Letter to the Democratic Candidates of North Carolina

Note: more than 58 people in North Carolina have added their names as signatories in support of this letter. If you want to add your name, leave a comment.

Further note: This is an organizing space, not a space of public debate. No anti-immigrant and/or hateful comments will be approved.


We are writing to let you know that those of us signing this letter will not be voting for nor giving money to any Democratic candidate who includes in their platform their intention to target “illegal” immigrants.

The campaign ads of Beverly Purdue, Kay Hagan, and the Democratic Party, have all made a point of their commitment to targeting this population. Purdue, in her zeal to join the anti-immigrant bandwagon, has been a leader in the recent decision by the N.C. Community College system to ban admission for undocumented immigrants in spite of advice that such a ban is neither legally required nor wise.

Our so-called leaders insist that their stand against “illegal” immigration is based on their respect for the law, failing to point out we make the law. Someone we deem “illegal” today can easily become “legal” tomorrow; in fact history shows that we have made this shift many times. History has not been kind to those who proclaimed the virtue of following immoral laws – we look back on Jim Crow, Japanese internment, to name just a few, with a sense of shame and disbelief. The proponents of those policies were also proud proponents of following the law.

It is too easy to be a leader who preys on the conditioned racism of communities who have been well taught to fear those who are different. A politics of fear has no future in the global community we are becoming. We wish for a Democratic Party, any party, that would have the courage to help us envision a country, a world, where we are guided by the understanding that we are all in this together.