Keep a Watchful Eye Out for Anti-Immigration Activities

The anti-immigrant population control organization, Carrying Capacity Network (CCN), which promotes itself as a liberal environmental group, recently launched the Diversity Coalition for an Immigration Moratorium. Its goal is to bring together "ethnically and racially diverse groups and individuals" to press for an immediate five-year moratorium with a 100,000 all-inclusive ceiling on legal immigration. The Coalition is working with Congressman Bill Archer of Texas, Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee and sponsor of the Immigration Reduction Act of 1995.

The Coalition's conservative agenda is reflected in the composition of its National Board of Advisors, which includes Willis Papillion, California Black Republican Council; Jesse Laguna, Sponsor, Proposition 187; Gil Wong, Asian Americans for Border Control; and Benny Chien, Former President, Californians for Population Stabilization. Several Native Americans are also on the board who are listed with only the name of their tribe while the other members have specific organizational identifications. Intentionally or not, this gives the impression that the Native Americans represent their tribes. The Coalition lays much of the blame for social, economic and environmental problems on immigrants, from overcrowded prisons to unemployment, and attacks family reunification.

As it increasingly reveals its true conservative colors, Carrying Capacity Network appears to have gone too far for some of its previous supporters. In a welcome move, Paul and Anne Ehrlich have left CCN's national board of advisors, though Paul Ehrlich continues to serve on FAIR's advisory board. (For more on the moratorium, see "Minorities Back Moratorium on Legal Immigration," Diversity Coalition News Release, October 12, 1995; "Why a 100,000 Limit on Immigration is Realistic and Necessary," CCN; and CCN Network Bulletin, vol.5, no.6, Oct./Nov. 1995.)

Population-Environment Balance, closely linked to CCN, is also in on the anti-immigrant action. In September it launched the Coalition for United States Population Stabilization (CUSPS). CUSPS statements blame environmental degradation in the US on population growth and, remarkably, mention nothing about the right-wing attack on environmental regulation in Congress. CUSPS advocates reducing net immigration to near zero (around 200,000 legal immigrants a year) and reducing US fertility rates through a variety of means including "changes in tax and welfare incentives" (meaning more attacks on poor women and children?).

In addition to Population-Environment Balance and the Weeden Foundation, CUSPS' founding members are Curtis and Edith Munson Foundation, Dave Foreman, Foundation for Deep Ecology, Negative Population Growth, Wilburforce Foundation, Richard D. Lamm, Forest Guardians, Massachusetts Audubon Society, the Ehrlichs, Edgar and Peggy Wayburn, CCN, David Brower, Trout Unlimited, Wild Earth and Lester Brown. (See September 1995 mailing from Population-Environment Balance re.: "Protecting the Environment by Ending Population Growth in the United States.")

Meanwhile, Negative Population Growth (NPG) has placed negative ads about immigration in numerous newspapers and magazines including Atlantic Monthly, Harper's, Natural History, and The Washington Post. It also advocates a drastic reduction in world population to no more than two billion people (world population is roughly six billion today) through supposedly "non-coercive social and economic incentives." NPG believes that "no couple has the 'right' to have more than two children," and supports various punitive economic measures against those who do. It employs racist stereotypes of poor people to promote its agenda: "With few exceptions, newborn humans in most third world countries come into a world that can offer them nothing but hunger, disease and squalor. No matter how many relief programs we set up, there is just no way to cope with mass misery that gets worse as numbers increase." On its advisory board are environmentalists David Brower and Herman Daly. (See recent NPG promotional mailing.)

Funding the 'Greening of Hate'

In the last issue of Political Environments we listed some of the funders of the anti-immigrant movement. We are continuing to research this issue, and have several more foundations to add to the list. In 1993, the Munson Foundation gave $40,000 and the Henry Luce Foundation $25,000 to the Federation for American Immigration Reform, and the Foundation for Deep Ecology gave $10,000 each to Carrying Capacity Network and Negative Population Growth. (Based on tax record research by Nikki Douglas.)

The Foundation for Deep Ecology's role is particularly problematic, as it also gives grants to some worthwhile environmental initiatives. The Foundation is funded by Doug Tompkins, co-founder of Esprit clothing, whose version of deep ecology unfortunately includes a deep vein of extreme neo-Malthusianism. (For more information on the Foundation, see Doug Henwood's article on "Antiglobalization" in Left Business Observer #71, January 1996.)

Moving Further to the Right

There are interesting connections on the Far Right between the militia movement, anti-abortion forces and anti-immigrant groups. In "Armed and Dangerous" (Rolling Stone, November 2, 1995) Leonard Zeskind describes the activities of Larry Pratt, a key figure on the Far Right who until recently was one of Pat Buchanan's top campaign advisers. Allegedly one of the major movers behind the militia movement, Pratt is the Executive Director of the Gun Owners of America (GOA). He also helped found English First which is run out of the same office suite in Springfield, VA that houses GOA. According to Zeskind, in 1990 Pratt used funds from his Family Foundation to pay bills for Randall Terry's Operation Rescue, the extremist antiabortion group.

Note: CWPE would appreciate any leads on what other foundations fund the anti-immigrant movement as well as quinacrine research.