against refugees and recent immigrants when prodded.
By now we should know who these people are. They're Stephen Harper's people. And they haven't changed.
Image: Haas Institute UC Berkeley
4 comments:
Yes, they are Harper's people. But Harper was cunning enough to notice that religious fundies in immigrant communities could be lured by the same social conservative messages as the rest of his followers. He sent Kenny to gorge himself on ethnic delights and reach out to them.
But by 2015, Harper couldn't control himself and his barbaric cultural practices snitch-line sent Kenny's work up in a great autodafé as his bigoted base roared their approval and the GTA's immigrant-rich Tory ridings went Liberal.
Ford's handlers learned from that mistake. Some of the biggest resistance to the new sex-ed curriculum came from Muslim communities in Thorncliffe Park, Mississauga and Brampton. Hammering on the curriculum allowed Ford to appeal to these communities and to McVety's crowd.
Scheer isn't nearly as smart and the ethnic vote is a significant blindspot in his Rebel-led campaign.
Cap
I agree, Cap. Harper was a cunning cuss, with a keen sense of his enemy's jugular vein. Scheer isn't Harper. But the caucus still drinks the Harper Kool-Aide.
Since the advent of the ReformaCon Party, " the base" has always been racist.
It's always been easy to spot their true colours, Jay.
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