The pride of Mexican-American
The Mexican flag is a symbol of pride of the Mexican community, particularly important in Los Angeles, according to Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda, specialist in Latin American studies at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA). “Even if I know that I am privileged, because I live here, I think it is very important to know where we come from,” said Diana Mena, a 28 -year -old demonstrator to AFP on Tuesday.
Mexican flags are omnipresent during events in Los Angeles, such as “Italian flags on Christophe-Columbus (celebrating the Italian-American community), or as Irish flags during Saint-Patrick,” says Hinojosa-Ojeda, who underlines that demonstrators in Los Angeles also carry the American flag.
A gesture of support
The Mexican flag is also a symbol of solidarity towards immigrants risking being expelled from the United States. And resistance for “all immigrants, not just those of Mexican descendants”, explains David Grondin, researcher at the Center for International Studies and Research at the University of Montreal.
The sign of an invasion, according to Trump
President Donald Trump recovers the symbol of the Mexican flag to portray from the United States “invaded” by Mexican immigrants who would appear “without the slightest suspicion of shame”, says researcher Rafael Jacob, associate researcher with the Raoul-Dandurand chair of the University of Quebec in Montreal (UQAM).
Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda goes even further. According to him, when she planned her roundups to expel immigrants, the Trump administration knew that the population would go out on the street with Flags from Mexico and provided that this visual would take advantage of him.
Who benefits from this visual?
For Rafael Jacob, wearing the Mexican flag during demonstrations, “it’s literally playing the game of (Donald Trump)”.
“Whenever there is an image of a masked demonstrator with a Mexican flag, there is a political winner, and it is Donald Trump,” he insists. He plays the nationalist card so hard ”.
According to several, including Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda, immigrants contribute positively to American society, both culturally and economically. According to Rafael Jacob, the visual of protesters brandishing the Mexican flag held at the argument, at least for a fringe of the American population.
The Mexican flag in the history of the United States
This is not the first time that flags other than the “stars and stripes” have been brandished in demonstrations in the United States.
Los Angeles was shaken in 1994 by a political crisis that moved to the street, where Mexican flags were then a symbol of the opposition to the anti-immigration measures of the Republican governor of the time, Pete Wilson.
Rebelote in 2006, when millions of Americans opposed the migration measures of the President of the United States George W. Bush. Like today, the Mexican flags present during these demonstrations then created controversy, according to Rafael Jacob.
“On January 6, 2021 (during the invasion of the Capitol), there were many Confederate flags or flags of the thirteen colonies, but that, we talk about it less,” said David Grondin.
With the France-Presse agency
