Lou “Hired Undocumented Immigrants” Dobbs: Another Example of Immigration Hypocrisy?

The “scandalous” stories about rich people hiring undocumented workers have been floating around like crazy lately. First there was Meg Whitman and her hasty firing of an undocumented housekeeper who asked for help gaining legal status. Then there was Colin Powell's "keeping it real" statement about undocumented workers working on his yard that inspired outrage from some fellow Republicans. And now we are shocked, shocked! — that a multi-millionaire ex-television talking head with two huge properties in need of landscaping maintenance, and a stable full of horses that are lovely to ride but awful to care for, had undocumented workers laboring away in his presence for crappy pay. Uh, America, this goes on every day … in every neighborhood … especially in the wealthy ones. Unless you are completely blind to reality, you know this already.

The only shocking thing about Lou Dobbs indirectly hiring undocumented workers is the way it flies in the face of the anti-immigrant rhetoric that made him his millions in the first place. Lou Dobbs who proclaimed on his show that it was “ridiculous” to think employers who hired sub-contractors weren’t responsible if it was discovered that the workers were undocumented. Well, it appears Lou Dobbs is quite ridiculous indeed, though not for the reasons he might think. After departing from what was certainly the most virulently anti-immigrant, influential hate-mongering cable news show around, Lou Dobbs has been suddenly declaring himself a force of compromise that is against deportation and seeking “humane immigration reform.” Maybe it’s just an effort to re-fashion his image in anticipation of future political goals. Or maybe he really has seen the light. Either way, it’s obvious that the more people like Lou Dobbs demonize immigrants, the more chances there will be to expose our greatest collective hypocrisies.

What opponents to comprehensive immigration reform (of which Lou Dobbs used to be champion leader) are essentially saying is that they are fine with the status quo of millions of undocumented workers behind the scenes. We already operate under an enforcement-only policy, with tighter border security than ever before and deportation through the roof. It has done nothing to change the open secret that undocumented workers are picking America’s food, building America’s houses, and caring for (wealthy) America’s kids. And it will continue to do nothing to change that reality. All it does is drive these workers further into a fearful existence, alienated and segregated from society at large. We want everything cheap, but don’t want to know where it came from when in reality we do know. Anytime someone takes a bite out of a tomato grown on a commercial farm in the United States while announcing their disapproval of undocumented immigrants they are, essentially, no better or worse than a Meg Whitman or Lou Dobbs. There is nothing about their actions that is shocking, other than the way it flies in the face of their empty rhetoric — we are all indirect employers of undocumented immigrants. The question that remains is, are we going to keep denying this reality, or change things for the better for all parties involved?

Photo Credit: Joe Flood