“Turd eaters” and Title 42: How the pandemic is being used to fulfill a white supremacist fantasy
To gain a comprehensive understanding of the Title 42 policy instituted by the Center for Disease Control and enforced by the Department of Homeland Security, one must begin in a rather unusual place. An obscure French novel published in 1973 entitled “The Camp of the Saints.” The novel is considered a sort of Bible for white supremacists and far-right radicals. It depicts a dystopian future that imagines “turd-eating” brown-skinned refugees from Southeast Asian and Africa invading and destroying France.
The book posits itself as a warning that foreigners will destroy “Western” civilization, bring disease and violent crime and it is the duty of white people and defenders of civil society to practice constant vigilance against such invasions of similar savages. Now, what in the world does this piece of racist propaganda have to do with the utilization of a public health order during a pandemic? The answer is found in senior advisor to former President Donald Trump, Stephen Miller.
Miller earned his xenophobic bonafides as the architect of Trump’s “Muslim ban,” dismantling the DACA program (or at least attempting to), the family separation policy and bringing the refugee resettlement program to a screeching halt. In 2015, acting then as an advisor to the Trump presidential campaign, Miller emailed anti-immigrant blog Breitbart and suggested they run a story drawing parallels to “The Camp of the Saints” as a way of challenging the Pope for calling on compassion to help Syrian refugees. Miller thrived in the Trump administration and was one of his most trusted advisors and they enjoyed many xenophobic successes together. When the Coronavirus came in 2020 Miller saw an opening to utilize a policy that would restrict asylum seekers and refugees comprehensively and completely in an unprecedented way.
Title 42 under the Public Health Service Act of 1944 allowed the federal government to bar the entry of persons into the United States based on public health concerns. Miller could use this little-known section of US code to realize his dream of completely sealing the border and preventing any more “turd-eaters” from entering the country. And he could even do it using a public health justification in the face of the worst global pandemic in over a century. The only problem was the scientists at the CDC found no evidence to justify denying vulnerable asylum seekers as a way to mitigate the damages of COVID-19. Unfortunately, science lost to corruption and after one phone call from then-Vice President Mike Pence to the director of the CDC the decision was made to enforce Title 42 and seal the border completely.
The simplest breakdown of the asylum process is this: someone comes to the United States, either at a port of entry or by turning themselves over to CBP agents and initiates a claim for asylum. They are then given a “credible fear interview” by a US Citizenship and Immigration Services officer. If their fears are deemed “credible” they are allowed to actually process an asylum claim before an immigration judge. They are then allowed into the United States in various contexts, from being granted work authorization to being forced into immigration detention as they await the outcome of their case. A flawed and inhumane process even when operational, with backlogs that keep people in limbo for years. Title 42 works in a way where anyone and everyone is immediately expelled (like deported but for someone not yet even in the country) without even having a chance to ask for a credible fear interview. Not even a chance to ask for a chance to claim asylum.
More than a year later and a change in Presidents and Title 42 remains in place. Unaccompanied children are now exempt from Title 42 and given the chance to claim asylum, but this is a marginal concession towards human dignity. Even so, this creates impossible situations for families who arrive at the southwest border and realize they will either be expelled directly back to the desperate conditions they fled from, or make the excruciating decision to self-separate from their child to allow at least them the chance for refuge. This is, by the way, a violation of national law, international agreements and of asylum seekers’ human rights, which is why the ACLU is suing the Biden administration currently.
The justification of Title 42 is not one of economic growth but in the supposed interest of public health. Understanding that this order was given at the protest of scientists and was politically demanded by a documented white supremacist, these justifications deteriorate rapidly. Physicians for Human Rights, a Nobel laureate organization, recently published a report that detailed the dangers and risks of violating asylum seeker’s rights by enforcing Title 42 and confirmed the protests of CDC experts who saw no evidence to justify the policy on public health grounds.
The report found that the inhumane treatment of asylum seekers went beyond simply violating their right to asylum and actually increased the chances of the spread of COVID-19 by forcing migrants into crowded facilities, buses and flights to expel them into Mexico, often in dangerous conditions. Furthermore, continued evidence of abuse, mistreatment and psychological harm was reported by asylum seekers by the hands of US government officials and agents. These harms are only exacerbated under the Title 42 policy.
Ultimately the report confirmed what other public health experts had concluded, that there are ways to process and accept asylum seekers that are in accordance with public health guidelines concerning the spread of COVID-19. Denying and violating the rights of the most vulnerable people, mistreating them and exposing them to the deadly Coronavirus without regard for their health and safety is not the impact of a policy enacted in sound public health concerns. As thousands of vulnerable migrants fleeing violence, poverty, destruction and prejudice are re-traumatized by those they are seeking refuge among, mistreated and abused while their human rights are made a mockery of. The outcomes of this policy make it absolutely clear what the origin of Title 42 was, not a public health determination, but a white supremacist and his disgusting bible.
Title 42 is reviewed on a two-month basis and renewed accordingly. While science remains on the side of human rights, political calculations have prevented the Biden administration from having the courage to support the rights of asylum seekers. In recent weeks Republican and right-wing leaders have invoked the sentiments of monsters like the El Paso shooter and Stephen Miller and decried “invasions” of migrants who are “seeding” and “farming” diseases throughout the country and “bringing filth” to America. All this despite the almost complete closure of our borders and with the rise of concern surrounding the Delta variant of the Coronavirus, Biden knows he will be flooded with xenophobic attacks about “open borders” and pearl-clutching about White Replacement Theory. So the policy remains.
Contacting representatives to ask that they demand the end of the cruelty of Title 42 can assist in pressuring the Biden administration to lift the policy. Sharing the real situation of the border, the horrors of Title 42 and stopping the spread of misinformation about “open borders” or migrants spreading disease is crucial in eradicating these tired xenophobic tropes from the narrative of migration and the pandemic.
The CDC can and should immediately revoke Title 42 and instead of perpetuating and exacerbating trauma onto vulnerable asylum seekers should prioritize their time and energy on assisting asylum seekers through the difficult asylum process in a way that is safe and humane. The DHS can and should stop the enforcement of Title 42 as well as ending immigration detention for all migrants but particularly for those merely seeking asylum as is their international right.
If “Turd-eaters” is ever an appropriate moniker for a group of people it should perhaps only be reserved for the group of people with tremendous power who deny asylum seekers a shred of human dignity. Obsessed with power and beholden to the rebuke of white supremacists they hide behind excuses of public health while simultaneously disregarding the same public health concerns to force vulnerable people seeking refuge into unsafe and crowded detention centers. Whether we are the ones who find scripture from the pages of bigotry and hate or the ones who allow these bigots to practice their cruelty unchecked, the impact on the vulnerable is the same.
