Decades of US policies in Guatemala are why people like Mario David Coronado Juarez end up in this country

For anyone reading the GRIID blog it is clear that I spent a fair amount of time writing about the terrorism perpetrated by ICE, immigrants that are affected by ICE repression and what we can collectively do about it.

One question that rarely comes up in our conversations about undocumented immigrants is, What are the reasons for them coming to this country, especially with the risk of not coming with papers?

The bulk of undocumented immigrants that are crossing into the US every year are primarily Mexican, Central America and to a lesser degree, people from various Caribbean countries. Immigrants from the countries listed are coming to the US because of decades-long political violence, drug cartels, state repression, debilitating poverty that has been driven by de-valuing national currency, the displacement of people living off the land, and lastly, because of the growing ecological and social consequences of Climate Change.

Equally important is for us to ask the question – What has been the relationship of the US to the countries that undocumented immigrants originate from? This, along with the first question, is rarely about of the political discourse coming from elected officials and it is almost never part of the reporting that is done by commercial media.

To answer both questions previously asked I will use the recent death of Mario David Coronado Juarez, a Guatemalan national who came to the US as an undocumented immigrant as an example.

We know that Mario was in Grand Rapids primarily as a means to generate income in order to support his family back in Guatemala. In fact, a great deal of the undocumented immigrant community is here for the same reason, to earn enough money that will allow them to send some of it back home to support their loved ones. These funds are often referred to as remittances.

History of US relations with Guatemala

The US government has always had an interest in the rest of the Americas to the south, including Mexico, Central and South America, along with the Caribbean countries. In fact, the Monroe Doctrine adopted in the early part of the 19th century was essentially a policy that said that all of Latin America was the back yard of the US and only the US has a right to what happens in that part of the Americas.

During much of the first half of the 19th century the US was also pressing Latin American countries to maintain a slave system, since the US would also benefit from it, especially after Haiti rose up and defeated the French colonizers and ended slavery. The book, This Vast Southern Empire: Slaveholders at the Helm of American Foreign Policy, documents this dynamic in detail.

However, a major driving force for US interest in Latin America was economic interests. With Guatemala it was coffee, then bananas. The US-based United Fruit Company quickly bought own a great deal of land in Guatemala, quite often the best land. Various Guatemalan leaders from the late 19th century into the 20th century were happy to support United Fruit’s exploitation of the land and the workers of Guatemala. In fact, by the 1930s people were referring to the United Fruit Company as El Pulpo, the octopus, because the company had its tentacles in everything.

However, Guatemalans became increasingly frustrated with being exploited, so in 1944 then they ended the dictatorship of Jorge Ubico (who was a fan of the Nazis) and elected a progressive government that made significant reforms, especially land reforms. The United Fruit Company was so enraged by these policies that the sough assistance from the US government to overthrow the Guatemalan government. In 1954 the CIA organized a coup and Guatemala and put in place another military dictator, since the interest of the United Fruit Company was more important than the people of Guatemala, You can see from the graphic here on the right how integrated the United Fruit Company was in the US government.

During the Cold War Guatemala acted as a proxy for the US, even allowing for US military to use Guatemala as a base for the Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in 1961. Beginning in the 1970s, there was a growing insurgency movement throughout Central American and many Guatemalans began to support an armed uprising. Various Guatemalan administrations, beginning with Rios Montt, engaged in massive repression of the civilian population, disappearing tens of thousands, displacing 200,000 and  murdering over 100,000, in what Amnesty International referred to as a genocidal campaign. Throughout all of this the US was providing millions in weapons sales, training and advisors to the Guatemalan military. (See Aviva Chomsky’s book, Central America’s Forgotten History: Revolution, Violence, and the Roots of Immigration)

Eventually, there was a ceasefire in 1995, following by an internationally observed elections. However, root causes of the conflict were not resolved nor did the military reduce their numbers or end their repressive tactics. Guatemalans are still uncovering clandestine mass graves, plus those seeking justice are being targeted by the Guatemalan authorities.

In 2006, Guatemala, along with the rest of Central America, adopted a so-called trade agreement with the US, known as the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). CAFTA provided easier access for multinational corporations to exploit Guatemalan resources and labor. According to a report entitled,  CAFTA’s Tragic Legacy in Central America: Failed Trade Policy That Drove Millions From Their Homes, “from 2005 to 2014, the number of undocumented immigrants from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala living in the United States increased 49 percent, 122 percent and 73 percent, respectively.”

The Guatemalan currency has become increasingly devalued over the past several decades and the influence of US and other multinational corporations has been devastating for a large percentage of the Guatemalan population, which has forced thousands of them to flee the country and come to the US to earn a living and be able to support their families.

This is exactly why Mario David Coronado Juarez came to the US. Mario was unable to obtain a visa from his own government, primarily because it is too expensive for most people to afford. Due to limited economic opportunities Mario took the risk to come to the US in order to support his family.

Combined with over a century of US military and economic intervention in Guatemala, using violence and exploitation of land and workers, you can see why people like Mario make the difficult choice to do whatever they can to support their families. Guatemalans like Mario fled state terrorism and exploitation that the US funded only to end up being the target of state violence in the US. This is a reality for most undocumented immigrants and we need to come to terms with this reality if we ever want to have a truly just immigration policy.

Suggested Resources:

Doing Business with the Dictators: A Political History of United Fruit in Guatemala 1899-1944, Paul Dosal

Revolution in the Countryside: Rural Conflict and Agrarian Reform in Guatemala 1944-1954, Jim Handy

Bitter Fruit: The Untold Story of the American Coup in Guatemala, Stephen Schlesinger & Stephen Kinzer

Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA) https://nisgua.org/

Guatemalan Genocide case https://cja.org/where-we-work/guatemala/

National Security Archives – declassified US documents from the 1954 CIA coup to the present https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/project/guatemala-project

Consequences of CAFTA reports https://www.citizen.org/topic/globalization-trade/central-america-free-trade-agreement-cafta/