One Tar Heel was enthusiastic about the "climate of fear" created by ICE

 Probably by intention, the incursion of federal agents into North Carolina created a climate of fear in the state. But one Tar Heel was rather enthusiastic. Michael Whately, candidate for Senate, announced that we was “welcoming” CBP and ICE agents to our state. There was a job to done, roughly if necessary. 

Whatley’s full-throated support for ICE’s aggression stood out for its stridency even among fellow Republicans. A Trump cult, the NCGOP offered dutiful support to the autocrat’s immigration enforcers. But Whatley was giddy, gung-ho, for the cause. “We welcome the arrival of ICE agents to Charlotte, which is a direct response to Roy Cooper’s failed leadership,” he enthused. The rant went on: “President Trump has provided strong, decisive action to keep North Carolina communities safe after Cooper vetoed legislation which would have required North Carolina sheriffs to honor ICE detainers — inviting dangerous criminals to remain on our streets and communities rather than face federal deportation.” It was Christmas in November. 

ICE roamed through Charlotte and Raleigh hunting down Brown-skinned people and harshly demanding their papers. Many of these people, it almost goes without saying, were American citizens. One American citizen in Charlotte was sitting in his car when a CBP agent—masked and boiling with testosterone—smashed his window and dragged him out of the vehicle. ICE arrested about 130 people, barely a third of them with criminal records. The community reeled in distress. Thirty-thousand children, one-fifth of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg School System’s enrollment, stayed home from school, taking precautions against the trauma and violence ICE has inflicted on young children in Chicago and elsewhere. 

This is a spasm of state violence unseen in North Carolina since the Civil War. Armed federal authorities are entering the state on dubious pretexts to harass, intimidate, and harm peaceful North Carolinians. At least in the Civil War federal forces were here to free the enslaved and expand liberty. Today, under the direction of Donald Trump and Duke graduate Stephen Miller, the government is coming to frighten people and enforce a strict racial hierarchy. The point is to intimidate Brown people and reduce the number of racial minorities who feel comfortable living in their communities. 

Whatley professes to be thrilled. He’s trying to piggyback (“quiet, piggy!”) on Trump’s rampage to blame violence in North Carolina both on immigrants and on Roy Cooper. This is ludicrous. Cooper did veto a bill that would have usurped local authority by requiring sheriffs to cooperate with ICE. But the bill was gratuitous. The legislature had already banned sanctuary cities in North Carolina in 2015, removing the option of shielding the undocumented from immigration enforcement. Cooper made his bones in North Carolina locking up meth dealers and cracking down on pedophiles. His crime-fighting credentials are much stronger than those of Whatley, who has spent every day of his professional life as a political hack and corporate lobbyist. 

We can discern two things from Whatley’s lusty cheerleading for Trump’s masked army. First, he is a politician for white people only. “We” welcome the agents, he said, employing the first-person plural. Based upon public opinion in Black and Brown communities, that “we” would seem not to include anyone of non-European ancestry. Whatley speaks for the tribe. He represents culturally conservative, nativist white people who are not threatened by immigration enforcement. His politics are ethnocentric. 

The second fact to be gleaned is that a vote for Whatley is only a vote for Trump. For political purposes, Whatley is a non-person. He exists as an instrument for the implementation of Trump’s will. I highly doubt that Whatley is personally hawkish on immigration. He worked for the George W. Bush GOP that embraced comprehensive immigration reform. He has completely transformed himself into a border-enforcing, cosplaying would-be lawman because Donald Trump’s will has demanded it. Whatley will never, ever stand up to Trump on anything, including when North Carolinians’ lives and wellbeing are at stake. 

Whatley’s “tough” act is rather unconvincing. We know that this man is a loyal apparatchik of the GOP whose only passion, if he has one buried somewhere in his colorless personality, is to win elections for Republicans and accumulate power for Republicans. He’s not a lawman. He cannot be a true-believing immigration hawk. North Carolinians wondering whether to send this man back to Washington on their behalf should know that his loyalties reside only with the White House