BY HANNAH POUKISH

California Democratic lawmakers on Wednesday called for the state to commemorate the Mexican Repatriation of the 1930s, a 15-year period when nearly two million people of Mexican descent were deported to Mexico. 

Senate Majority Leader Lena Gonzalez, D-Long Beach, and Sen. Josh Becker, D-Menlo Park, introduced Senate Bill 537 to address injustices committed against Mexicans and Mexican Americans during the Great Depression. 

“People don’t know that the Repatriation ripped families apart. They do not know about the generational trauma that was caused by it,” Becker said. “We need to memorialize it in a much bigger way.” 

The two legislators held a press conference Wednesday to promote the legislation, which would require a statue or memorial to be built in California that recognizes this historic period of forced deportations. 

If the bill passes, a nonprofit organization representing Mexican Americans or Mexican immigrants would be in charge of planning, building and maintaining a memorial in the city or county of Los Angeles for those forcibly removed from the U.S. during the Mexican Repatriation. Los Angeles was the epicenter of the movement where many raids and round ups took place.

THE HISTORY OF THE MEXICAN REPATRIATION 

In 1929, President Herbert Hoover issued an executive order calling for the forcible removal of Mexicans and Mexican Americans to save job opportunities for other Americans during the Great Depression.

The racist policy, which was labeled the Mexican Repatriation Program, lasted from 1921 to 1944. During that time, about two million people were forcibly removed, with an estimated 400,000 people of Mexican descent deported from California alone. The program violated the constitutional rights and civil liberties of many Mexican Americans who were U.S. citizens or legal residents. 

Sen. Gonzalez, who serves as Vice Chair of the Latino California Legislative Caucus, said she felt personally connected to these victims. 

“So many Mexicans and Mexican Americans deported,” Gonzalez said. “I thought to myself, you know, my mother was a Mexican immigrant, I’m a U. S. citizen, I would have been deported too under this type of program.” 

Throughout the 1930s, there were major raids, acts of violence and threats committed against Mexican American communities across the county, according to research by former Sen. Joseph Dunn, D-Santa Ana. In 1931, one of the largest raids occurred in Los Angeles when more than 400 people at La Placita Park were rounded up and deported to Mexico. 

People of Mexican descent were deported from the U.S. to Mexico by train, buses, ships and planes. While most were forcibly removed from the country, there were thousands of others who chose to leave out of fear of escalating violence.

CORRECTING RACIAL WRONGS IN CALIFORNIA 

SB 537 is not the first time California lawmakers have pushed for greater acknowledgment of the harms inflicted by the Mexican Repatriation program. In 2005, the state Legislature passed the “Apology Act of the 1930s Mexican Repatriation Program,” which led to the creation of a commemorative plaque in La Placita Park in Los Angeles in 2012. 

California remains the only state that has formally apologized for the Repatriation program.

The state also previously passed a law in 2015 that encouraged public schools to include these unconstitutional deportations to Mexico within history and social science curriculum. 

Gonzalez said more legislative action was needed to guarantee this dark period would not be forgotten. 

“We can continue ensuring that every single child in California can learn about this history, commemorate, and that we can still create a better future generation that understands the history, acknowledges it, and tries to not repeat it,” Gonzalez said of the bill. 

This legislative session, lawmakers have also called for a series of reparations-related bills for Black Californians harmed by racism and slavery. The budget agreement announced in June included $12 million to help implement legislation. 

The money would help support proposals endorsed by the Legislative Black caucus, including having the state apologize for inflicting harm on Black Californians and allowing slavery to occur in the state. The current bills do not include setting aside cash payments for descendants of enslaved people.

Read the article on the Sacramento Bee, here.