{"id":21321,"date":"2024-01-08T00:36:43","date_gmt":"2024-01-08T10:36:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/?p=21321"},"modified":"2024-01-08T00:36:44","modified_gmt":"2024-01-08T10:36:44","slug":"will-trump-become-the-white-marcos-in-2024","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/2024\/01\/08\/will-trump-become-the-white-marcos-in-2024\/","title":{"rendered":"Will Trump Become The White Marcos In 2024?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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by Emil Guillermo<\/em>

As we close 2023 this holiday season, I am moved to extend to you the gift of history. President Joe Biden made me do it.

But first, consider the stark contrast in the recent immigration-speak from the two who will be vying for your attention in the new year, 2024.

There\u2019s the aforementioned Biden, and then there\u2019s that other<\/em> guy, the twice-impeached, quadruple-indicted, former president who seems intent on driving the U.S. into full-speed reverse mode.

That would be the desire of Donald Trump, who as Liz Cheney says has America sleepwalking into dictatorship, Trump\u2019s ambition come November.

He\u2019s already vetting people for a Trump administration that would allow him to be a strongman autocrat. When he says he wants to be a dictator for one day, he\u2019s not kidding.

According to reports, on his first day in office, Trump intends to invoke the Insurrection Act and establish an American martial law.

It reveals Trump\u2019s main ambition–to become the White Marcos. (The senior Ferdinand, not Bong Bong).

That would truly be historic, where the colonizer goes retro and becomes more and more like the country it colonized.

Don\u2019t think it can\u2019t happen, not if we continue to the trend of the polls, where 70% of Republicans say despite Trump\u2019s criminality, they would rather see the aging and morbidly obese Trump man return to power, according to a recent New York Times\/Sienna College poll.

Republicans have normalized the \u201cbadness,\u201d and just want power.

Good for them, bad for America.

There\u2019s still enough time to reverse the reversal before Trump actually debases American democracy.

If we don\u2019t, that won\u2019t look good for Filipino Americans, or Asian Americans in general.

Trump<\/strong>\u2019<\/strong>s view on immigrants<\/strong>
Just before the Christmas holiday, Donald Trump was on the campaign trail in Iowa denouncing immigrants: \u201cThey\u2019re ruining our country. And it\u2019s true, they are destroying the blood of our country.\u201d

Trump, the phlebotomist, was talking about the southern border, but the arrivals aren\u2019t just from Mexico, or Central and South America. Increasingly, the border crossers have been Asian, particularly from China and India.

Trump was talking about our blood too.

Trump denies he was using Hitleresque rhetoric, boasting about his illiteracy saying he\u2019s never read \u201cMein Kampf.\u201d It doesn\u2019t matter. The thoughts are in his heart.

Compare Trump\u2019s hate speech with the public statement of President Joe Biden on Dec. 17.

On that day, President Biden honored all Chinese immigrants to America by remembering the 80th anniversary of the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act.

Did anyone (public figure, stranger, friend, or family member) even bother to mention that momentous occasion and what that means not just to Chinese Americans, but all Asian Americans?

Exclusion has been a fundamental theme for Asian Americans in U.S. history.

America always wants us to come here to work, but they don\u2019t want us for good. Not if it can be helped.  As Trump would say, we\u2019re poisoning the blood of America.

The Chinese Exclusion Act was the first and only major law that targeted a specific national group from immigrating to the U.S.

Imagine a Chinese face, put a bar across it. With few exceptions, they weren\u2019t allowed in the U.S.

And, of course, the idea was first introduced by a threatened, pre-MAGA California Republican, Horace Page, and signed into law by Republican President Chester Arthur on May 6, 1882.

Even when the Exclusion Act was finally repealed in 1943, some restrictions remained. Chinese may not have faced wholesale exclusion, but Chinese immigration was limited to just over 100 people a year.

The racist quota was in place until the Hart-Cellar Act gave the U.S. the immigration reform needed in 1965.

By recognizing the repeal of the Chinese Exclusion Act, President Biden was acknowledging the original sin against all Asian Americans.

If you\u2019re wondering why you should care about the Chinese exclusion, consider how all other Asian ethnicities were excluded in the U.S. in the early 20th century,  including Japanese, Indian and Filipino.

But the Chinese were the first. Their exclusion was a model for all Asian hate in America.

\u201cThe Act, along with racism and xenophobia in other parts of American life, was part of the anti-Chinese \u201cDriving Out\u201d era which included the Rock Springs and Hells Canyon Massacre,\u201d Biden added for good measure.

How many Americans, let alone Asian Americans, even know of those two horrible events that captured the animus of the time? Biden mentioned them, but for most people, like me, they were just empty words.

