against a certain group of people, which should not be the basis for the United States’ policy on the matter. These laws disregard the principles upon which this country was built and ultimately serve no purpose since the exclusion of one ethnicity is quickly forgotten when the next alleged threat manifests.
The apparent threat to American freedom over the last several decades has been the surge of illegal Mexican immigrants entering the country in search of jobs or simply seeking refuge from external pressures. Though there have been recent concerns regarding Muslims and their links to terrorism, Hispanics are the primary focus of anti-immigration supporters’ attention and are often blamed for poor economic conditions in the United States.
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However, not all legal or illegal immigrants enter the country out of a desire to work as many seek refuge from adverse conditions in their homelands. The United States should remain a haven for such unfortunates and help facilitate their integration into society, especially given that American foreign policy over the last century has been responsible for great social unrest. For instance, ever since the Monroe Doctrine in 1823 declared the Western Hemisphere free from European influence and colonization, America had become increasingly interested in the affairs of Latin American countries. It has conducted military and economic intervention since the end of the nineteenth century, with the first instance occurring when soldiers were sent to Argentina in 1890 (Becker, 2011). However, such interference peaked during the mid-twentieth century when United States corporations, such as the United Fruit Company, heavily invested in Latin American infrastructure in order to gain control of production facilities and transportation routes so their exploitation the region’s natural resources for profit could continue. Consequently, the CIA led a coup against the president of Guatemala Jacobo Arbenz in the 1950s. His plans for widespread land redistribution that favored the country’s destitute