I looked down on the beach at Tijuana on February 11 and saw the border wall extending out into the Pacific Ocean. I was standing on the former site of Friendship Park. The park was inaugurated by first lady Pat Nixon in 1971 to celebrate the relations between the people of Mexico and the United States. The Department of Homeland Security built a secondary border fence (100 feet north of the wall) during the first months of the Obama administration and eliminated Friendship Park.
The Clinton administration created the border wall in 1994 – just months after the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was implemented. U.S. corporations used NAFTA to flood Mexico with subsidized corn and more than two million Mexican farmers lost their land.
Displaced farmers, along with workers who had lost their jobs, crossed into the U.S. to seek employment. The Clinton administration built walls in the urban areas to push the migrants into more remote and hazardous terrain. The goal was to “Raise the risk…to the point that many will consider it futile to attempt illegal entry…Illegal traffic will be deterred or forced over more hostile terrain less suited for crossing.” More than 5,000 people have now died while attempting that crossing.
I was in Tijuana and San Diego to participate in the “Turning Walls into Tables” border conference organized by the United Church of Christ and Disciples of Christ. Josue, a minister in Mexico, challenged all of us to knock down the walls that divide us – including the walls in our hearts and minds.
Pat Nixon planted a tree to inaugurate Friendship Park and then ordered her security guards to cut the barbed wire fence at the border. She crossed over to embrace some of the Mexican children and said “I hope there won’t be a fence here too long.”
Photos of the border wall at Tijuana and the former site of Friendship Park:
The Clinton administration created the border wall in 1994 – just months after the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was implemented. U.S. corporations used NAFTA to flood Mexico with subsidized corn and more than two million Mexican farmers lost their land.
Displaced farmers, along with workers who had lost their jobs, crossed into the U.S. to seek employment. The Clinton administration built walls in the urban areas to push the migrants into more remote and hazardous terrain. The goal was to “Raise the risk…to the point that many will consider it futile to attempt illegal entry…Illegal traffic will be deterred or forced over more hostile terrain less suited for crossing.” More than 5,000 people have now died while attempting that crossing.
I was in Tijuana and San Diego to participate in the “Turning Walls into Tables” border conference organized by the United Church of Christ and Disciples of Christ. Josue, a minister in Mexico, challenged all of us to knock down the walls that divide us – including the walls in our hearts and minds.
Pat Nixon planted a tree to inaugurate Friendship Park and then ordered her security guards to cut the barbed wire fence at the border. She crossed over to embrace some of the Mexican children and said “I hope there won’t be a fence here too long.”
Photos of the border wall at Tijuana and the former site of Friendship Park:
