Op-Ed |
Hating on immigrants hurts everyone - except for elites

Photo: Photo by Manny Becerra/Unsplash

by Sonali Kolhatkar
     OtherWords


Republicans are counting on fears of immigrants to draw white conservatives to the polls. This calculation is dangerous — and it lets the real villains in our politics off the hook.

There’s a direct line between Donald Trump’s 2015 declaration about Mexican “rapists” and his 2024 lie about Haitians eating pets. Trump’s running mate, Senator JD Vance (R-OH), has echoed the horrific contention about Haitians even while admitting it was a lie.


In Vance’s world, immigrants are smuggling fentanyl and importing illegal guns.

Both men are married to women of immigrant origins and may not even believe their own lies. In fact, as a Yale law student in 2012, Vance wrote a blog post decrying Republican anti-immigrant rhetoric. But after he found how convenient it is to bash immigrants for votes, Vance asked his former professor to delete it.

During the vice presidential debate between Vance and Governor Tim Walz (D-MN), Vance scapegoated immigrants every chance he got. In Vance’s world, immigrants are smuggling fentanyl and importing illegal guns. They’re also driving up housing prices while simultaneously putting downward pressure on wages by working for pittances.

Never mind that it’s mostly U.S. citizens smuggling fentanyl, and that illegal guns are flowing the other way across the border — from the U.S. into Mexico. Never mind that it makes no sense for immigrants to be working for less while paradoxically being able to afford homes that Americans cannot.

Truth and logic are beside the point. Fear of the “other” is the plan. This makes life very dangerous for immigrants. Haitian migrants, among others, are facing threats to their safety.


Beating the racist, anti-immigrant drum is the first step toward violence.

Trump has repeatedly deployed Hitlerian language to describe immigrants, blaming them for “poisoning the blood” of the country and claiming that they commit homicide because they have “bad genes.” (One can hardly imagine him extending the same logic to mass shooters, who tend to be overwhelmingly white and male, or to the two white men who recently tried to assassinate him. According to Trump, being white means you have “good genes.”)

Beating the racist, anti-immigrant drum is the first step toward violence. The United Nations identifies hate speech as a “precursor to atrocity crimes, including genocide,” and scholars of past genocides have drawn clear links between language that “otherizes” whole communities and pogroms aimed at them.

Anti-immigrant lies also harm native-born Americans. Trump, Vance, and their supporters recently unleashed rumors falsely blaming immigrants for disaster relief difficulties. Elon Musk jumped on the bandwagon, claiming that “FEMA used up its budget ferrying illegals into the country instead of saving American lives.”

FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell called these lies part of a “truly dangerous narrative.” Even Republican governors of hurricane-hit states are deeply appalled, warning that these lies threaten to disrupt disaster recovery efforts.


If right-wing politicians really want to help Americans struggling with economic stressors, they could ban hedge fund managers from buying up homes.

Most importantly, the purveyors of anti-immigrant hate let corporate power and wealthy elites — like Musk — off the hook for the problems facing Americans.  Hedge fund managers, not immigrants, are outbidding Americans for housing. Corporate employers keep wages low and privatization has ruined healthcare, not immigrants.

Oil and gas corporations are responsible for the catastrophic climate change fueling hurricanes like Helene and Milton, not immigrants. (Indeed, migrant workers often help rebuild after these catastrophes as communities struggle with a labor shortage).

If right-wing politicians really want to help Americans struggling with economic stressors, they could ban hedge fund managers from buying up homes, support single-payer health care, increase the federal minimum wage, tax billionaires, divert money from war to climate, hold fossil fuel companies accountable for climate crimes, and back a renewable energy transition.

Instead, they attack immigrants — and do nothing.

Attacking immigrants and calling for mass deportations will do nothing to ease the very real struggles people face. What it will do is whip up hate and violence, give the purveyors of hate the political power they desperately seek, and let corporate vultures off the hook.


About the author:
Sonali Kolhatkar is the host of “Rising Up With Sonali,” a television and radio show on Free Speech TV and Pacifica stations. This op-ed was distributed by OtherWords.org.


