Deconstructing a Hillary Scholten political ad: Promoting xenophobic nationalism

For months now, we have all had our minds carpet-bombed by political ads on a variety of platforms. This is not surprising, since buying political ad space and time is what accounts for the bulk of campaign contribution spending by candidates.

In the case of incumbent Hillary Scholten, they have out raised and out spent their opponent, based on the latest campaign finance data just before the primary. Rep. Hillary Scholten is hoping to get re-elected, so many of their ads are either middle of the road on messaging or they embrace more conservative messaging like the issue of safety.

In one of Scholten’s most recent political ads, an ad that uses rather intense music and quick, zoom in video transitions. However, the narrative and the statistics used are what should concern people, especially people who care about immigration justice.

The person featured in this political ad, is Muskegon County Prosecutor D. J. Hilson. Hilson begins his comments about Scholten by say, “When it comes to our safety, Hillary Scholten is all about action.” When the prosecutor says “our safety” does he mean those of us who live in the 3rd Congressional district? 

Hilson continues with some “evidence” that Scholten is committed to our safety, saying:

“As an attorney she worked in the Justice Department enforcing our immigration laws.” We all should be convinced by this “evidence”, despite any real concrete examples or her track record in the Justice Department on immigration matters, but Scholten does look impressive walking down steps.

Next Hilson says, “In Congress Scholten worked across the aisle to spearhead legislation to increase border security, hire 22,000 Border Patrol Agents and crack down on drug cartels. That is the type of action we need in Washington.” This part of the political is just plain bullshit. Increasing border security and Border Patrol Agents just means the further criminalization of immigrants who have fled political violence, economic despair and climate disaster, only to show up at the US/Mexican border and suffer further abuse. 

Rep. Scholten has supported bipartisan legislation known as the Dignity Act. However, the Dignity Act is not Comprehensive Immigration Reform, nor does it address more structural elements of root causes of immigration, such as the US role in supporting military and trade policies in Latin America that have destabilized most of the region, along with the fact that more and more people are being displaced and forced to flee their homelands because of Climate Change. (See Todd Miller’s excellent book, Storming the Wall: Climate Change, Migration and Homeland Security.) 

What the immigrant justice movement is demanding – a movement led by immigrants – is more humane policies and practices when people show up at the border, such as expanding the US asylum policy. Unfortunate, the Biden Administration has done just the opposite. Biden has used Section 212(f) of the Immigration and Nationality Act, which was previously used by former President Donald Trump. This policy has restricted and limited immigrants from applying for asylum, which has sparked numerous legal challenges. In fact, the deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants’ Rights Project, Lee Gelernt, said of Biden’s restrictive asylum policy: “This is not a ‘win’—it’s a monstrosity. Asylum is a human right.”

On the matter of “cracking down on the drug cartels”, the political ad provides no evidence or verification of said claim. Using a staged image of what are meant to look like drugs on a table in front of a cop is no evidence. But that doesn’t matter, because it sounds like tough on crime shit. In fact, what Hillary Scholten and the Democratic Party is doing is adopting a slightly milder version of what Trump wants to do regarding immigration policy. 

In a recent article entitled, Kamala Harris Surrenders to Trump on Border Security and Endorses the War On Drugs, writer Phil Wilson states:

Harris has adopted a strategy of offering a feast to the reactionary right while cunningly spreading crumbs for progressive voters. She told us, effectively, that the vast majority of people desperately attempting to seek safety on US soil will be sent back to the starvation, death squads, cartels and paramilitary forces that chased them to the US border. These people, often undertaking perilous journeys across nearly impenetrable jungles, mountains and deserts, flee for their lives. They come to the US to be rejected and maligned by those guarding the borders of one of the most underpopulated nations on earth.

Wilson ends his article by saying, “Trump has proven that there is a massive market for bluster, bullshit, impossible promises and dummied down, simplistic narratives. Harris and the Democrats have taken notes and want a piece of the action. There is no border crisis, but no end to ambitious politicians who want to scream for higher walls and more Draconian punishment for the most vulnerable people, those trapped between the rock and hard place of US power.”

Besides supporting Israel’s genocidal policy against the Palestinians, Rep. Scholten is pushing a harsh, militarized US border policy that makes a mockery of the words ascribed on the Statue of Liberty, and instead embraced xenophobic nationalism.