Capitol riot revived immigrants’ fears
Scenes in D.C. shook those who came to U.S. to escape unrest in own countries
As he listened to news on the radio of his black truck, Renier Suárez became increasingly concerned with the events unfolding in Washington, D.C., on Jan. 6.
He was on his way to work in south Houston after lunch, but felt the same sense of security he said he’s always had since coming to the United States as an immigrant from Cuba two decades ago. America, a stable country, gave him the opportunity to become a successful business owner. America opened the doors of an advanced democracy where civility always prevails, as opposed to the authoritarianism he said he lived under in Fidel Castro’s government in the Caribbean island.
“When I later turned on the TV in my office, I couldn’t believe my eyes,” said Suárez. “Not in this country!”
The images of rioters storming the U.S. Capitol after being incited by a U.S president shocked the country. It also shook many immigrants who moved to America to escape civil unrest and authoritarian governments. The scenes unfolding in Washington while Congress ceremoniously confirmed the electoral votes of President-elect Joe Biden deeply disturbed many immigrants like Suárez.
“This is something that I have only seen in Latin America,” said Suárez, who is a member of Casa Cuba, a nonprofit in Houston composed mainly of conservatives and Republicans.
The pro-Trump rioters revived the fears many immi
grants still have of their countries of origin, said Teodoro Aguiluz, director of the Centro de Recursos Centroamericanos (Center for Central American Resources or CRECEN). The advocacy nonprofit in Houston received several calls last Wednesday from people trying to understand the situation.
“Most of us who came in the ’80s were politically persecuted and lived that violence, that constant fear of death coming from the violence we experienced from years of military dictatorship and civil war” in El Salvador, Aguiluz said. The pro-Trump rioters revived deep-rooted trauma and PTSD symptoms of many who fled from his country of origin. “I have seen some people very anxious, people crying.”
Suárez said he feels sorry for the people who believed lies about widespread election fraud and followed President Donald Trump’s rally to fight Congress and a legitimate electoral process.
“Trump supporters are good people who were manipulated by the president to assault the U.S. Congress,” said Suárez. “It’s all about first me, then me, always me. Anything that serves him and his ego is OK (for an) authoritarian… Destroy Congress? It’s OK. Fracture the country? It’s OK. Are people dying? It doesn’t matter for dictators,” added the Cuban American. He choked back tears for what he saw as the desecration of the U.S. Capitol, an international symbol of democracy.
Aguiluz said the fears are aggravated with contemporary similarities he observed between the insurrection attempt in the United States and the current political distress in El Salvador. “People are afraid of having yet another dictatorship and violence with (the Salvadoran) President Nayib Bukele.”
Jan. 6 at the Capitol was a sad reminder of an “authoritarian Bukele who stormed the National Assembly” last year surrounded by armed soldiers and is becoming more emboldened during the pandemic, Aguiluz said, based on political analyses of the region.
“This administration is responsible for putting in question the message of America as the beacon of democracy,” Aguiluz said. “And this is very, very sad, because the American people (are) very noble, and some people fell into the grotesque traps of this president.”
For some immigrants like Venezuelan Edgar Villafane, who has supported Trump as president, last Wednesday was a depressing wake-up call.
“It was a big disappointment because I had certain respect for President Trump for his support against the regime of (President Nicolás) Maduro in Venezuela,” Villafane said. “We who oppose Maduro appreciated that.”
The Houston resident fled the South American country in 2013 when it was governed by Maduro’s predecessor and mentor, Hugo Chávez. The latter established the current far-left system under which Venezuela has plunged into deep poverty and political instability.
“The taking of the Capitol made me realize that what we are seeing here is the result of an extreme right-wing populism fueled by the president, and that’s very sad,” said Villafane. “What we have in Venezuela is an extreme left populism.”
Many of the 1.6 million foreignborn immigrants living in the Houston metro area came as part of U.S. refugee resettlement programs. Texas was consistently the top recipient state of refugees before the Trump administration. About 100,000 refugees resettled in Texas since 2002, coming from regions as diverse as Africa, Asia or Latin America.
But many people fleeing violence and authoritarian governments have found shelter under programs such as the Temporary Protected Status. That’s the case for more than 36,000 Salvadorans and their 42,500 American citizen children calling Texas home. Whether coming through refugee programs, common visas or illegal border crossings, Venezuelans and Cubans are the fastest growing foreign-born populations in Houston, both with an increase rate of over 220 percent since 2010, according to the Washington, D.C.-based Migration Policy Institute.
Many people expressed their pain about the Capitol riot on social media, including politicians who insist that the pro-Trump insurgency against the U.S. democracy “is not what we are.”
But immigrants who have found shelter from authoritarianism and violence in this country say it is a cautionary tale. In their experiences, to survive, democracy should not be taken as a permanent condition but as a constant aspiration.
“My mind was telling me, ‘no, this is not here!’ I couldn’t comprehend what I was seeing,” said Ali Al Sudani, a senior vice president at the Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston, an organization that offers services to refugees. “But whether you are born here or in another country, what happened is a reminder that democracy is not something we should take for granted.”
Al Sudani, an immigrant who faced death threats in his native Iraq before coming to Houston in 2009, added that “democracy takes sacrifices, compromises, listening and taking care of each other… we need to nurture democracy.”
For people like Suárez, keeping democracy healthy in the United States is an obligation incumbent on all Americans.
“This country is still a great country. We were able to derail the insurrection, our democracy prevailed,” he said. “Now we have to keep it.”
“What happened is a reminder that democracy is not something we should take for granted.”
Ali Al Sudani, a senior vice president at the Interfaith Ministries for Greater Houston