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Comment by atemerev | Hacker News Reader

Most of the these routes are organized by Russian state actors to be used as a political weapon. The money paid by the would-be immigrants are also eventually going back to Russia.

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Russian propaganda always blames US state department for all kinds of random problems in Russia.

Navalny was accused of being a CIA asset, Middle East instability was there as some kind of sinister plot against Russia, even potholes in the road are somehow part of the plan.

I never thought I would see this get mirrored in the West.

Now there are people that believe that Russia blew up its own nordstream, that every bit on twitter is Russian bot, but there are no western bots, etc

Like I get that they are a sinister opponent, but you can’t blame everything on them

Could you explain how this can be used as a political weapon? Both parties in the U.S. seem quite happy with the perennial Mexican border topic that is used to distract from other issues.

I think neither party actually wants to stop anything. Republican farmers in the south need the labor, urban Democrats need voters (or so they think) and virtue signalling.

>urban Democrats need voters

Immigrants can't vote. Let's just make that clear because it's a common right-wing talking point that is provably wrong and steeped in bigotry.

Well it's being helped by the talking point of requiring ID to vote is racist

The ID voting requirements are about keeping marginalized American citizens from voting (seniors, poor people who are bad at managing their documents, etc). Studies have been done of before/after ID requirements have been added in various states and there’s no indication that illegal aliens were taking advantage. Maybe a few anecdotes of people with a green card who were confused about the requirements - the illegally present usually try to stay as far from the government as they can.

That does not sound even remotely plausible there are way more mundane activities that all require IDs.The study like that is purely meaningless because you can not control for all the other variables of societal change in the same time frame. I can take any other variable and claim it's the cause of the decline. Also I spent most of my life in Europe in way more left leaning countries than US and this is not even remotely on the radar of anyone.

It's also being helped by the fact that the right wing has a history of attempting to restrict votes, from mass purging of voter rolls without telling people, to closing voting sites such that voting in-person requires traveling farther and waiting longer in line, to making it illegal to hand out food or water to people at voting sites (in Georgia), to having gutted the VRA in 2013 with Shelby v Holder, which is often what allows them to do this in the first place. I have no faith voter ID laws wouldn't be used simply to further suppress votes in states where Republicans control the state legislature; and yes, often in racist ways, because non-white people tend to support the left more than white people, so suppressing their votes (often those of rural black or Hispanic voters) is beneficial to Republicans.

And the Democratic party has a history of systematically rigging elections. The Chicago machine and Tammany hall only worked one way. The presidential election was notoriously rigged for JFK by his influential criminal father. There's very good reasons historically to argue either side of that opinion.

How?

> In the remaining 14 states and D.C., voters can cast a ballot in person on Election Day without showing an ID document. These states have "non-documentary" ID requirements, meaning voters must verify their identity in other ways, such as by signing an affidavit or poll book, or by providing personal information. All states have procedures for challenging voter eligibility.

https://www.ncsl.org/elections-and-campaigns/voter-verificat...

The census counts those living in the US regardless of their immigration status. That census count is used to determine Congressional representation. Plus, anyone born in the US, regardless of immigration status of their parents, is a legal citizen and in eighteen years, a voter. Politicians might not be able to see past the next election cycle, but political parties play the long game (e.g. "the Southern Strategy")

I think he's referring to illegal aliens voting illegally (which does happen sometimes) or, once they become legal through whatever means, they will become reliable Democrats. Or, their children will do the same. One way or the other, replacement-Americans tend to support the left. Always have. It's proveable.

Also, these sorts of shenanigans:

https://www.npr.org/2021/12/15/1064385999/new-york-city-will...

If you all don't want "replacement-Americans" voting, who'll be left on the rolls, the Lakota?

(who did their own Dunki over the Bering, back in the day)

I have ancestors who were in the Colonies before the Constitution, and once upon a time, they were also FOB.

Their children born in the US can, once they are old enough. But I'm a little doubtful politicians are thinking that long term.

The real long term solution would be to make legal immigration easier and cheaper. But neither party seems to be pushing very hard for that.

And yet shouting about evil immigrants taking your jobs, living on your welfare (even if it's contradictory), mugging you in a dark alley, raping people left and right seems quite a successful tale that empowers the most atrocious parts of the far-right political spectrum.

Deglobalize, polarize, institute the rule of the power as opposed to the rule of law seems to be the message. The consequence, though, would be overall weakening of the states, erosion of trust, and making the defence of all the values our predecessors have already paid in blood for even more toothless.

I think your statement puts the cart before the horse, though. Both parties are "ok" with the status quo not because they necessarily collude to create it, but they are full to the brim with opportunists who use the status quo to their advantage. I don't think there is major political will to actually change anything, but if change forcefully comes any other way, they will happily try to ride any wave to their advantage.

I don't believe this mode of operation is going to change much while the facto regime in the US is gerontocracy which is also all about risk aversion. Oh, and quite possibly a drive to protect big money at all costs.

The immigration to the US is the collateral damage of the bad US foreign policies towards those countries. Those "banana republics" are poor because the big companies own the banana business. The poor people flee to the US.

Same with Syria. But in the case the immigration went to Europe, not the US. Again Europe f-ed up.

I know Russia and Belarus are playing games sending immigrants to the borders of Finland and Poland respectively, but is there proof they’re involved in the US/Mexico border?

I can't find definitive proof in open sources, but yes, Russia smuggles migrants to Poland, to Finland, establishes control for the migration routes via Sahel to Southern Europe (https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/africa-file-ma...), why wouldn't they do the same for the US southern border? The presence of Russian-speaking smugglers on the Mexican border is well documented (https://globalinitiative.net/analysis/russian-migrant-smuggl... their link to the Russian government is yet to be clearly established, but I have little doubt.

That happens from the territory of Russia

This is preposterous, you can’t blame Russia for every random domestic problem in USA.

why did comrade Trump try to stem the tide then?

To solve the "crisis", you need to fabricate the crisis first. Trump works with his Kremlin friends to create the very "problem" he promises to solve.

Lol, the delusion of blaming everything on Russia!

Some many people these days seems to have a coin with Russia and China on each side, they flip it and then comment.

Well, I am Russian who has left the country for political reasons. I have some idea of what Russian government is capable of, and how critically they are interested in destabilizing the West.

It's not out of the question. Belarus, supported by Russia in this instance, is confirmed to use illegal migration as a political weapon. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belarus%E2%80%93European_Union...

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