Trump Admin Adjusts Housing Rules, Immigrants Still Not White Enough
The 2018 Newsweek piece blandly reports the Trump administration's changes to housing rules affecting immigrants, presented as standard bureaucratic procedure. What they omit, of course, is the lineage: this isn't innovation, it's iteration. From the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 denying citizenship and basic rights, to Japanese-American internment during WWII eroding property ownership, to
Operation Wetback in the 1950s—the playbook remains the same. Restricting housing access is a time-tested strategy to marginalize, destabilize, and ultimately 'encourage' expulsion. It's not policy; it's a feature, not a bug, of xenophobic governance. One might wonder if these 'adjustments' ever aim to expand access for anyone not already deemed politically convenient. Every administration plays
its part in the ongoing saga of 'America for Americans,' as long as 'Americans' remain a fluid, exclusionary definition. It appears some national histories are meant to be repeated, just with fresh coats of legislative paint.