The Federalization of Racism and Nativist Hostility: Local Immigration Enforcement in North Carolina

Abstract

In recent years, immigrants from Latin America in record numbers have chosen the South-and North Carolina, in particular-as a new and favored destination. Because race has been a decisive historical organizing category in the South, the legacy of racism remains an ongoing source of concern as Latina/os take their place in the state. Although some state institutions and entities adapted to accommodate the changing population, this chapter argues that nativist sentiment has been expressed through a number of practices, including a program known as 287(g) that authorizes the enforcement of immigration laws at the local level. The program has provided new-found authority upon which localities can disguise a local politics of resentments and racial hostilities toward immigrants through the use of the instrumentalities of immigration enforcement powers. However, one conceptualizes the larger framework of immigration issues, what remains clear is that the enforcement of immigration laws at the local level will inevitably involve historical legacies of race and tolerance.