Keywords:

Op-Ed |
Tipped wage system isn't working, removing taxes won't save it

Photo:Bimo Luki/Unsplash

by Red Schomburg
      OtherWords


Both major presidential candidates have called for eliminating taxes on tips. But that won’t help most restaurant workers.

What will? Replacing the subminimum wages that tipped workers make with one fair wage nationwide.


The vast majority of tipped workers in America ... don’t earn enough to have to pay federal payroll taxes.

The federal minimum wage for most workers is just $7.25. But for workers who get tips, employers are allowed to pay them $2.13 an hour. If tips don’t raise your hourly pay to at least the regular minimum wage, bosses are supposed to make up the difference — but very often don’t.

I was a bartender in Boston for over a decade. Technically, I was paid $6.75 an hour — the current subminimum in Massachusetts, which is thankfully higher than the $2.13 federal rate. But my coworkers and I made next to nothing anyway.

Like us, the vast majority of tipped workers in America — 66 percent — don’t earn enough to have to pay federal payroll taxes. So eliminating those taxes won’t benefit two-thirds of us at all.

It would only help the upper earners, like fancy waiters at the fancy restaurants — or millionaire Wall Street types, lawyers, or hedge fund managers who could reclassify their incomes as tips to dodge taxes.

Donald Trump has proposed ending taxes on tips as a clear attempt to pander to tipped workers. But as president, Trump actually gutted overtime regulations and tried to make it easier for our employers to steal our tips. So it’s clear to me he doesn’t really want to help us.

It’s a telling sign that the National Restaurant Association (NRA), which is backed by corporations and wealthy business owners, has embraced Trump’s plan.

The NRA is constantly looking for ways to get around having to actually pay their workers a full, fair minimum wage like every other industry in America. Their lobbying is the reason the subminimum wage has been stuck at $2.13 for over 30 years in the first place.


Many of my coworkers and I are pressured to tolerate inappropriate customer behavior because our livelihood depends on being likable.

Kamala Harris has also embraced ending taxes on tips. But unlike Trump, Harris has also voiced support for ending the subminimum wage. That would mean that my coworkers and I would be paid a full, fair minimum wage just like all other workers in our country — plus get tips on top.

In that scenario, not having to pay taxes on tips would be meaningful for all of us.

When employers can pay a subminimum wage, it forces our income to depend on uncontrollable factors — like weather, customer traffic, and tips.

Even worse, many of my coworkers and I are pressured to tolerate inappropriate customer behavior because our livelihood depends on being likable. This especially harms women and contributes to the restaurant industry’s notoriously high rates of harassment.

That’s why I’m helping turn out votes for a ballot measure this fall that would end the subminimum wage in Massachusetts and ensure all restaurant workers are paid one fair wage with tips on top. There’s similar legislation pending in 12 more states.

The good news is we know this policy works.


It’s great that politicians are talking about tipped workers.

One fair wage is already law in seven states and two major metro areas (Chicago and Washington, D.C.). And in those places, wages are higher, rates of tipping are the same or higher, and restaurant growth is higher.

Tipping is so ingrained in our culture that in places like California, which recently eliminated its subminimum wage, customers routinely continue to tip their usual amount — which workers receive on top of the full minimum wage. It’s a win-win solution.

It’s great that politicians are talking about tipped workers. We’re a powerful voting block and we’re invested in voting for meaningful change. Tipped workers see beyond the lies and the pandering and know that one fair wage is the change we need to put more dollars in our pockets.


About the author:
Red Schomburg is a worker and leader with One Fair Wage. This op-ed was distributed by OtherWords.org.


Keywords: Minimum Wage, Restaurant Workers, National Restaurant Association, Tipped Workers, Federal Minimum Wage
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Op-Ed |
Tipped wage system isn't working, removing taxes won't save it
Both major presidential candidates have called for eliminating taxes on tips. But that won’t help most restaurant workers.

What will? Replacing the subminimum wages that tipped workers make with one fair wage nationwide.

The federal minimum wage for most workers is just $7.25. But for workers who get tips, employers are allowed to pay them $2.13 an hour. If tips don’t raise your hourly pay to at least the ...
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