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Although the Chinese Exclusion act was far from the first racial injustice this nation is guilty of, it was the first law passed in the United States that specifically restricted immigration. This law gave way to other racial and unjust laws such as the mass deportation of the Mexican Americans with he Mexican Repatriation Act and the Japanese internment camps, just to name a few. Fear and racism from politicians are what has driven unjust political issues like these.

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Even today we struggle to dissociate our racist and classist views when questions arise surrounding immigration, i.e. who is worthy – and who isn’t – of immigrating to the United States? Who can assimilate to American life – and who can’t?

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Today, we can see the repercussions of the Chinese Immigration Act, the Mexican Repatriation Act and the Japanese Internment Camps. For example, we have seen how our current President projects hateful rhetoric, blaming immigrants for the imperfect qualities of the America economic and social structures. Leveraging this rhetoric, he implemented policies that deported Mexican immigrants. Many of these individuals have families here, are hardworking individuals, and haven’t lived in Mexico for years. Still, they are being sent back to a place that is now foreign to them. Despite the complete lack of evidence to support this invented “crisis at the border”, our President has resolved to build a wall along the whole southern American-Mexican border. These rhetoric and actions are eerily similar to those that surrounded and drove the ultimate implementation of the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Mexican Repatriation Act.