Let me fill them out for you. Everyone needs to know them.

Chinese massacres of the exclusion<\/strong>
If you think all the mass shootings, we\u2019ve had in the U.S. are bad, they\u2019re nothing like the mass murder and riot in Rock Springs, Wyoming in 1882.

That\u2019s when angry white miners went after Chinese miners who worked for less and were accused of taking jobs away from white workers.

At least 28 Chinese miners were killed and 15 were injured. Rioters also burned down nearly 80 Chinese homes in what was Rock Springs\u2019 Chinatown.

It was just the beginning of hate toward the wave of Chinese immigrants who had come to America to help build the railroad and mine for gold in the American West.

Examples of the hot rhetoric were published in The North American Review, where Asian immigrants were referred to as \u201cthe Asiatic race, alien in blood, habits and civilization.\u201d

Sound familiar?

The hate extended from Wyoming to Oregon\u2019s Hells Canyon Massacre, also known as the Snake River Massacre in 1887.

That\u2019s when 30 laborers mining gold were gunned down by a white gang of horse thieves.

The identity of the seven murderers was known, and a trial did take place in 1888. But only three stood trial and were acquitted.

According to History.com, a rancher who attended the trial commented, \u201cI guess if they had killed 31 white men, something would have been done about it, but none of the jury knew the Chinamen or cared much about it, so they turned the men loose.\u201d

No one cared about the Hells Canyon case again until 1995 when a Wallowa County (Ore.) clerk found some files in a local museum\u2019s safe. The records of the trial, like the shameful history, were hidden.

Once uncovered, a reporter from the Oregonian wrote a book on the massacre, which led to a memorial built on the Snake River to honor some of the Chinese who were killed.

Exclusion<\/strong>\u2019s repeal<\/strong>
Of all the candidates running for president, I only heard President Biden care enough to mention the importance of the events that signified the Asian hate in America during the Chinese Exclusion Act, officially repealed on Dec. 17, 1943.

\u201cToday, there are those who still demonize immigrants and fan the flames of intolerance,\u201d Biden said in his statement.

\u201cIt\u2019s wrong. I ran for President to restore the soul of America. To bring people together and make sure we give hate no safe harbor. . .[and] to celebrate the diversity that is our great strength.\u201d

Almost as if on cue, that same weekend Trump was in Iowa, talking about how immigrants\u2019 blood poisons our country.

Trump\u2019s already done plenty to poison our modern politics. In 2012, during President Obama\u2019s term, a Republican-led House of Representatives passed unanimously<\/em> a resolution to condemn the Chinese Exclusion Act.<\/em>

Can you imagine that happening now with an anti-China, anti-immigrant Freedom Caucus?

That\u2019s how close we are to an America in full reverse, led by a newly elected Trump.

History can repeat itself if we aren\u2019t careful.

President Joe Biden remembered that the other day when honoring the repeal of an act some politicians wish still existed.

Biden knew the importance of recognizing what all Asian Americans, including Filipinos, have had to overcome.

That is the gift of history. Putting the present into context always helps us to keep moving forward with undeniable clarity in 2024.

EMIL GUILLERMO<\/strong> is a journalist and commentator. He does a micro-talk show on <\/em>YouTube.com\/@emilamok1<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Emil Guillermo As we close 2023 this holiday season, I am moved to extend…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21293,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[29,20],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=1277%2C706&ssl=1",1277,706,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=300%2C166&ssl=1",300,166,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=640%2C354&ssl=1",640,354,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=640%2C354&ssl=1",640,354,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=1277%2C706&ssl=1",1277,706,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=1277%2C706&ssl=1",1277,706,true],"ultp_layout_landscape_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=1200%2C706&ssl=1",1200,706,true],"ultp_layout_landscape":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=870%2C570&ssl=1",870,570,true],"ultp_layout_portrait":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=600%2C706&ssl=1",600,706,true],"ultp_layout_square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=600%2C600&ssl=1",600,600,true],"covernews-slider-full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=1115%2C706&ssl=1",1115,706,true],"covernews-slider-center":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=663%2C500&ssl=1",663,500,true],"covernews-featured":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=1024%2C566&ssl=1",1024,566,true],"covernews-medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=540%2C285&ssl=1",540,285,true],"covernews-medium-square":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?resize=375%2C250&ssl=1",375,250,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Candid Perspectives<\/a> Featured<\/a>","tag_info":"Featured","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/CP-TrumpApo-color_01062024.jpg?fit=1277%2C706&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21321"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21321"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21321\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21322,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21321\/revisions\/21322"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21293"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21321"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21321"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thefilipinochronicle.com\/backup\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21321"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}