The changing face of the heartland

By Devona Walker

Published: February 18, 2008

These days, Hispanic-owned businesses line SW 44 and SW 29 as well as Western and Walker avenues, diversifying this once homogenous community.

The couple's neighbors are now an even mix of white retirees and immigrant families — primarily Hispanic and Vietnamese.

"There has been a lot of Mexican restaurants opening up, and now there's this big Mexican grocery store in the old Homeland building,” said Kathryn Winwood. "I suppose some people feel a little upset by it, but we're just glad that something came in. I feel like if someone can put up with me, then they deserve to be talked to.”

According to Washington-based Pew Research Center, immigrants and their American-born descendants will account for 82 percent of the nation's population growth over the next 45 years if current trends continue. During that time, the percentage of white people will shrink. At present, white people make up about 67 percent. By 2050, white people will account for only 47 percent of the population, officially becoming a minority.

The total U.S. population will climb from 296 million in 2005 to 438 million in 2050, 117 million of which will be immigrants. The surge in Oklahoma, and others that have only recently become migration points for newly-arriving immigrants, will likely be more significant. From 2000 to 2006, in Oklahoma the Hispanic population grew by 30.8 percent; nationally that growth rate was 18.4 percent.

"One of the underlying tensions in all this is the fear of losing cultural identity,” said Charles Winwood. "Most people who were here, they were white, retired and middle class. When they think of what it means to be American, they think of pilgrims and England during the 1700s. Anything that casts a shadow on that is foreign; it is threatening.”

Many argue the nation's current obsession with immigration enforcement is less about national security or rule of law. Many feel that America, once the melting pot that absorbed its new residents is on the brink of being absorbed itself, losing its identity.

Jeff Passel, author of the U.S. Population Projections study, did not attempt to differentiate between illegal and legal immigrants in his study. Many estimated that illegal immigrants make up roughly half of the nation's immigrant populations. Population projections for the study also assume that current trends will continue. It does not factor changes in immigration enforcement and/or comprehensive immigration reform.

Passel did argue, however, the existence of one constant throughout American history.

"The basic attitude of Americans towards immigrants has been remarkably constant. The immigrant that came before was the good immigrant, the immigrant today is too different,” Passel said. "People fear that immigrants are going to change the country.”

Native-born Americans have traditionally felt threatened by newly arriving immigrants, Passel said, but he feels the larger story about immigration will be told in the future.

"Sure, that old woman who used to live next door will be missed, but that Hispanic family moving in, well, their children are American citizens,” Passel said. "They are our future.”

"It's been a very rapid change, and it's something people are now reacting to,” Passel said.

Dan Howard is president and founder of Tulsa-based Outraged Patriots, an anti-illegal immigration grass roots group.

"They might not be armed, but we have the biggest invasion in U.S. history going on right now,” Howard said, adding that the backlash against illegal immigration is not about xenophobia. "We were getting too many of them, too quickly, and it affected crime and the economy.”

Howard said illegal immigration is a symptom of free trade where big business, instead of paying livable wages, simply imports cheaper labor at the expense of America's working class.

"Our society as we know it is not going to survive,” Howard said. "I'll be damn if I sit here quietly by and watch Mexico move onto my front lawn.”

As of November 2007, 1,562 pieces of legislation related to immigrants and immigration had been introduced among the 50 state legislatures. Of those bills, 244 became law in 46 states. Eleven bills were vetoed by governors, and two measures were still pending a governor's review. This number was up three-fold in just one year.

Last year, Oklahoma enacted HB 1804, which has been called the toughest immigration statute in the nation.

Jose Estrada, 24, came to the U.S. from Chihuahua illegally a little more than 10 years ago. He and his entire family now either have green cards or are naturalized citizens. He lives within a few miles of the Winwoods with his sister. He works two jobs, making a little more than minimum wage. His community, too, is evenly split between Hispanics and older white people.

"They're OK, they got used to us. We're normal like that,” Estrada said of his neighbors and how they have reacted since his family moved in a few years ago.

"But a little further that way, it's a different story,” Estrada said, pointing south of SW 59, where there are fewer Hispanics and, he thinks, less of a Hispanic-friendly attitude.

Flavia Jiminez, senior policy analyst for the National Council of La Raza, says feeling uncomfortable with or somewhat resentful of the dramatic change in population is understandable, but she too says there is no excuse for the vitriolic anti-immigrant sentiments so commonplace in the immigration debate.

"Change and population is a difficult issue to deal with whenever society sees rapid growth in a certain sector that does not look the same or speak the same language. It is natural to blame the others,” Jimenez said. "What is not acceptable is the anti-immigrant sentiment that is so full of hate that it uses code words like invasion.”

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